Dalen Gardeneer 28 Feet x28 Feet Bird-X Net 3/4 Inch Mesh

The product itself is five stars; this is your typical lightweight plastic bird netting. Two of the pictures show the size of the mesh. It will keep out birds and chipmunks from your fruits and berries. It is strong enough to do the job, but you can tear it up if you pull hard on it. If you drape it over vegetation, it will be hard to remove without tearing since things will grow into the mesh. If you are very careful about how you take it off and store it, it will last many seasons; we have similar netting that is over five years old but the stuff we mistreated was lucky to last 2 or 3 years. So if that is the netting product you need, it's five stars as far as the product goes. If you need something strong enough to use as ratlines on the side of a ship, or maybe your idea of taking it off is grabbing a corner and pulling, this is not what you need. More important than the product is how you intend to use it. If you don't plan ahead, this is a two star product and it will have you screaming in frustration. 1. Wear the right stuff when you use it. Anything with buttons, like a flannel shirt, is asking for trouble. Take off your watch. Make sure that your jeans cover the "speed lace" open eyelets at the top of your hiking boots. [all of those from prior experience] If your work gloves have adjustable cuffs with the leather thong, the ball at the end of that thong will wind up caught right when you are already in need of a third or fourth hand. 2. Mark it and keep track of where it is. This stuff turns invisible unless it is viewed against a light background and even then it's hard to see. Note in some of the photos that it's really hard to see. I mark it with masking tape and twist ties. The wind will gladly whip it around as well. 3. 28 feet might be bigger than you realize until you unfold it. You need to have a plan to get it put into place. It's about two cars by two cars in size. I thought I had enough driveway, but found out that I had half as much driveway as I needed. I re planned and it went OK. "And then 4 magic, floating, synchronized bucket trucks pick it up and drape it over my stuff" is not a viable plan. It comes as a 14 foot long roll. When you unroll it, it's 14 x 28 and still folded in half. [As others have pointed out, it's 2 28 x 14's sewn together. Mine had no sewing defects and the white line at the seam is a godsend.] 4. After you unfold it (or at least after you unroll it), you have to be able to carry it. You can't drag it over the yard or it will snag every twig and leaf and any plant that's not fresh cut grass. Even if you use two people, it's still a problem. I solved it by taping it to a 20' long fence top rail and rolling it like a carpet. The ends hung over, but it was manageable (and easily deployed later by unrolling it). [third and fourth picture] We have also used long lengths of 2x4 to hold up netting like this when placing it. 5. Use rocks and things to hold it down when unfolding it. It will never be more organized or easier to handle than when you first take it out of the package.[first picture] 6. Measure first and mark it. I used tape and twist ties to mark it. That way in the yard we lined up the tape with the posts, unrolled until we hit the twist ties, and in general knew if we had it properly placed. Our previous experience with similar netting is that it's real easy to get it put on wrong and it's next to impossible to adjust if you have it sitting on the plants. If you leave an opening on one side, the birds will find it. 7. Consider a framework to drape it on. If you need a net this big, you have something big to put it on. Putting it directly on the plant invites madness and words you don't want the young people repeating. [Those posts in the pictures are 2.5 inch fence posts driven so 8 feet is above ground. The rails are old chain link fence top rail. The posts are almost 8 feet apart. There's another blueberry bush you can't see outside the square.] 8. Have enough people and tools to place it. It was easy with 4 people and two ladders, the netting rolled on a top rail, and a framework to unroll it over. We used twist ties to anchor it and rocks around the bottom to keep the chipmunks out. No hard words were spoken and it didn't take long at all. I can't imagine single-handing this. 9. Leave enough so that it reaches the ground with netting to spare. I may be leaving something out. For us, with that plan and then the re-plan, it was the easiest bit of netting we have ever placed and also the largest by far. If all that sounds like way too much to fool with, save yourself the frustration and let the birds have your blueberries or whatever. It's a good, inexpensive product if you can use it. Screw up and it's a nightmare. We made really sure that no one tripped while working with this stuff; fall over inside one of these and you'll have to order another after you destroy it getting out.

What works BEST is if you cut it into smaller sections (7x14 for example) ALSO what Ive found EXTREMELY helpful: Since this netting is so light and thin, AND it sticks to everything... I used pieces of 1/2" PVC and zip ties - I spread out the smaller sections of netting and rolled ONE END around PVC (a few times around the PVC), then I used zip ties to tightly secure the netting to the PVC THEN, I could throw the netting over the tree by lobbing the end attached to PVC - this gave it weight and you can now throw it over the tree you want to protect. That is BASICALLY the approach Ive used and it works GREAT. I hope this technique/approach works for you as well because there is no way you can drape this netting over a tree, that just wont work. Save yourself some frustration and cut it into more manageable sizes and zip ties it to PVC - that works WONDERS - very easy to use using this technique - This bird netting works GREAT. There is no way a bird can get through it. Not a chance. The material feels / looks similar to fishing line. Only time will tell but it seems as though it is also pretty durable. The entire net is VERY light weight. Unfolding it in itself was difficult because it would snag on everything - 28ft x 28 ft. I unfolded it on my driveway which is asphalt and the netting snagged on the driveway itself, my clothing... everything. It is pretty difficult to unfold. It is even harder to drape it over a tree because it snags on everything, ANYTHING in its way (a leaf, your pants, a twig from a different tree, etc) it will snag on and you will not be able to drape it over the tree you are trying to protect. So you might have to do some clearing / peripheral tree trimming of other trees / vegetation in the way (FYI). But once it is in place, it works GREAT. I could not be happier with its performance. There is absolutely NO WAY ANY BIRD can get through it. It gets the job done 100%. Also, it is pretty much invisible / unnoticeable once it is up, you have to literally walk right up to it to notice it is there. So it doesnt ruin the "look" of your yard or tree you are using it on. If you need to protect a tree from birds, this will end your search. I used this net on an orange tree that was ravaged by birds, and it worked 100%. SWEET! Final comment: GREAT PRODUCT! Just a little (very) hard to use / set up.

I am thrilled to have waited to write this review of this wonderful product. Our area experienced an intense hail storm that stripped the trees of leaves, rendered bushes nearly completely void of any foliage, and absolutely pummeled all flowers and vegetable gardens to the bare stem coming out of the ground. But not our outdoor gardening structure which we had put Bird-X on. The hail did not not get through to damage our veggies and it did not rip or tear either. Not one single plant had any damage whatsoever, and there is no roof or sides on the structure, it is open to the air, it just has Bird-X on it. We built it to be our outside garden that we can simply put plastic on in the Fall to extend our garden season, and protect its contents in the Summer from Birds and small animals, little did we know that we were protecting our garden from Hail too. We are thoroughly amazed at this wonderful product - Thank you Bird-X - you saved our garden.

I got six years of use out of my two 28x28 ft netting and just ordered two new ones. Each year I had to rip limbs out of the netting at the end of the season that had grown through in the 8-10 weeks during which these were on the trees. I was able to patch up the holes with small zip ties and reuse the nets. I use long PVC poles to raise the nets up and over the trees with 2 people. Then, I tie the net to the trunk with zip ties. It even slows down the raccoons, but they will eventually bully their way through the netting. But, just put a security camera with real-time notification on your peach tree and you will be able to confront the masked bandits! I get a little bit of grasshopper damage to my peaches, but this netting solves the bird problem and allows me to solve the raccoon problem a little bit more easily.

This worked perfectly for me. We built a chicken run for our layers that is 24x16. We stretched this over the top for hawk protection. It seems strong and was easy to work with. The overall effect/use is perfect. As other reviewer stated, this is actually two 14x28 pieces of netting sewn together. This actually helped me line up the "middle" when I was unfolding it because the netting is black and the runner that holds the pieces together is white. So, bonus. One small con is that the net is folded from the center over and over again, which means you need to unfold the entire 28x28 net before using it - you can't start from one side and work to the other side, it doesn't "unroll" like it appears to when you initially open it. This is sort of a pain. You really need a large, open area because the net does tend to catch on things. I used my four kids and husband to hold-up everything. 8 months Later.....the netting is still holding strong. Even with tons of wet leaves weighing it down a bit, it hasn't broken. We just do into the run and "pop" the net up and knock the leaves off. Last month a rather largish branch of a tree fell onto the net and tore a small hole - we are talking a branch that was 12 plus feet long and about 6-7 inches thick - it caught most of the branch, but one end tore a small hole. I just pulled some of the netting together and used a small stick to weave it back together and it's held up fine. Completely happy with how this is working out.