This is a post from our neighbour Kim at 7 Humphrey Gate
Hi…I noticed birds nesting in my external dryer vent this year and could see them doing the same thing in virtually every neighbour’s vent that I could see from my backyard. I waited until the end of baby bird season and have just removed 6 nests as well as 3 dead birds from the vent….ugh! Obviously this was an extreme fire hazard. The vent cover is not animal/bird proof and if the louvered shutters are loose or open the mother bird is able to get in and out very easily.
As well as cleaning the vent we replaced the cover with one that is animal/bird proof. Now in my case we needed a very long ladder (over 24’)…if you don’t have one you can rent from someplace like Home Depot. Another alternative is to have a service like Magic Touch do the dryer vent cleaning for you (all the way from the dryer thru to the house exit). I had this done in May of 2015…I think they will also replace your cover for you but I really don’t remember….you should ask. (I didn’t have any nests in the vent at the time so this wasn’t an issue). If you're interested their website is www.magictouch.to .
While you are at it, you might want to check your other external vents to ensure that the louvered cover is still secure….although not a fire hazard like the dryer vent I don’t think anyone wants dead birds decomposing in their vents!
I want to also add that during our top floor renovation, we discovered that the dryer duct had blown apart inside our floor joists and had been depositing lint everytime we used the dryer. It was a fire hazard of the worst degree. The design of our ducts is not the best and we need to perform basic maintenance on a regular basis.
