A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2006 bird bath

Hello everyone got a question my friend gave me her old bird bath its ceramic stand and the ceramic bowl sits on top of it but it has a lot of hard white stuff which I think is hard water?Today I soak it in bleach and water and scrub it out but the stain is still there is there anything I can do to get rid of the stain? Thank you Rita

Probably not from my experience. I'm sure the birds will enjoy it anyway.

Jorgie

I wouldn't worry about the stain much. The birds will like your bath just fine. I use a $20.00 concrete birdbath from Walmart I bought last year. The birds like mine so much I am going to buy another one this year. (They weigh 200 pounds, though.)

I would leave it be. you could try lemon sometimes it will work.. wouldn't want to have to much toxins for the lil birds...

vinegar might work alssso, but i'm with the others, i'd just ignore it!

that white stuff is lime. did you get all the crusty build up off? sometimes it's hard to get rid of, especially if it's been sitting for a while.

for any staining that's left, i'd soak it really well with fresh lemon juice and let it sit in the sun for a few hours. it'll probably lighten up some, there will still be something left tho.

to keep the build up from coming back, use bottled water.

If the bleach didnt work none of the other acids, vinegar etc., probably will either. If its a hard ceramic a pumice stone may scrub it off. But test an inconspicuous area first to be sure it wont damage the bath worse. Like everyone else said I'd just leave it. I have hard water, (Iron and lime) I've gotten used to my 'tie-dye' birdbath.

wrennie, i hate to be disagreeable, but vinergar will desolve mineral deposits that bleach will not. each acidic compound has it's own "range" of things it will desolve, and that is why many industries will use 2 or 3 different kinds of bleaching agents to obtain the "whitest" or the "purest" color.

and i know personally that vinegar will desolve water stains (mineral deposits) that bleach will not. i use vinegar to clean my vases and bottles that i use to root cuttings in. and the beauty is that it is less toxic than chlorine bleach.