Cleaning bat and bird poop from holds

Any tips from you seasoned route developers? 

Thanks, Warrior.

Took your advice and got covered in wet bat and bird shit ... but the holds are clean! And the route "Bat Shit Crazy" is now ready to climb. 

Josh Cook wrote: Thanks, Warrior.

Took your advice and got covered in wet bat and bird shit ... but the holds are clean! And the route "Bat Shit Crazy" is now ready to climb. 

That cliff you're developing on looks very ugly and not fun to climb at at all.... Also, those rooms by the ocean look terrible too.... I'll take my bleak office over that any day

The routes are all covered in bat shit too. Terrible. Really hating looking out at a UNESCO World Heritage site all the time too.

A mask and goggles will be your friends.

Also, do you expect that these routes will be trafficked enough such that they just won't get covered in shit again?

So what is the method for cleaning up bat shit? Looking at a nice new route that is marred by a horizontal crack coated in the white stuff...

I ended up taking up a plastic water bottle with a hole pierced in the cap in order to spray water on the holds. Then I brushed vigorously with a metal brush and repeated. Good to have gloves and clothes on that you don’t care much about. 

Huh, just water and a wire brush? I would have expected some sort of solvent, but hey, if it works it works! Thanks for the reply.

Luke Bertelsen wrote: A mask and goggles will be your friends.

Josh, pay attention to this (above).  I caught an exotic bacterial sinus infection from bat guano when cleaning a route a few years ago which triggered an over-reaction from my immune system.  Long sad story.  

You want to protect yourself whenever you are creating an aerosol with the guano, either the black sticky stuff or the dried powdery stuff.  You do not want to be inhaling it, and probably don't want it in your eyes either.  

It shouldn't be a problem for people just climbing the route unless they are doing a knee-bar rest with their face in a guano deposit.  But as the developer who is cleaning the route, you are exposed to 10 times the amount of guano, or more, and that makes a big difference in whether you get sick or not.

Also, do you expect that these routes will be trafficked enough such that they just won't get covered in shit again?

It might be a problem, but there's a lot of factors.  

battery powered power washer! 

I've cleaned routes with a battery powered pressure washer before. Water supply is the main problem. Even weak pressure cleaners like the Ryobi EZ Clean run nearly a gallon a minute.

Even if you have a creek at the base of your route, you still have to get the water up to the top. 

That being said, they're pretty awesome for removing dirt and small choss from inside cracks where a brush can't reach.