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.
Hi from 89 DDC -- we had a related problem with vents this spring -- we discovered water leaking from the ceiling in the bathroom adjacent to the dryer room. We had a commercial dryer and duct cleaning company come in to (what we thought) clear out the dryer/duct lint suspecting a blockage only to have the leaking persist and worsen. To make a long story short, we discovered the looonnnng duct from the dryer to the outside was still very seriously plugged and so the wet moisture from the dryer was not escaping the duct, pooling when it cooled and then found a duct crack to drip through. Our regular handyman (since I'm NOT handy!) brought his very long ladder and very long vacuum hose and cleared out an immense amount of damp lint from that very long duct closer to the outside wall. Moral of the story is: commercial duct cleaners may not be cleaning the entire duct, so they may not be getting everything out since the ducts are so long. Suspect others may have a similar problem--a quick test: when the dryer is running, look and validate that all three flaps on the exterior vent are open. Since we had this fixed, the time to dry clothes has dramatically improved!
ReplyDeleteWe replaced all of our outside vent covers several years ago after having birds nest in one. The originals are horrible and I would recommend everyone replace theirs.
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