disco-ballness

Every time I go to sit in the zen garden there is bird poop on the chairs and I have to hose them off. I go out there a few times a day (cookie breaks!) and this routine is tiring and gross. The good thing about the zen garden is it is shaded by a tree and the chairs are beneath the tree. I researched safe ways to keep birds away and the one that seemed most effective was to hang CD's from the tree branches with fishing line. The spinning and disco-ballness would repel the birds. OK!
I hung the CD's in various locations in the tree and a few on the main branch they like to use as a toilet which is right above the chairs.  The birds were staying away! I went outside with my cookies and sat down. A breeze started to blow and I looked up to see the CD's in action. I sat there startled for a moment, my head tilted up the way chiropractors tell you never to sit. The disco-y shadows from the hanging CD flashed on my neck.  If this were a movie, the light breeze would turn to a strong force that would pull that CD from the branch and slice my jugular vein. Safe for the birds maybe, but not for the poor cookie-eating girl sitting under the tree. The dangling CD's are weapons of unexpected death! And we all know if it can happen in a movie it can happen in reality.I flew to my feet and took my cookies and racing pulse to a different part of the garden.
Still, I want to go in my garden without the fear of decapitation and bird poop. So I tried hanging something soft. Poofy balls of glittery ribbon! Hopefully these will repel birds the same way or maybe birds will think the tree is a gift and just know not to land on it. Everyone knows you don't crap on someone else's gift.