Has anyone successfully deterred magpies but not the other birds?
We are lucky enough to have moved recently and now back on to some open space that has big trees so we get a lot of birds and squirrels in our garden. Even the pigeons are inoffensive as they just waddle about eating everything. But the magpies are getting out of hand. They don’t attack the other birds but they attack each other - yesterday two of them had another pinned down trying to kill it and today they’ve been chasing it around the garden, pulling it out from its hiding place and attacking it again. The screaming is horrific and they wake us up in the morning with their antics too. I am actually quite scared of birds and am having to shut the doors/windows in case their fighting gets out of hand and they barrel in to the house. We’ve had a few close calls. I’m also (irrationally) worried they might attack our dog who likes to lay outside all day.
I don’t really want to stop putting food out, but is there anything I can do to specifically deter the magpies? I’ve seen conflicting opinions on shiny things. I’m wondering about one or more of those garden mirrors?