Pecking on wood or roof of house, crow, grackle or raven? (Dallas: woodpecker, move) - Texas (TX) - City-Data Forum

Johnhw2 · 10-15-2019, 08:54 AM

About a month ago I noticed a sound during days outside my home. At first I thought someone was putting a new roof on and I was hearing hammering sounds but I would not find a roof job near me. We have noticed some large black birds hanging around on the roof of our house and some neighbors most recently. My wife thinks th birds are one of the three mentioned in title.

Anyone had experience with such a bird pecking on the wood or shingles of a home in Plano area? If so how do you get rid of them?

Thanks in adance.

turf3 · 10-15-2019, 09:27 AM

More likely woodpeckers are doing the noisy pecking.

The large black birds could be crows or grackles, more likely to be grackles just because there are so darn many of them. Grackles are more slender and crows are heavier bodied. Plus the color of the grackle often shades into a dark grey here and there whereas crows are pretty much always pure black.

There is basically nothing you can do about crows or grackles, they are way too intelligent to be scared off by stuff like fiberglass fake owls. But they are probably not the source of your concern. It's probably woodpeckers and I don't know what if anything you could do about them, either. If they are actually getting after worms and grubs in trees, it's no harm. It's only if they start pecking holes in the house that it's an issue.

Johnhw2 · 10-15-2019, 09:38 AM

The pecking is pretty loud, sounds like a roofer hammering nails into plywood on my roof or very near by. When I went out to see what it was and saw the huge back birds again as I have lately for some reason., I clapped my hands and they flew off and the noise has stopped for the past couple of hours. Seem louder than a wood pecker but I am not at all sure

Katana49 · 10-15-2019, 10:48 AM

This is the time of year when rodents try to find a suitable warm place to sit out the winter... It's possible mice or squirrels have gotten into your attic from the roof somewhere, and the birds are trying to get at them.

We had this happen last year to us, two squirrels took up residence and several large black birds (not sure what they were either) would see them and try to make them a snack. The birds left after we put poison pellets in the attic and killed the squirrels.

Johnhw2 · 10-15-2019, 11:01 AM

Thanks that makes perfect sense and sounds like my situation too as we have had small rodents in our attic when we moved in 9 years ago. Did the poison pellets you put out cause the rodents to leave the attic.? Sounds like they did leave to die but wanted to be sure it worked that way.

Katana49 · 10-15-2019, 11:25 AM

No, I had to retrieve them, thankfully they died out in the open, the instructions said to put the poison where we could see signs of droppings. They don't pee/poop where they are actually nesting, so hopefully they will die in an easy to reach location like they did for me, or try mouse traps.

Johnhw2 · 10-15-2019, 11:32 AM

Ok thanks I assume this is something an exterminator can do too.

bigbear63 · 10-15-2019, 06:41 PM

Not sure where you're from but we don't have ravens and crows in Dallas. Grackles, yes, but they do not peck. It would be a woodpecker species if it is in fact a bird. They will move on faster than it will take to try to address. Give it some time and enjoy the sounds of nature.

Katana49 · 10-15-2019, 07:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigbear63

Not sure where you're from but we don't have ravens and crows in Dallas. Grackles, yes, but they do not peck. It would be a woodpecker species if it is in fact a bird. They will move on faster than it will take to try to address. Give it some time and enjoy the sounds of nature.

You must not go outside much. They can be found all over north TX.

https://txtbba.tamu.edu/species-accounts/american-crow/

elan · 10-15-2019, 07:45 PM

We used to have a woodpecker, it was really noisy.