As a gardener living near a mix of fields, forest, wetlands and a pond, I have a love/hate relationship with birds. Although I understand that everyone needs to eat, it's difficult to nurse along a strawberry, blueberry, grape or cherry crop, only to have the harvest stolen by birds.
The simplest solution is to use netting. I like the green mesh netting. It drapes over plants well and keeps in good contact with the ground so birds can't crawl under it. The key with netting, though, is to not drape it directly on the plant. Whenever you remove it to work or harvest, the leaves and berries will go flying. A better solution is to build or buy a cage made of wood, PVC or metal. This isn't too hard to do for a small bush if you're handy with tools. For dwarf trees, I get tall metal stakes, cap them with tennis balls and drive four of them around the tree. Then I drape netting over the stakes and balls. This allows me to protect the cherry fruits and not harm the tree.
If netting isn't your thing, try hanging reflective tape, aluminum pie-tins and old CDs to reflect light as they blow in the wind. There aren't many bird control repellents for home gardeners, but one home remedy has some science behind it. Cornell University found that spraying artificially flavored grape Kool-Aid or sugar on blueberries thwarted the birds. They didn't like the flavor and left the berries alone. Of course, simply wash off the berries after harvesting. If all else fails, plant a mulberry tree on the far end of your property. Birds love mulberries and may just leave your other berries alone.
Now for this week's tip: keep planting short rows of bush beans every two weeks until the end of July to have a consistent crop of beans all summer.
