There’s nothing more annoying than having a freshly cleaned car become the favourite toilet of your local birds but bird droppings can be a lot more than a frustrating sight, they can actually damage your paintwork leading to costly repairs.

Bird droppings contain uric acid, which is between 3 and 4.5 ph which makes it acidic enough to damage the wax coating and paint on the exterior of your Mercedes. Additionally, when your car is left in warm weather or exposed to heat the lacquer which softens and expands then later cools and hardens again. Unlike your car’s coating the bird poo will remain hard and so your paintwork may mould to the droppings as it cools, leaving a deformity in the paintwork even when it is cleaned. This type of damage is called a fractured or wrinkled etching.

Wrinkled etching is less common than topical stain etching, which is when there is a discolouration to the paintwork after the bird lime is removed.

How to Avoid Damage

To avoid the risk of bird poo even landing on your car there are a few things you can try, though none are 100 per cent fool proof. These include:

• Avoiding parking under trees, lampposts, or other places that birds like to congregate or sit
• Where possible park under covered parking or in a garage
• Us a car cover to protect your paintwork, especially if you are parking in one spot for a prolonged period
• When cleaning your car use a wax or paint sealant after washing to help protect the paintwork

How to Clean Bird Poo Off Your Car

It’s pretty much impossible to avoid a bird pooing on your paint work for your entire life and so we’ve put together the best practise for cleaning it from your car.

You should always try to clean any poo from your vehicle as soon as you notice it to prevent it from drying or damaging the paintwork.  To make this easier we recommend keeping some cleaning supplies, such as a small bottle of cleaning spray and a cloth or some wet wipes (that won’t damage the paintwork).

If it has dried, you should use a damp cloth or directly wet with a gentle flow of water to soften the stain before attempting to clean it.

You can then use a vehicle safe cleaner and microfibre cloth, or even some wipes, to gently remove the stain. We would advise you avoid pressing too firmly against the mark, using a hard rubbing or scraping motion as this could cause further damage to the car.

It’s important that you check the cleaning solution is suitable for your car before using it as some household cleaners may do more harm to the paintwork. If you’re cleaning a window then standard glass or window cleaner will be fine.

While cleaning your car you might want to wear disposable gloves to protect your hands, if you do not then you should make sure you wash your hands afterwards.

If it is a particularly large stain or has been there for some time, then it might need more than one cleaning attempt. We would advise wetting the stain again to soften it and then repeating the wiping process.

Should your paintwork be discoloured or damaged beneath the stain then you might want to take it to a professional or repair the area yourself. Please note that if your Mercedes is a leased car then a poor repair may be picked up on the collection inspection and you could be charged for repairing this.