by Pigeon Patrol | Jun 28, 2016 | Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Pigeon Patrol's Services
The man admitted to killing the hawks he believed were preying on his prized racing pigeons he kept in Stamford.
A racing pigeon enthusiast has pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to charges that he killed federally-protected hawks that apparently were preying on his prized birds that he kept in Stamford.
Connecticut’s U.S. Attorney Deirdre Daly and Special Agent in Charge of the Northeast Region of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Office of Law Enforcement Honora Gordon announced that the 63-year-old man pleaded guilty Wednesday in Hartford federal court to one count of conspiracy to take, capture and kill red-tailed hawks and Cooper’s hawks, and four counts of taking, capturing and killing red-tailed hawks or Cooper’s hawks.
According to court documents and statements made in court, red-tailed hawks and Cooper’s hawks are birds of prey, also known as raptors, and consume pigeons as part of their natural diet. These hawks are protected under the federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
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In his guilty plea, Thomas Kapusta of Westbury, NY admitted that he and another individual were racing pigeon enthusiasts who built and maintained a pigeon coop at 330 Weed Ave. in Stamford. Kapusta and his unidentified associate kept a large number of racing pigeons at this coop, and regularly let them fly outside the coop for exercise.
Prosecutors said that because Kapusta and his associate viewed the hawks as a threat to their pigeons, they systematically captured the hawks in a trap specifically designed to capture birds of prey, shot and killed them in the trap, and disposed of their carcasses.
Kapusta admitted that he and the associate killed red-tailed hawks on Sept. 8 and Oct. 14, 2015, and Cooper’s hawks on Sept. 2 and Oct. 21, 2015.
Kapusta faces a maximum sentence of 30 months in jail and a $75,000 fine when he is sentenced by U.S. District Judge Robert N. Chatigny on May 13.
In a statement, Daly said, “Red-tailed and Cooper’s hawks are protected species under federal law. With our law enforcement partners, the U.S. Attorney’s Office will continue to investigate and prosecute individuals who violate the law and harm such protected migratory birds.”
Gordon praised the cooperation with state and local agencies in investigating the case. “The plea agreement today is a success in our collective efforts to conserve migratory birds and other wildlife,” Gordon said.
When asked for comment about the second individual allegedly involved in the hawk killings, a spokesman for Daly said, “Kapusta is the only one charged at the moment.”
The case is being investigated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Office of Law Enforcement and the Division of Refuge Law Enforcement, and the Environmental Conservation Police of the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, with the assistance of the Stamford Police Department. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Hal Chen.
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
by Pigeon Patrol | Jun 27, 2016 | Animal Deterrent Products, Pigeon Patrol's Services, Pigeon Spikes
It seems both FortisBC and BC Hydro protocols to deal with animals on power poles has been tested a lot lately, with at least four high-profile incidents in a short timeframe reported across the province. Representatives said it’s rare to receive that many calls.
Nicole Bogdanovic, a communications adviser for FortisBC, said they got a call of another cat on a power pole on June 4 just after 9:30 a.m. The crews were already in the Black Mountain area of Kelowna, where the cat found its new perch, so they stopped to help it down.
On June 4, FortisBC rescued a cat who was perched on a live power pole in Kelowna.
Bogdanovic said when considering a rescue, they focus on safety first.
“While calls like this are pretty rare, when we do receive one we have to assess the situation very carefully before responding, and typically the safest situation is for the cat to come down on its own,” said Bogdanovic.
“We’re relieved that our crews were able to assist in this case.”
In this type of situation, they assess the risk a rescue would pose to both the animal and crew, as well as potential service impacts.
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She said crews ask a few simple questions before intervening: “Could this cause an outage if it wasn’t dealt with, or could this delay our crews in dealing with other issues?”
They also have to make sure the infrastructure belongs to them before they do anything with it.
In the end, it was a happy ending for the cat who was stuck up on a power pole, but it’s not always such an easy save.
“A cat on a pole, if it’s in distress, could be skittish,” Bogdanovic said. “That could cause it to behave unpredictably and be injured in some way.
“We recognize that this is really a tough situation for pet owners to be in and we do what we can to assist, but again, that’s usually waiting for the cat to come down on its own.”
Just one day earlier, BC Hydro crews had to move two 40-kilogram osprey nests from power poles in Salmon Arm to two newly built nesting platforms nearby.
On June 3, BC Hydro crews moved an Osprey nest near Salmon Arm.
In the last few weeks, the nests caused three power outages to thousands of customers in the area.
Ospreys are a protected species in B.C. and BC Hydro has a permit from Ministry of Forests Lands and Natural Resources to allow the nests to be moved. The birds like to build their nests on the tallest structures they can find, which in some cases means a live power pole. If the nest doesn’t pose any risk, workers often wait to move it until it’s unoccupied in fall.
Jennifer Walker-Larsen, who works in communications for BC Hydro, said this case was different.
“When osprey nest on energized power lines there is a risk to those nests,” she said, “They may short out the lines and they may catch on fire and this can kill and wound birds.”
Crews saw that the nest were there and decided to act.
Osprey in the area already had another nesting platform, but Canada geese had taken it over. Nesting Canada geese cannot be disturbed as they are protected under the Migratory Bird Convention Act.
When this happens, the osprey usually tries to build another nest very close to the original site, usually on a nearby power pole.
Workers had to first move the eggs in the nest and then relocate it to a new nesting platform a short drive away. The eggs were placed safely back in the nest.
Over the last weekend in May, BC Hydro crews took the time to rescue a bear in Port Hardy that was camping out on top of a 50-foot power pole.
“There was an immediate risk there that the bear might be electrocuted so we took immediate action.
The 25,000-volt power line was deactivated as crews worked to get the bear down using a cherry picker. After about 10 minutes, the cub came down and ran off into the nearby bushes unharmed.
About 450 Port Hardy customers were affected by the short outage, but BC Hydro is happy to report it was a successful mission.
Larsen said when it comes to dealing with animals on power poles, they assess the situation on a case-by-case basis.
“It really depends on what the risk is to the animal,” she said.
When cats are up power poles, BC Hydro workers typically wait three days before attempting a rescue, according to Larson. In the vast majority of cases, she said cats come down on their own and a rescue effort could pose more danger to the animal. If it gets scared when the crew comes up in the bucket to save it, it might try to get away, touching energized lines on equipment.
In April, FortisBC and BC Hydro were both alerted to a cat that had been stranded on a power pole in Princeton for four days.
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The hashtag #savethePrincetonBCcat was trending locally, with many people raising concern for the animal.
Once BC Hydro realized it was on their land, they called in a specialized crew to conduct the rescue and got the cat home safe and sound by 9 p.m.
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
by Pigeon Patrol | Jun 26, 2016 | Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Netting, Pigeon Patrol's Services, UltraSonic Bird Control
Urgent repairs will be made to netting under a bridge in Shrewsbury following reports that pigeons were getting caught and starving to death.
Shropshire Council said it would send out a team to the bridge near Shrewsbury Railway Station to tackle the problem.
Wildlife experts today urged people in the town not to encourage pigeons in the wake of the issue.
Stuart Edmunds, from Shropshire Wildlife Trust has said the birds have become caught and not been able to get out.
He said: “The netting has been put there under the bridge to stop pigeons from roosting in it. But unfortunately it is only a thin netting and has been ripped away so the pigeons have been roosting there and have been unable to get out. Although they are considered a pest people do feed pigeons and that is one reason they are doing so well in the town. There are lots of different ways to put off pigeons but the way this bridge has been constructed netting is the only option. The easiest way to deter pigeons is to try not to leave too much food out as they become pretty well used to where food is left out. The main this is what the council does which is reducing the number of roosting sites there are. I don’t like the word pest that much because pigeons are not like the other kinds of pests. But a pest is like rats or mice – it is anything that develops a relationship between themselves and human activities. The main problem is pigeons flying and dropping their waste all over the place.”
Following reports of the pigeons getting caught in the netting, Shropshire Council has said it will send a team out to repair it as soon as possible.
Tim Sneddon, Shropshire Council’s environmental maintenance manager, said: “The railway bridge is owned and maintained by Network Rail. However, the former Shrewsbury & Atcham Borough Council entered into an agreement with them to maintain the underside of the netting, which Shropshire Council took on responsibility for in 2009. We regularly attend to undertake repairs when lorries catch the netting. Some birds do get access from the track side, and Shropshire Council are unable to do any works to stop that.”
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
by Pigeon Patrol | Jun 25, 2016 | Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Netting, Pigeon Spikes, UltraSonic Bird Control
An irate phone call to the newspaper last week brought up an interesting question: what to do about pigeons pooping on a 12th-floor balcony? An octogenarian in Oshawa was fed up with the mess and insistent that something be done to rid him of his unwelcome visitors. Stymied over how to help, the editor passed the query on to me.
Smiling wryly, I pictured aluminum pie plates dangling in the breeze, likely contravening every condo and apartment regulation in the book. Or what really would work — stretching garden netting from balcony roof to railing, screening pigeons out. Lightweight, cheap and durable, the one-inch mesh is virtually invisible; I know because I have it tacked outside my sunroom windows, stopping birds from flying into the glass.
And then I thought of the most natural, long-term, cost-free solution for our caller’s problem: peregrine falcons. The world’s swiftest birds have made headline news moving into Toronto, then Oshawa in recent years, and their favourite prey happens to be rock pigeons. The two species, in fact, evolved together, both nesting on cliff ledges where four-legged predators can’t get at their eggs or babies.
The docile feral pigeons happily at home in every urban centre around the planet have a wild and romantic history as mountain dwellers of Eurasia, fast, strong fliers traveling long distances to bring food back to their young. Since their main diet is seeds and grains, numbers grew when human hunter-gatherers settled down and started farming. People began domesticating pigeons 5,000 years ago, for food, sport and carrying messages, and brought them along everywhere they went, including the New World in the 1600s. Even Charles Darwin bred pigeons, and based his argument for natural selection on how his own birds changed through the generations.
Peregrine means ‘wanderer,’ and peregrine falcons got to every corner of the globe on their own, though falconers have been breeding them, too, for centuries. Widespread use of DDT wiped wild peregrines out of most of North America in the 1950s, but a ban on the pesticide and great efforts by conservation groups have managed to slowly bring them back. Like pigeons, peregrines have readily adapted to cities, nesting on ledges of high-rise buildings.
So it comes full circle, with two ancient neighbours meeting up again right here in Durham. Maybe peregrines will move in near our frustrated caller and scare his pigeons away, or at least keep numbers in check.
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
by Pigeon Patrol | Jun 24, 2016 | Bird Deterrent Products, Pigeon Patrol's Services, Pigeon Spikes, UltraSonic Bird Control
Pigeons often roost on the edges of balconies and ledges giving them plenty of chances to mess up your car or property with their “guano.” Pigeons have become a common sight here in Delta of the last several years. The Rock Dove has pale grey feathers with two black bars on each wing. Now that FedEx and the Internet have taken over the jobs for carrier pigeons they are considered a nuisance and a pest by many. Pigeons carry many diseases that can cause serious health problems including; salmonellosis, tuberculosis and toxoplasmosis. Pigeons do not have natural defense mechanisms to protect against predators yet they are not in any danger of vanishing. To help rid pigeons around your home: Eliminate bird feeders, seal areas where they can nest, place a fake owl on your roof and spray water to scare them off.
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
