Pigeons love the space under a solar panel. It is warm, dry, sheltered from wind and hawks, and completely out of sight. Once a pair settles in, the flock follows, and within a season you have nesting material packed across the roof, guano running down the tiles and a smell that reaches the rooms below.
Exclusive Eco proofs solar panels across George, Wilderness, Sedgefield, Knysna, Plettenberg Bay, Mossel Bay and the wider Garden Route. We close the array off with PVC coated galvanised mesh, fitted without drilling a single hole in your panels or your roof, and we guarantee the installation for 24 months. No birds are harmed in the process.
Is bird proofing necessary for solar panels?
If birds have already moved in, yes. If they have not, it is cheap insurance compared with what comes after.
The real costs are not the ones people expect:
- Guano is acidic and it does not wash off cleanly. It corrodes roof sheeting, stains walls and blocks gutters with nesting material.
- Shading and soiling cut your yield. Droppings on the panel surface and debris packed under the array reduce what the system actually generates, which is the whole reason you bought it.
- Nesting material is a fire and water risk. Dry material packed against roof penetrations and cabling is not something you want on a roof.
- Bird lice and mites travel from the roost into the roof space and, from there, into the top floor rooms.
- Cabling faults. Worth being straight about this one, because it gets repeated online and it is wrong: birds do not chew your cables or cable ties. The genuine risk is birds catching on them and pulling them loose, which is what causes the fault.
What to put around solar panels to stop pigeons
The answer is mesh, closing off the gap around the array. What separates a proofing job that lasts from one that fails is not the material, it is the way it is fitted, and that is where most of the difference between installers sits.
Four things we will commit to on your roof:
Nothing gets drilled. No holes in your panel frames, no holes in your roof, and nothing that could affect your panel warranty.
It will not rust on you. We are on the coast. Salt air finds any weakness in a coated wire product, and the way most mesh is installed creates exactly that weakness. Ours is fitted so it does not, and we back that with the guarantee.
The birds cannot simply walk back in somewhere else. Closing three sides of an array and leaving the fourth is the most common reason a job fails within a season.
It will not spoil the look of your roof. On a dark roof the mesh is close to invisible from the ground.
What if the birds sit on top of the panels?
That is a different problem from nesting underneath, and it is a common one on arrays laid at a shallow angle, where the panel face itself makes a comfortable perch. Birds sitting on the glass soil it, and soiling costs you generation.
Two things solve it, and which one your roof needs depends on where the birds are actually settling.
Bird wire. A fine stainless steel wire, held under tension just above the panel frames, so there is nowhere comfortable to land along the edges. It is barely visible from the ground and it does not shade the panels.
A rotating deterrent rod. Fitted to the array and turning slowly above the panel surface, so birds cannot settle on the glass itself. This is the answer where an array sits close to flat and the birds are landing on the main panel area rather than the edges.
Neither one harms the bird. Both simply make the panel an unpleasant place to sit, so the flock chooses somewhere else.
What about tilted panels on a flat roof?
Different problem, different answer. Panels tilt mounted at a steep angle on a flat or concrete roof do not suit the same approach and are proofed differently. We will tell you which one your roof needs when we look at it.
Deterrents, and the order we do things in
We phase the work deliberately rather than selling you everything at once.
First the proofing, closing off the nesting space under the array. In most cases that alone moves the birds on, because the shelter underneath is what brought them there.
Surface deterrents come second, and only where birds are genuinely settling on the panels themselves. If your roof does not need them, we would rather not charge you for them.
Being straight about what deterrents do: they make a surface unattractive to land on. They do not close a roof, and they will not solve an established nesting colony or a property where food is freely available. Physical proofing is what stops the nesting. The deterrents keep the panel faces clear.
How much does it cost to pigeon proof solar panels?
We quote per roof, because the array size, the roof profile and the access all change the number. Pricing is based on the perimeter of the array, with better rates on complex and estate scale work.
We can give you a provisional figure from clear photos and satellite imagery before anyone climbs anything, and the measured survey is free. Send us a photo of your roof on WhatsApp and we will come back to you honestly.
Working safely on your roof
Our technicians are experienced at working at height and use fall prevention equipment on every job. Where we can, we access the roof from a top floor balcony rather than bringing in scaffold or a cherry picker, which keeps the cost down and the disruption to a morning.
Our guarantee
We guarantee all installations and workmanship for 24 months.
What we will not do is promise you a bird free property, because nobody can honestly promise that and anyone who does is selling you something. What we guarantee is our work: the mesh, the fixings and the installation.
Birds elsewhere on the building
The panels are usually not the only place. The same birds use the gutters, the chimney, the eaves and the roof void, and closing off the array while those stay open moves the problem rather than ending it. Our main bird control page covers the rest of the building: which bird causes which problem, and what gets fitted where.
Where a nest has been under the panels for a season, the parasites in it usually outlast the birds. Our bird lice page covers what they are and what treating them involves.
Where we work
Solar panel bird proofing across George, Wilderness, Sedgefield, Knysna, Plettenberg Bay, Mossel Bay, Hartenbos, Great Brak River, Klein Brak River, Vleesbaai, Gouritzmond, Oudtshoorn and the wider Garden Route and Klein Karoo.
Get a free quote
Send a photo of your roof and your location on WhatsApp and we will give you a provisional figure, then a free measured survey with no obligation to proceed.
