Pigeons are usually classified as a pest species because they are filthy gutter birds that inhabit cities, roost everywhere, and crap all over everything. The most common repellents include the following:
Fake Plastic Owls
Flashing Mylar Owls
Flashy Spinning Tops
Fluttering Tinsel Strands
Pigeons don’t care about these repellents. Go ahead and try them for yourself. The birds need a place to roost and nest, and they aren’t at all discouraged by these festive decorations.
Birds can sometimes be an irritation if they frequent your porch and leave their nasty bird poo in there. Pigeons in particular can always be seen roosted anywhere from your roof, to your chimneys and even in ledges in condominium units or apartments in most urban areas. Tendencies of them making it inside to take a peek on any inviting food source would not a good sign because this might be a start of more frequent visits and more company flying in your unit or house. Read more about How Can Pigeons Enter Your House? or read about How to Find Pigeon Entry Holes In Your House.
Before engaging in any complex pigeon repellent method, you should first try to observe to know which attracts them in your property. Being aware of the things that bring them in your area would definitely help you in trying to take them away or to eliminate them giving no reasons for these pigeons to constantly keep coming back to your place.
But if it does not work, you can always try to look into a more effective method of getting rid of these birds. Some people would recommend scaring them away by using some devices that would make these pigeons feel too uncomfortable to still continue to stay in your place. Perhaps the most widely used is the plastic owl which was thought by many people as an effective tool of shooing them away but unfortunately pigeons are much more wiser not to know the difference between the live one and the one that you are hanging in your house even in the middle of the day. Read more about Do plastic owls scare pigeons. Some thought that they can scare off the pigeons by the use of objects that are usually hung and reflects light. But the truth of the matter is neither method is effective in eradicating your pigeon problem according to the experts.
One thing that might work though is trying to scare them with a flock or starlings or perhaps a single woodpecker that would emphasize the ownership of the territory as belonging to that specie and an unwelcome trespasser is not welcome. But if you can’t do with the real thing try to create an environment with their replicas and sounds that might scare away other birds. But you must remember to try to imitate their real behavior and not leave them stationary for a long time that might lead to another failed attempt because pigeons have already deciphered and gotten accustomed to the sight and sounds.
If this won’t work, you can try to enhance your own homes perhaps by doing some roost modification techniques. These methods would try to lure them away by not giving them a space or an area to land. One of the most recommended is the use of pigeon control spikes. You can use them in strategic areas where you normally see these pigeons land and stay. With the use of these almost invisible spikes, they might learn their lesson the hard way but of course without killing them.
If you have pigeons roosting inside a building, you’ll want to get them out and do building repairs to close up the openings that they use to enter the building. This is crucial in cases of pigeons in the attic, because if you don’t seal the holes, new birds will continue to enter.
One more thing that you might be able to do is to cover the area with nylon nets so as not to allow them the space that they need for landing. This is most recommended for wide open areas such as garages and courtyards. But other than this, you can also try to change the angle of elevation of some of the areas that these pigeons frequent. You can create an almost slanting angle of 45 degrees in ledges so that they cannot surely establish a strong foothold especially in slopes where they are easily pulled down by gravity. Doing it this way would surely show them how futile it is to try and land on your property. Not giving them a chance to roost is better than trying to scare them away. As most people say it would be better to take on the prevention method than to wait for the problem and do the treatment. Read the guides Can You Use Mothballs to Help Repel Pigeons? and Needle Pigeon Strip.
About Pigeon Repellents: Gel, Spray, Home Depot, Lowe’s, Amazon, Walmart. Pigeons for all their peacefulness and intelligence, can become a great inconvenience when they decide to come to roost at your home – you wake up to their cooing sounds and then you see your roof, windows or balcony get stained with bird droppings and what not. They just act like they own the space! If you have had your fill of them or perhaps, just finished getting rid of them, there are ways to discourage them from coming back. Read more about using rice or alka seltzer to repel pigeons.
Pigeon repellents are materials, objects or substances that can repel or deter pigeons from your property. Repellents can either be home-sourced or store-bought. Examples of pigeon repellents are electronic sound emitters, pigeon spikes, scare owls, repellent gel etc.
Use Fake Owls (scare owls)
Scare owls are not real owls but they are designed to look like real owls, which are the natural predators of the pigeon. Just place them at the spot where your nuisance pigeons roost and the birds will move away. You may have to reposition the fake owls from time to time so they look mobile and real, or else pigeons will detect that they are not real faster (because they will eventually, anyway) and persist in frequenting your space. Some fake owls are capable of turning their heads on their own, this would definitely be a plus. Also available for the same purpose, are fake snakes and fake hawks.
Repel them with sound
There are two ways to do this; by using recorded predator sounds or store-bought electronic sound emitters. You can record sounds of predators (hawks or owls) by yourself and play it from a strategic position to make it look like the predator is lurking around. Electronic sound emitters can be purchased from local pets stores. Sound emitters, like the Bird-X emitter, produce sounds that may not be picked by human ears, but can be heard by pigeons. This sound may keep them at bay for some time at least, though they will eventually find a way to live with it.
Pigeon spikes
Pigeon spikes are needle-like structure that prick a pigeon as soon as it tries to settle down on the spiked surface. These spikes are not lethal and are almost invisible, so they will not cause any structural changes to your house. Glue the spikes to roofs, ledges, rafters etc. with adhesive and it will be there permanently, to be cleaned every now and then.
Scare them with spices
Sprinkle spices like cinnamon and cayenne pepper on the surfaces that the birds perch on whenever they come visiting. Pigeons do not like spices and this is meant to discourage them from settling down. They have been known to kick the spices aside unperturbed though.
Balloons
Brightly colored balloons with predator eyes drawn on them can scare pigeons for a limited period only. You may use them to hold the birds at bay while you find a lasting solution.
Gel Repellents
Store-bought pigeon gel repellents may be manually applied to the surfaces on which the pigeons roost. These gels are sticky and slippery, making it hard for pigeons to stay on. Repeated application is necessary as the gel stops being sticky or slippery after some time.
Methyanthranilate
This is a chemical substance that can be sprayed on soil and plants to give them an unpleasant taste when consumed. Methyanthranilate works best for farmyards or gardens that are being frequented by pigeons. It has no harmful effect on the soil or plants.
Spray pigeon with water
Yes, you read it right – just spray them with water. Get a water hose and spray water directly on the pigeons while they are perched on their favorite spot on your property. It will scare them away for some hours or maybe even days. An alternative is to use a small water pistol loaded with ice cold water. Ice-cold water works even better and will not harm the pigeons.
Note: While all of these repellent solutions have the potential to keep pigeons away, their success rate leaves much to be desired. This is so because pigeons are highly intelligent birds and are able to quickly get acquainted with or work their way around the repellent. For example, pigeons will detect fake owls as being fake in few hours or days, they will also get acquainted with balloons and may even find a way to push spices aside to find a way for them to roost there. So overall, repellents are not dependable way of getting rid of pigeons.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
LONDON, ONT. — Startling video provided to CTV News shows a pigeon shaking violently before its death. And a warning that some viewers may find the video disturbing.
“We just found one that is literally shaking to death,” explains Bonnie Siegfried.
Siegfried says she found the dying bird near the Northview Apartment REIT complex on Mornington Avenue over the weekend.
She comforted the distressed pigeon in its final moments before posting the video to Facebook.
“We found it upside down shaking and vibrating outside…it was hard to watch,” says Siegfried.
A spokesperson from Northview Apartment REIT confirmed to CTV News that this year and in previous years, management has hired licensed pest control professionals to deal with tenants’ concerns about pigeons at 520 and 560 Mornington Ave. – with the most recent services provided last week.
CTV News has confirmed that Husky Pest Control was the company recently hired to deal with excessive pigeon droppings on balconies.
A spokesperson for Husky says, “Pigeon poop droppings is a health hazard that can cause diseases called histoplasmosis…fungus grows on pigeon droppings which is a health hazard.”
The company says they used a pest control product according to the label, which was made specifically for pigeon control. They also say they cleaned and sanitized the balconies.
A spokesperson from Northview told CTV News in a statement, “We understand that the efforts used by the pest control professionals to mitigate the pigeon situation at the building are now the subject of an investigation by the Ministry of Natural Resources, and we have pledged to cooperate fully with that investigation.”
The Northview spokesperson adds that services have immediately been ceased and all treatments have been discontinued.
Full Statement from Northview:
“As responsible property managers, we have been working- for more than a year- to address the concerns of residents at 520 and 560 Mornington struggling with the effects of a pigeon situation at the building. Tenants came to management concerned about the number of birds assembled on the property, the nuisance they were causing, the property damage sustained as a result, and the potential negative health implications of the birds’ presence.
“Through this period we have retained pest control professionals to address the matter. These professionals were fully licensed, and assured management that their efforts were permitted and humane. Last week efforts made by the pest control professionals attending to the building resulted in a situation that management believed was untenable, and the services were immediately ceased and all treatments were discontinued.
“We understand, that the efforts used by the pest control professionals to mitigate the pigeon situation at the building are now the subject of an investigation by the Ministry of Natural Resources, and we have pledged to cooperate fully with that investigation. As this process is now ongoing, we will not be making further public comment at this time.”
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
One of the most common questions that people with pigeon problems ask is how to get rid of the birds from roofs, balconies, and industrial facilities. The pigeons are causing at best an inconvenience and at worst a health hazard. Irrespective of the mess, pigeon feces are corrosive and can etch through steel or even concrete.
In this article, we will discuss how to get rid of pigeons using different methods, so that you can easily find the best solution for your scenario.
How to Get Rid of Pigeons?
1.CULLING PIGEONS– this method includes shooting, poisoning, using traps and even raptors
2. REDUCING PIGEON REPRODUCTION– this method includes using pigeon birth control, nest destruction and dovecotes combined with egg removal or replacement
3.PHYSICALLY EXCLUDING PIGEONS– this method includes using spikes, wires, slides and shock tracks to keep pigeons away
4.USING DETERRENTS-this method includes sonic and ultrasonic emitters, effigies, reflected and direct light sources, propane cannons and trained raptors to deter pigeons
5. USING REPELLENTS- this method includes using gels and pastes, optical gels, fogs and vapors to deter pigeons
How to Get Rid of Pigeons from a Balcony
Getting rid of pigeons from small areas like balconies can be resolved with relatively simple common-sense solutions.
Wires. You can use a wire coil or stainless-steel wire to deter pigeons perching on rails.
Shock Track. Several suppliers offer a “shock track” system to keep birds off balconies. The shock track does not hurt the bird but provides enough stimulation to make the targeted perching area unattractive.
Netting. Consider using a netting system to physically exclude the birds from balconies. This is the costliest alternative, although if installed properly it’s 100% effective. Newer versions of netting are virtually invisible.
Sound or reflected light. The easiest way to deter pigeons from your patio, deck, or balcony, is with sound or reflected light. You can achieve this with a wind chime, Mylar balloon, aluminum foil pans or even hanging CD’s. The reflected light disorients the birds.
Plastic owl or rubber snake. Consider using scarecrows (“effigies”). The most common example is a plastic owl or rubber snake. Unfortunately, the effects will most likely be short-lived. The pigeons come to recognize the scarecrow as something that is not a threat.
Spikes. Consider using anti-perching spikes that you can attach anywhere the birds like to perch. Spikes are best advised for limited areas where the goal is to move the birds someplace else. They are available in different materials from plastic to stainless steel.
Gel Repellants. You can use gel repellants to ledges where pigeons perch. The gel makes the surface sticky and the birds will try to avoid it. Unfortunately, dust and debris take their toll and reapplication is often necessary. The application of gel repellants is not recommended where there are smaller birds. They can permanently get stuck in the goo
How to Get Rid of Pigeons on Roofs
If you have a pigeon problem on your roof, there are a few things you can do to get rid of them. First, try to figure out how they are getting onto your roof in the first place. If you have any holes or cracks that they can use as an entry point, seal them up with some wire mesh or caulking. You can also try installing a physical barrier like a wire fence around the perimeter of your roof.
Keeping pigeons off a roof can be far more challenging. Here are some popular methods you might consider if you wonder how to get rid of pigeons on roofs:
Consider using a wire coil or stainless-steel wire to deter pigeons from perching on the ridge(s).
A “shock track” system might keep birds off rooftops
Using wire or netting is appropriate for a roof design that incorporates nooks. You can also apply nets where the pigeons can construct a nest.
Solar panels provide excellent harborage for pigeons. Metal grid netting is the most effective method to limit access to the birds.
Flat commercial roof styles have their own set of challenges. The first option is to electrify the parapet perching areas. The second option is to install simple spikes. Be aware that pigeons enjoy the comfort of HVAC installations. As a solution, consider netting these units.
How to Get Rid of Pigeons at Industrial Facilities
The basic nature and scope of modern industrial facilities make them highly attractive to pigeons. The design of these facilities is most often open which allows the birds ready ingress and egress. More importantly, pipes, beams, poles, and catwalks offer a wide range of harborage and nesting options. Food sources are typically located nearby and as mobile pests, pigeons can move around freely from one area of the plant to the next.
Pigeons can represent a costly nuisance for plants, and in many cases have been at the facility ever since it was built. Over time, the nests, feces, and debris can cause considerable damage to a plant’s mechanical and electrical components. Furthermore, the birds’ droppings and other debris add additional health hazards to an already hazardous area.
Most conventional methods of pigeon mitigation offer little comfort to an industrial facility and decision makers often select culling solutions since everything else is either prohibitively costly or impractical. Methods such as trapping and poisoning the birds may help alleviate the problem temporarily, however, due to their rapid breeding, pigeons always return and repopulate the very attractive site in a few weeks or months.
While highly effective at smaller sites, physical exclusion is typically not an option at a larger plant. It is simply impossible to cover an oil refinery or power plant with a net.
The more common solutions for smaller scale facilities are only appropriate for the resolution of isolated problems at a larger plant. An area where there is zero tolerance for birds mandates physical exclusion to keep them out, while the overall control strategy needs to focus on abatement.
The following graphic provides an outline of the various options for bird abatement. There are just two alternatives:
Increase mortality with the common culling methods, trap, shoot or poison
Reduce reproduction with a contraceptive.
Conclusion
NO SINGLE METHOD OR SOLUTION WILL SOLVE ALL PIGEON PROBLEMS
Short of exterminating the birds, there is no foolproof way to get rid of all of them. Pigeons have accompanied mankind for thousands of years and, like rats, are not leaving anytime soon. Unfortunately, even the effects of lethal methods are only effective in the short-term as the remaining flock rapidly breeds back the ones that are missing. Lethal solutions often represent a “harvest” of pigeons as opposed to an actual control program. Both larger and smaller problems can be solved with the techniques outlined above although all but the simplest sites require some observation and planning to develop a safe and effective strategy for success.
WHY NOT JUST KILL THE BIRDS?
Irrespective of any humane considerations, the casual observer often asks, “why not just kill the birds” for a prompt and effective resolution to a pigeon problem? While culling options provide an immediate and tangible solution to an acute pigeon problem, the effects are fleeting. More often than not, the population will simply “backfill” the void created by culling with increased reproduction and even more birds. Unfortunately, just killing the birds just provides the illusion of control. Only by limiting reproduction can you effectively manage the population in a manner to provide long-term control. Over time, killing pigeons more closely resembles a harvest as opposed to an actual control program.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
Outdoor space is a premium asset (perhaps now more than ever before). When my wife and I moved into a new apartment with not one but two decks, I excitedly had visions of barbecues, alfresco dinners, and relaxing afternoons of intermittent reading and napping. Shortly after we moved in, however, we realized we weren’t the only ones with grand plans for our decks: Several families of pigeons had claimed them as their own, and it seemed like the only only meals that would happen on them would be feasts of regurgitated worms that the mother pigeons fed to their squabs. As we continued to awake to mournful coos and find more eggs in planters, we got the sense that our presence — no matter how loud or imposing it was — would not be enough to shoo the avian invaders away for good.
This was before the pandemic, so I hired an exterminator (shout out to Stan) to come over and help me with our feathered frenemies. Stan told me that pigeons are far smarter than we give them credit for and that fully ridding them from any areas they like often requires a multipronged solution. An opportunity to implement such a solution presented itself when I noticed that the group of baby pigeons living on our deck had all grown up and seemingly flown away. So, armed with Stan’s hard-won wisdom, I did some research and ultimately bought a few products that, when used together, rendered our decks completely free of wildlife. Read on for everything I used — along with a few other things I didn’t use but came highly recommended — to solve our pigeon problem.
Stan the exterminator may have said pigeons are smart, but they’re not that smart. He told me that even the appearance of a pigeon’s natural predators (like a hawk or an owl) is enough to keep the birds moving and indicate that your porch is not a safe space to raise a family. Another tip he shared: Move the fake bird twice a day (in the beginning) to maintain the illusion of sentience for the pigeons’ sake.
At first I bought just one fake hawk, but a gang of pigeons angrily attacked it. So I bought two more, and found that three of them placed at different points around my decks were sufficient to scare them off.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
This article examines a group of working-class men who breed and fly pigeons from their rooftops in New York City. It explores how the flyers experience their neighborhoods through their animal practices and shows how ethnic whites transmitted this practice to non-whites. It also documents their gatherings at a pet shop, where the flyers campaign for status based on their birds’ performance. These men form a distinct collective that is strongly rooted in their solitary animal practices but is given meaning largely through social interactions. Most community studies find conflict among different working-class racial-ethnic groups who share urban neighborhoods, but pigeon flying fosters solidarity among Italian, Hispanic, and African American New Yorkers of varying ages. The study highlights how animal practices can organize social relationships and connections to the environment and demonstrates that shared everyday activities can be as vital as ethnicity or class in primary group formation.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
Broadband is the most modern of communication means, while carrier pigeons date back to Roman times.
But on Thursday, a race between the two highlighted the low speeds of rural broadband in the UK; the pigeon won.
Ten USB key-laden pigeons were released from a Yorkshire farm at the same time a five-minute video upload was begun.
An hour and a quarter later, the pigeons had reached their destination in Skegness 120km away, while only 24% of a 300MB file had uploaded.
Campaigners say the stunt was being carried out to illustrate that broadband in some parts of the UK is still “not fit for purpose”.
It is not the first time that such a race has taken place. Last year a similar experiment in Durban, South Africa saw Winston the pigeon take two hours to finish a 96km journey. In the same time just 4% of a 4GB file had downloaded.
The pigeons are expected to complete a 120km journey to Skegness in around two hours, but Tref Davies, who is organising the stunt to give publicity to the campaign for better rural broadband, said the broadband connection will take significantly longer to transfer the 300MB file.
“The farm we are using has a connection of around 100 to 200 Kbps (kilobits per second),” Tref Davies, the stunt’s organiser, told BBC News on Thursday morning.
“The kids need to do school work and the farmer has to submit online forms but the connection is not fit for purpose.”
Mr Davies, who is co-founder of business ISP Timico and serves on the board of ISPA (Internet Service Providers’ Association), believes the issue is one that industry and government needs to address.
“This is the UK. It should be well-connected but around a third of homes still can’t get broadband,” he said.
However, BT disputes his figures. A spokesperson said that 99% of homes could now get broadband, leaving an estimated 160,000 lines “where excessive line length means broadband won’t work”.
Speed test
Even among those who can get broadband, rural areas are fighting to get reasonable speeds.
Research commissioned by the BBC last year found that around three million homes in the UK had internet connections of below 2Mbps (megabits per second).
The government has committed to delivering a minimum of 2Mbps to every home by 2015.
However, a recent report by communications watchdog Ofcom found that while these “headline speeds” were on the rise, they are not the relevant measure for broadband customers.
According to the report, “although headline speeds increased by nearly 50% between April 2009 and May 2010, actual speeds delivered increased by just 27%, and averaged just 46% of headline speeds”.
Lloyd Felton, founder of the Rural Broadband Partnership, said the effort to draw attention to rural broadband deprivation and low speeds was laudable.
“It’s true that there are particular areas of the country that suffer much more than others,” Mr Felton told BBC News.
“You’ve got massive deprivation – this long-quoted ‘digital divide’. As we all get more dependent on the internet, that divide gets wider.
“In the end it’s who takes ownership and responsibility for co-ordinating how a parish is going to handle it – what we say is that ‘communities need to help themselves to broadband’.”
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
When travelling in groups, animals frequently have to make decisions on the direction of travel. These decisions can be based on consensus, when all individuals take part in the decision (i.e. democratic decision; social information), or leadership, when one member or a minority of members make the decision (i.e. despotic decision; personal information). Here we investigated whether decision-making on the navigation of small flocks is based on democratic or despotic decisions. Using individual and flock releases as the experimental approach, we compared the homing performances of homing pigeons that fly singly and in groups of three. Our findings show that although small groups were either governed (i.e. when individuals in the flock had age differences) or not (i.e. when individuals in the flock had the same age) by leaders, with concern to decision-making they were all ruled by democratic decisions. Moreover, the individual homing performances were not associated with leadership. Because true leaders did not assume right away the front position in the flock, we suggest that as in human groups, starting from a central position is more effective as it allows leaders to not only transmit their own information but also to average the tendencies of the other group members. Together, the results highlight the importance of democratic decisions in group decision-making.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
If you do a Google search for “Darwin bird” you will find endless references to the finches of the Galápagos Islands. But it took a long time for Charles Darwin to recognize their significance. When he collected them he did not even realize that they were related, considering some to be “grosbeaks,” others true finches, and others blackbirds. He even considered one warblerlike finch to be a kind of wren.
In fact, during and soon after the historic around-the-world voyage of the HMS Beagle, from 1831 to 1836, Darwin had not yet come to the idea that different islands might be inhabited by different species. As his biographer Janet Browne put it, “He experienced no legendary moment of inspiration.” He was more interested in butterflies. When he returned to London, Darwin dispersed his enormous collection of specimens to the specialists at the Royal Zoological Society. It was only then that ornithologist John Gould told him that the Galápagos birds he had thought were a mixture of blackbirds, grosbeaks, and finches were actually 12 species of finches.
A better case might be made that the most important bird in Darwin’s studies was the humble domestic pigeon. In fact, one of the first readers of the manuscript that would become On the Origin of Species, in 1859, disliked most of the book intensely. Whitwell Elwrin wrote to the publisher, John Murray, and called the text “a wild & foolish piece of imagination . . . for an outline it is too much & for a thorough discussion of the question it is not near enough.” Rather than tell the publisher to reject the manuscript, he consulted Darwin’s friend, geologist Charles Lyell, who had already suggested that the book should focus on Darwin’s observations on pigeons. Elwrin recommended that Darwin write a short book on pigeons. “Everybody is interested in pigeons,” he told him, and a book like this would “be reviewed in every journal in the kingdom and soon be on every table.”
The Origin of Pigeons? Although it sounds funny today, the breeding of fancy pigeons and other pedigreed animals was something of a craze in Victorian England, one that crossed class lines, attracting enthusiasts ranging from miners and weavers to Queen Victoria. When Darwin began studying and breeding pigeons in 1856, he soon became as enthusiastic about the wonderfully varied breeds as any working-class fancier. As Janet Browne says, “Darwin loved his pigeons . . . he spent hours reading self-help manuals and books by breeders to make sure he was doing the right thing and visiting shows and exhibitions to see what was available. He found it very entertaining hobnobbing with breeding experts and trying to exude an air of practical knowledge as he leaned over cages of absurdly ruffled feathers. The esoteric world of pigeon fanciers seemed to him delightfully fresh and curious.”
At first he was not without a little upper-class condescension. He wrote to Huxley, “I sat one evening in a gin palace in the Borrough amongst a set of pigeon fanciers, when it was hinted that Mr. Bolt had crossed his Pouters with Runts to gain size: and if you had seen the solemn, the mysterious, and awful shakes of the head, which all the fanciers gave at this scandalous proceeding, you would have recognized how little crossing has had to do with improving breeds, and how dangerous for endless generations the process was. All this was brought home far more vividly than by pages of mere statements & c.”
Soon, however, he met more scholarly and “respectable” fanciers. His most important friend in the pigeon world became the journalist and editor William Tegetmeier. Their association lasted for more than 10 years and was mutually beneficial. Tegetmeier provided Darwin with specimens, information, and contacts. Tegetmeier, who seems to have been a bit of a social climber, loved to brag about his intimacy with Darwin.
Darwin’s family fell in love with pigeons as well. His daughter Henrietta later wrote, “I can still recall their different characteristics: a cross old fantail when taking food from my hand liked to take a good peck & hurt me if he could. The Pouter pigeon was good-natured but not clever, and I remember a hen Jacobin which I considered rather feeble-minded.” Darwin wanted all of his friends to be as delighted with his pigeons as he was. He wrote Lyell, “I hope Lady Lyell & yourself will remember whenever you want a little rest & have time how very glad we should be to see you here. I will show you my pigeons! Which is the greatest treat, in my opinion, which can be offered to human beings.”
Although his study of pigeons informed The Origin of Species, Darwin’s real “pigeon book,” The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, did not come out until 1868. Its long and beautifully illustrated section on pigeons is still readable and relevant to both naturalists and pigeon fanciers today.
He begins, “I have been led to study domestic pigeons with particular care because the evidence that all the domestic races are descended from one known source is far clearer than with any other anciently domesticated animal. Secondly, because many treatises in several languages, some of them old, have been written on the pigeon, so that we are enabled to trace the history of several breeds. And lastly, because, the amount of variation has been extraordinarily great. . . . I have kept alive all the most distinct breeds, which I could procure in England or from the Continent; and have prepared skeletons of all. I received skins from Persia, and a large number from India and other quarters of the world. Since my admission to two of the London pigeon-clubs I have received the kindest assistance from some of the most eminent amateurs. . . . I do not hesitate to affirm that some domestic races of the rock-pigeon differ fully as much from each other in external characters as do the most distinct natural genera.”
Every one of the illustrated breeds in Variation exists and is shown today. Some, such as the English pouter and the African owl, have not visibly changed in the last 150 years. Others, such as the carrier, barb, and fantail, have become even more exaggerated and differentiated from the ancestral Rock Pigeon by the strange and unnatural selection of shows, just as dogs and other domestic animals have. The carriers’ already exaggerated beak wattle has grown larger than a walnut; such birds are prone to colds and eye diseases—so much so that in Germany legislation was passed limiting the size of the wattle in the breed! The barb, in Darwin’s day a short-billed bird with large circular eye ceres, now has such a short bill that it is unable to feed its own young (foster parents are required) and has a carrier-like wattle cramped between the short bill and its forehead. The engraving of the fantail in Variation shows a bird with a turkeylike fan that today’s birds possess, but Darwin’s bird has a graceful, erect, swan-like neck. Today’s birds carry their heads so far back against their tails that from the front their heads are invisible. From that vantage point they look like a headless ball in front of a circular tail.
Such changes would probably have fascinated Darwin, who wrote, “There is hardly any exception to the rule that those characters vary most which are now most valued and attended to by fanciers, and which consequently are now being improved by continued selection.” Whether such exaggeration is good for the individual birds is another question. The breeding of domestic show animals is a biological art but can be warped by too much passion for the extreme and strange. One need not go to the lengths of the Germans. A pigeon fancier all my life, I gave up breeding modern carriers because curing their constant colds became depressing. Darwin himself showed that crossing the extreme varieties produced something very much like the ancestral Rock Pigeon. Most show pigeons would not survive long in the wild, but their descendents, common “street pigeons,” inhabit cities and cliffs everywhere in the world. Except for their variable colors and slightly larger size, they resemble the wild Rock Pigeon, which they have displaced in all but the most remote places. Some scientists consider them to be a “superdove,” a bird stronger and more adaptable than even its wild ancestors. Evolution, of course, is never stasis. I have seen wild Rock Pigeons only on remote cliffs on the Euphrates, but “superdoves” thrive in environments ranging from the sweltering streets of Houston to the 30-below-zero squares of Ulaan Bataar, Mongolia, in winter.
But the domestic pigeon still holds a unique charm for both fanciers and naturalists. The genetics of its colors alone support a quarterly newsletter for scientists and enthusiasts. Some show people, like dog breeders fixated on Westminster, pursue ever-more-exaggerated standards. Others prefer less “improved” birds. I started out with modern racing homers, a breed developed in Belgium and England in the early 1800s, originally a carrier of messages but also a racing competitor. It is a stout, athletic bird. Most non-fanciers see little difference between it and a common pigeon, though it is larger and more muscular, and has a larger head and wattles than the Rock Pigeon. Such a bird can survive very well in the wild. The genes of lost racers probably contribute to the continuing evolution of the “superdove.”
Over the past 20 or 30 years, naturalist and breeder friends of mine have become fascinated by the ancient, “unimproved” pigeon breeds of the Silk Road and the Mediterranean. Such breeds may have existed for thousands of years. They have enough diversity to satisfy Charles Darwin; in fact, many—such as the English barb—are exactly as Darwin, or Shakespeare (who wrote about them), saw them. I have Catalonian tumblers—small pigeons in a dazzling variety of colors—that are agile enough to evade marauding Cooper’s Hawks; Syrian owls that are short-beaked, similarly agile, and, unlike modern show owls, can feed their own young; and English barbs, which are virtual duplicates of the illustrations of them in Darwin’s Variation. I have Spanish pouters that inflate their globes just as much as do modern show pouters. But they must remain athletic, because they are used in the remarkable Spanish sport of “thieving” in which the males compete to seduce marked females to their home lofts. All of these breeds remain functional but retain enough diversity and beauty to satisfy the most aesthetically-minded fancier. And, unlike the often-inbred champions of pigeon and dog shows, they retain, as Darwin noted, enough genetic variation to make each new clutch a suspenseful delight. Show pigeons often resemble clones.
To a naturalist and biophiliac, the humble domestic pigeon can come to occupy a necessary place in one’s life, as it did in Darwin’s. Beautiful and ever-changing, they are a backyard microcosm that embodies Darwin’s most fundamental quote: “There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.”
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
This week, a South African call-center business, frustrated by persistently slow Internet speeds, decided to use a carrier pigeon named Winston to transfer 4 gigabytes of data between two of its offices, just 50 miles apart. At the same time, a computer geek pushed a button on his computer to send data the old-fashioned way, through the Internet.
Winston the pigeon won. It wasn’t even close.
“Winston arrived after two hours, six minutes, and 57 seconds,” says Kevin Rolfe, head of the information technology department at Unlimited Group, a call-center business based in Durban. As for the Internet data transfer, he says, “when we finally stopped the computer, about 100 megs had transferred, which is about 4 percent of the total.”
Officially, the Unlimited Group has not given up on the Internet, nor has it any plans to embrace the use of homing pigeons that was pioneered on the battlefield by Genghis Khan. But while the pigeon-versus-Internet stunt was a resounding success in terms of satire, it also makes a point that many businesses throughout Africa are making: Africans pay some of the highest prices for some of the least reliable Internet service in the world. And if a country like South Africa – relatively prosperous and developed – can’t solve this problem, then it’s going to need a lot more pigeons.
In most parts of Africa, Internet service is provided by satellite transmission dishes, an expensive and unreliable option. Go to an Internet cafe in Kinshasa or Khartoum, and you’ll see dozens of earnest students and businessmen, typing out messages, pushing the send button, and then hoping the power doesn’t go out before the message gets sent.
Your humble correspondent in Africa last year attempted to send about one minute of digital video of displaced people in Kenya to his headquarters in Boston, through the so-called broadband Internet service provided at his Nairobi hotel. Six hours later, there was still an hourglass icon on his screen, with a message that simply read “sending.”
Undersea cable brings broadband to some
In theory, Africa’s problems are already well on their way to being solved. A $650 million undersea cable, linking the Kenyan port city of Mombasa with a larger sea cable system servicing Asia, was officially activated in late July of this year, bringing most major cities in East Africa their first taste of high-speed broadband Internet. But three months later, local Internet service providers have refused to drop their prices, offering increased bandwidth at the same price.
Some African nations have gone all-out to get the most bang out of the cable. Rwanda, for instance, has extended a high-speed fiber-optic cable network to every district and every major town in the country in anticipation of the cable, in hopes of turning itself into an information-technology hub like Singapore. Others, like South Africa, have been updating their systems, but can’t keep up with the exploding demand.
Which brings us back to Winston the pigeon. Mr. Rolfe says the idea for the pigeon race came from a member of his IT department, who remembered an April Fool’s joke of sending data by homing pigeons. After one too many incidents of a dropped line or a failed transfer, one IT tech finally blurted out, “We should just use pigeons.”
Taking a cue from former empires
As unusual as the idea sounds today, pigeons have been a powerful tool for empires, financial and otherwise. In the mid-19th century Paul Julius Reuter (founder of the Reuters news agency) used pigeons to send stock information between the cities of Aachen and Brussels, until telegraph service eventually replaced them. And as recently as World War I the British admiralty used pigeons to send battlefield information. (The Germans, predictably, trained falcons to intercept messages.)
Never a company to do things in half-measures, Unlimited Group began to promote its Pigeon Race 2009 on its website. Winston the pigeon soon had his own Facebook fan page, a website with training videos, and yes, Winston began to tweet. On Twitter. When Winston finally landed at the offices in Durban – risking hawks, gun-happy hunters, and high-winds – the results were carried by newspapers, TV stations, and were a huge sensation in the Twittersphere.
Winston’s feat illustrates larger problem
Perhaps stung by the pigeon experiment, South Africa’s giant communications company, Telkom, issued a statement to the South African Press Agency explaining that it was not to blame for Unlimited Group’s slow internet service.
“Telkom would like to clarify that the company cannot be blamed for this particular customer’s lack of throughput speeds,” Troy Hector, Telkom’s head of ICT, wrote to Sapa in an e-mail. “Several recommendations have, in the past, been made to the customer but none of these have, to date, been accepted. It must also be noted that Telkom is not the customer’s core service provider.”
Rolfe insists that the pigeon experiment was not aimed at any one particular company, but rather at the common problem that Internet have: slow Internet speed. A customer like Unlimited Group, which transmits an average of 500 megabytes of data per day, can’t afford to have unreliable connectivity.
“Look, we don’t blame Telkom or Neotel, or any of the other Internet providers,” says Rolfe. “Those guys, the providers are doing the best job that they can. But we are saying, fine, let’s sit down and think out of the box and figure out how to improve South Africa’s telecommunications.”
As for Winston, Rolfe says the pigeon is in no danger of losing his job. “He still goes out on training runs,” Rolfe says, especially when the computer lines are down. “Using pigeons, it’s not the optimal plan,” he chuckles. “But we may do it from time to time, to give Winston some airtime.”
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
A recent first detection of pigeon aviadenovirus-1 and pigeon circovirus co-infection associated with Young Pigeon Disease Syndrome (YPDS) in a pigeon flock in Turkey, prompted a study focused on documenting the distribution of Pigeon aviadenovirus (PiAdV-1 and PiAdV-2), Pigeon circovirus (PiCV), Columbid alphaherpesvirus 1 (pigeon herpesvirus (PiHV)) and Fowl aviadenovirus (FAdV) in the country. These viruses were selected as they are associated with severe disease in pigeons across the world. A total of 192 cloacal swabs were collected from young (<1 year old) pigeons from 16 different private pigeon flocks across Turkey, between 2018 and 2021 as part of routine diagnostic sampling. PiCV genetic material was the most frequently detected 4/16 (25%), PiAdV-1 and CoHV-1 DNA were both found in one flock each, while neither PiAdV-2 and FAdV were detected in any of the studied pigeon flocks. PiCV and PiHV genetic material were both detected in the same pigeon flock’s cloacal samples as a co-infection with the identification of PiHV being a first in Turkey.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
Among the most famous images of London’s Trafalgar Square is one of people feeding pigeons in its grounds. And closer to home, feeding these birds was a favourite pastime on the weekends around the Vidhana Soudha, when people flocked to it for a bit of relaxation in its gardens. But no more, as the pigeons are now as numerous in most parts of the city as they were once around it.
Far from feeding them, people have now taken to shooing them away as they invade their balconies and kitchens, building nests and dirtying them with their poop and feathers. Their numbers have become their downfall as they are no longer priced as pets either. Instead they are the flying rats of urban Bengaluru.
Observes one fed up Bengalurean, industrialist, Narendra Kumar, “Pigeons have adapted so well to our urban civilisation that they are driving other birds away. Cleaning pigeon droppings has become a huge problem today. People in high- rise buildings are the worst affected and even the plants on the balconies suffer as a result of their invasion.”
But what’s worse, the pigeon droppings are not just an eyesore, but also a health hazard, warn wildlife experts. With the pigeon population growing, they have been spreading diseases like avian influenza and castle fever through their droppings, according to them. “ The pigeon droppings contain bacteria and fungus, which can cause major lung disorders that can be fatal,” they explain.
It is also claimed that those who fall sick as a result of the pigeon droppings, find recovery hard despite downing antibiotics, because of the strong infection they transmit. Bird lovers too admit to being on their guard when it comes to these birds because of the infections and diseases they transmit.
The BBMP , which has received numerous complaints from people about the pigeon menace, is now planning to hold a meeting with wildlife experts, bird lovers , health experts and concerned citizens to deal with it, says Mr Sarfaraz Khan, BBMP joint commissioner (health).
The civic agency is reportedly considering taking a cue from other countries, which have effectively dealt with the growing population of pigeons without harming the ecology and is also planning a study on their impact on humans, animals and other bird species.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
Pigeons may seem harmless, but these pest birds cause millions of dollars in damage every year to buildings, ventilation systems, machinery, statues, roofs, and much more. Bird droppings and nesting materials left by pigeons pose physical problems and health hazards that can become very serious if not corrected quickly making prompt and effective professional bird control is often essential.
Potential Health Hazards:
There are many health risks associated with pigeons and their droppings. The bacteria, fungi, and ectoparasites that they and their droppings harbor are numerous. The four most common ways disease is passed by bird to human are: inhalation of fecal dust, food and water contaminated with bird feces, direct contact with feces, and parasitic transfer.
Pigeon droppings can expose humans to many diseases, including salmonella, Newcastle disease, candidiasis, encephalitis, orthosis, and toxoplasmosis. In addition, they can also carry cryptococcosis, and coccidiodomycosis, which cause meningitis. The droppings may also harbor growth of fungus, which causes histoplasmosis. Fleas, lice, mites, and other pests often live on these birds, hitching a ride to where ever they want to jump off. Pigeons may also attract other pests, such as rats, which feed on dead pigeons and food that well-intentioned bird lovers may scatter for them.
In addition to disease, bird droppings are known for triggering people to slip and fall, which makes it especially important to rid the birds from highly trafficked areas.
Damage Caused by Pigeons:
These are messy birds, leaving droppings everywhere they go, particularly near their roost sites. Pigeon droppings are not just gross, they are also full of uric acid which makes them extremely corrosive. The droppings are the direct cause of millions of dollars in damage to buildings and other structures. Particularly vulnerable are painted surfaces, awnings, signs, and other similar surfaces. A tragic example of the corrosiveness of pigeon droppings is the Minnesota bridge accident in 2007, which was found to be the direct result of bird droppings eating away at the metal bridge supports until they weakened.
In addition to the damage cause by their acidic droppings, pigeon nests can also cause damage. Pest birds will often build nests in gutters or on roof corners blocking essential drainage systems. Every year several warehouses experience roof damage, and even collapse, when drainage systems have been blocked and standing water rises just six inches. Bird nests can also block ventilation systems, which not only prevents exhaust of potentially harmful gases, but also has the potential to spread diseases. Fire is also a potential hazard. Nesting materials are usually flammable, consisting of twigs, straw, grasses and dried droppings. When pest birds build their nests inside electric signs or other machinery there is a great risk of fire.
Pigeons are creatures of habit and highly social. Once they have found a cozy spot the will return again and again, bringing along more of their pigeon pals. Prolific breeders, pigeons can hatch several broods a year, sometimes even laying a new clutch before the previous have even hatched. Often our buildings and structures have architectural features such as drain spouts and eaves that make perfect nesting spots for these birds. Pigeons are comfortable around humans and they’re hard to scare away or deter. Once a flock of stubborn unwanted pigeons have set up shop in/on your building, it can be stubbornly resistant to removal, often requiring the services of a pest control or animal control professional. As is true of many pests that invade our homes and businesses, the first step to controlling feral pigeons is to remove their food source.
Tips to deter pigeons:
Don’t feed the pigeons.
Screen drains and gutters to make your property less attractive to pigeons.
Encourage children to pick up spilled food – and teach them NOT to feed pigeons
Keep areas around trash bins and outdoor dining areas clean
Eliminate water sources such as bird baths, over-watered lawns, or kiddy pools.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
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Pigeons are highly social animals and are incredibly smart creatures. But did you know pigeons carry many diseases and parasites linked to their droppings? When pigeons start roosting on your property, they will rapidly create a vast mess with their poop. Not only are pigeon droppings in your home disgusting, but they can carry major risks to your wellbeing and can cause havoc on your property. However, the danger varies depending on the invasion. If you have a pigeon invasion on your property, there is a huge risk of your family members contracting illnesses from their droppings. Histoplasmosis, Candidiasis, Cryptococcosis, Psittacosis, Encephalitis, and Salmonellosis are some of the deadly diseases spread through pigeon droppings. The safe bet is to handle your pigeon invasion quickly by calling a professional pest control company to eradicate any risk of disease.
In addition to the disease and infection, pigeons can also carry parasites, ticks, and mites. A dead pigeon is more of a breeding ground for flies and pests. We at Accurate Pest Control believe, the more established the pigeon infestation, the more significant danger of having these pests getting into your property.
How hazardous are Pigeon droppings?
When an individual breaths dust or water droplets of contaminated bird droppings, it can cause several diseases, including aflu-like illness known as Psittacosis.
Salmonella is a bacterial virus that can cause Diarrhea. Pigeons with this type of bacteria can spread it through their droppings.
One must take safety measures when they are cleaning up or come in contact with pigeon droppings. Make sure to rinse your hands and clean any bare skin before eating, drinking, or placing your hands near your mouth. Similarly, if you are feeding or handling birds, wash your hands afterwards.
Individuals with a compromised immune system, like HIV/AIDS or cancer, must avoid cleaning the droppings as it can be fatal.
How can you catch it?
Anyone can become affected if he/she breathes it in. The infant who died at the hospital in Glasgow, Scotland, had been exposed to the fungus. Experts reveal the apparent source has been traced to a room on the rooftop of the hospital.
Bird feces and feathers can disturb your home’s heating and cooling modules and indoor air quality.
Pigeon droppings contaminated with bacteria or viruses are often left on the windowsills and cars to dry out.
The best thing you can do to get rid of your pigeon problem is to call licensed pest control in San Antonio, Texas. Our Wildlife animal control in San Antoniouses proper techniques to keep your home or business free from unwanted critters and ensure that these creatures are removed safely. To improve the situation, you must ensure all areas are properly cleaned, and preventive measures are taken to stop the birds from invading your home/property.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
If you’re heading to catch a bus at the Osborne station rapid transit stop, you might want to watch where you step.
Everywhere you look, every surface is covered in pigeon poop.
“It’s terrible,” said one bus rider. The man also told Global News, it’s been an ongoing issue he’s noticed for months. He said in September, the issue was worse.
Transit riders contacted Global News about the state of the station and health concerns.
“They need some time to clean it up. You can see it all over windows. Someone needs to take a mop to this place,” the rider said.
Pigeon poop can be hazardous to humans, and the build-up of pigeon feces on buildings and other structures is not only visually unappealing and but pigeon droppings are acidic and erode metal and stonework, according to Health Canada.
Pigeons have been associated with a variety of diseases, including histoplasmosis and cryptococcosis.
Histoplasmosis is a disease caused by a fungus that grows in pigeon droppings. The fungus can also be found in bat droppings or in the soil, and is carried by the wind. When removing droppings, people may breathe in some of the fungus. When exposure is high, the fungus can cause infection.
Cryptococcosis is another fungal disease related to pigeon droppings and grows in soils throughout the world. It is very unlikely that healthy people will become infected even at high levels of exposure. A major risk factor for infection is a compromised immune system.
The union representing transit workers also said it would be looking into the situation.
“We want to thank transit riders for bringing these concerns forward, which we certainly take seriously,” Everett Rudolph, Executive Vice President for the ATU said in an email statement.
The City of Winnipeg said the station is cleaned twice a week.
“Orkin Canada was contracted by Winnipeg Transit in the beginning of November to assess and provide recommendations based on industry best practices,” said a city spokesperson.
“They immediately performed an evaluation of the site, and recommended installing feeder units in the vicinity of Osborne Station containing ‘OvoControl P’ which controls the reproduction of pigeons.”
Two feeder units installed in late November are being filled with bait daily, said the city.
“The program will run for a trial period of six months, during which time we will evaluate the effectiveness of the program.”
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
Heading to his usual Sunday morning yoga class in Leslieville a few years ago, my husband, Peter, gave silent thanks when he found a sent-from-above parking spot right in front of the studio. He quickly eased his black Honda Fit, Jellybean, into the space and dashed to his class.
When Peter came out an hour and a half later, his car was so coated in poop he barely recognized it. “It looked like a bunch of elephants with wings had flown over my car and relieved themselves,” he said.
There were no pachyderms to be seen. Pigeons? Yes. Right above Jellybean a couple of hydro wires sagged under the weight of dozens of the city birds. There was only one thing to do. Peter drove straight to the old-timey car wash at Parliament and Front and paid the price to have the carapace of excrement removed. Twice.
Then there was the time our son’s girlfriend, Lisa, got pooped on at the bus stop at Lower Gerrard and Coxwell as she waited for her northbound bus to the subway. This stop is notorious for its pigeon problem and Lisa knew to be vigilant. But on this particular day she was running late for work, on her phone and not paying attention to the birds lined up like so many grey bombers in formation above her. When the bomb-bay doors opened, the blast hit her freshly washed hair. Thinking quickly, she dashed into one of the restaurants in Little India, washed the mess out and continued on her way.
Just another day trying to coexist peacefully with pigeons, the birds first dubbed “rats with wings” by New York City parks commissioner Thomas Hoving in 1966.
I didn’t think too much more about my family members’ run-ins with the tubby birds known officially as rock pigeons and formerly as rock doves. But a few weeks ago, our daughter, Em, mentioned that a family of pigeons had been hanging out on the peaked roof outside her bedroom window. That got my attention. In the more than 20 years we’ve lived here, none of us had ever seen a pigeon on any part of our roof.
Then a couple of nights ago, when I had my bedroom window open to allow the sweet-smelling evening breezes in, I heard faint noises that sounded like the scritch-scratch of bubble-gum pink feet moving about in our eavestroughs.
The next day, I decided to see if I could get a look at the pigeons. It turns out I didn’t need special clearance from MI6 to spy on them through Em’s window. Far from flying off in a furious flap of wings as I neared the glass, they were thoroughly unperturbed by my approach.
There were three pigeons, all about the same size. A close look revealed two were fledglings and the third was an adult. The youngsters skittered up and down our grey roof tiles, pursuing their parent for food. Once they made contact, they pushed their beaks into their parent’s bill, as if to say, “Come on! We know you’ve got our crop milk in there.” But the adult was having none of it; its parental contract for food delivery had already ended.
Until I started reading about the birds on our roof, I had taken the common pigeon, Columba livia, for granted. I thought of them as birds that had always been here, part of the everyday fabric of city life.
While it’s true rock pigeons have been associated with humans for many thousands of years, they haven’t always been in North America. They didn’t reach this continent until the early 1600s. Prior to this, rock pigeons were natural residents of Eurasia and North Africa, where their wild nests could be found in narrow crevices plentiful in sea cliffs, caves and canyons.
The latter fact explains why these birds have fared so well in both the New and Old Worlds. Wherever humans have created towns and cities, places with man-made structures that emulate cliffs, rock pigeons have found a home.
Beyond being evolutionarily successful, rock pigeons are beautiful birds with a regal carriage. Sure, they poop a lot. And it can be hazardous to park or walk under a flock of these birds on a wire. Step carefully, I say, and admire their shimmering, iridescent plumage.
And what of the birds on our roof? When I looked out Em’s window this morning, only the adult pigeon was there; the fledglings, rebuffed, had finally departed. A single small white feather remained on the tiles, a reminder of the pigeon family that was.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
Homing pigeons are a remarkable species with internal compasses that are able to memorize landmarks to retrace a path home. But one particular bird ended up so far off its course, it would have been a miracle for her to find her way back.
After being found frozen to a front porch, she was taken in by Calgarian Alex Gray who didn’t know what else to do and posted on social media, eventually tracking down Jeanie Palmer, a woman who raises and rescues pigeons.
“There were a lot of people who wanted the bird but couldn’t prove it was theirs, so I reached out to Jeanie and I said: ‘Alright, we don’t have traction and she doesn’t seem happy by herself, so by all means, come and get her,’” Gray said.
Once Palmer got her home she did some digging and, being a member of the Canadian Pigeon Fancier’s Association, she reached out to her fellow fanciers who helped her identify the tag.
She’s from the Netherlands and belonged to Henk Bax, a man who races pigeons.
“He said, this bird went missing from a race in Vervins, France on April 25, 2021. She was 200 kilometres from the coop and a year-and-a-half later she winds up on the sidewalk in Calgary, Alberta,” Palmer said.
The Dutch owner gave his blessing to keep the pigeon.
“How would you fly from France all the way here? How would she make that? I don’t think she could have made it that far, kudos to her if she did,” Palmer said.
“There’s a reason we named her Amelia Earhart, maybe she did fly here,” Palmer said.
“My jaw dropped,” Gray said.
Both could hardly believe it.
“This could be a book. The bird who flew across the world, or the pigeon who got lost. You could make up any adventures you wanted her to be on. The fact I have her is crazy to me, pretty lucky,” Palmer said.
She’s retiring from racing and will officially become a Canadian. It isn’t legal to ship a bird from Canada to the Netherlands.
“She’s going to join my coop and be a spoiled lazy pigeon. Hopefully she will pick one of my handsome boys and have a happy little family of her own,” Palmer said.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
Pigeons in the United Kingdom have become a target of a terrible disease called the Pigeon Paramyxovirus (PPMV) or Newcastle’s Disease. It results in neurological symptoms, including trembling wings and a violently twisted neck. The affected pigeons become reluctant to move and can’t fly. They also have green feces. The disease is fatal.
A JSPCA Animal Shelter spokesperson reported that the shelter had increased the number of grounded pigeons in the last few weeks. Many affected birds had neurological symptoms, such as a twisted neck, circling, or inability to stand. The spokesperson added that these symptoms are signs of pigeon paramyxovirus that affects poultry, doves and pigeons and is invariably fatal.
PPMV is a notifiable disease in captive birds. It does not apply to wild birds. The affected birds die within a few days, and there is no treatment for the disease. PPMV is highly infectious and can spread through feces and other excretions of the affected birds. Surviving birds will shed the virus, becoming a risk to other birds. So, at JSPCA, the infected birds are humanely euthanised. Since the PPMV virus survives better in cold and wet months, the disease’s clusters are usually found at this ..
Is PPMV highly infectious? PPMV is highly infectious, spreading through the affected bird’s feces and other secretions.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
Police in Edmonton are looking for help to solve an unusual crime involving dozens of pigeons.
Video captured on Tuesday night shows a man carrying a large bin and snooping around a pigeon enclosure in the backyard of a home on Checknita Way SW around 9:25 p.m.
Someone noticed the man, wearing a white tank top and shoulder holster, and called in a “suspicious person” complaint.
Feral Rock Pigeon (Columba livia) perched with a blue sky background
Before officers arrived, the man made off with 45 of the homeowners’ 60 competition pigeons, Edmonton Police Service said.
The birds are worth about $300 each, making it a loss of $13,500.
“What’s interesting about the video is that the suspect is wearing fairly distinctive clothing and it looks like some sort of fashion item or wallet that he’s wearing and that may help people recognize who he is,” said Cheryl Voordenhout with EPS.
City of Edmonton bylaws permit homeowners to have up to 75 pigeons.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
John Mittermeier could barely believe his eyes when he saw the footage of a little black and orange bird strutting its tail feathers in front of the camera.
He and his team have captured video of a black-naped pheasant-pigeon on an island in Papua New Guinea. It was the first time the bird had been documented since 1882.
“This is just a story of excitement and hope,” Mittermeier told As It Happens host Nil Köksal. “I mean, how incredible is it that this species was missing to scientists for 140 years and we were able to find it?”
Mittermeier was the co-leader of a 30-day expedition to search the island of Fergusson for signs of the elusive creature. They had just about lost all hope when one pranced right past one of their motion sensor cameras on Day 28.
“We had been working incredibly, incredibly hard to try to find this bird. We had tons of doubts going through our mind at that point, thinking that we might not be able to find it, wondering if it even existed,” Mittermeier said.
“It’s kind of like all our dreams coming true and just this incredible, incredible relief.”
The expedition was a joint venture by the American Bird Conservancy, the Papua New Guinea National Museum and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.
Mittermeier is the director of the lost birds program at the American Bird Conservancy. In partnership with Re:wild and BirdLife International, his organization is trying to find and document the more than 140 “lost” birds around the world.
And by lost, he means birds that have no confirmed documentation — in the form of photographs, audio recordings or genetic samples — for 10 or more years.
By that definition, you can’t get much more lost than the black-naped pheasant-pigeon, or Otidiphaps insularis, which was first described by scientists in 1882, then never again.
“The pheasant pigeon really stood out because it’s one of the birds that’s been lost for the longest period of time,” Mittermeier said. “Or I should say it was one of the birds that had been lost for the longest periods of time.”
Local knowledge was key
All the scientists really knew about the bird was that it was first spotted on Fergusson, an island in the D’Entrecasteaux Archipelago off eastern Papua New Guinea. Even that wasn’t much to go on, given that the island spans 1,500 square kilometres.
So the team relied on local knowledge, and began by interviewing residents.
At first, most of the people they spoke to said they’d never heard of the bird — until they reached the villages on the western Mt. Kilkerran. The hunters were familiar with the bird, which is known locally as an auwo.
It was a local hunter named Augustin Gregory in the village of Duda Ununa who give them their big break. He told the scientists he’d seen the auwo on multiple occasions. He described how it looked, moved and sounded in great detail.
He took the scientists to the places where he’d spotted the creature. They didn’t see any up close in person but they planted cameras in those locations. It was at one of those sites that the bird finally appeared.
“The game-changer in terms of finding it was really some leads we got from some local people there — particularly this one man,” Mittermeier said. “A huge component of this story is the incredible local knowledge.”
Serena Ketaloya, a conservationist from Milne Bay, Papua New Guinea, says the discovery is a welcome one.
“The communities were very excited when they saw the survey results, because many people hadn’t seen or heard of the bird until we began our project and got the camera trap photos,”
“They are now looking forward to working with us to try to protect the pheasant-pigeon.”
What do we know about the auwo?
At this point, scientists don’t know much about the auwo. They have two sets of photographs and video of at least two birds.
They suspect — for obvious reasons — that it’s very rare and geographically limited.
“My first hope is really that we’re going to have an opportunity to learn more about this bird, get a better sense of where exactly it occurs on the island, what its population size might be, and what potential threats it could be facing,” Mittermeier said.
“And then the next hope is really that we’re going to be able to turn that information into a great collaboration with some of the local communities there and find a way to protect this bird, perhaps develop some eco-tourism so that people can go and see it personally. I know I’d love to actually see it.”
It’s just one thing about the future that has him excited.
“I’m really optimistic that some of the other birds around the world might be able to be found as well. And I’m hoping we can do that and get some more good news in the near future.”
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosing / Vancouver Pigeon Control / Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / PIgeon Deterrent / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons / What to do about pigeons / sparrows, Damage by Sparrows, How to Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests / De-fence / Pigeon Nesting / Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping / woodpecker control / Professional Bird Control Company / Keep The Birds Away / Birds/rats/seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/pidgeon control/flying rats/pigeon problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/bird guard
An infection linked to pigeon droppings was a “contributing factor” in the death of a child at a Glasgow hospital, it has been confirmed.
The child was being treated at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital when he or she appears to have caught the infection – a fungus called cryptococcus.
The child has not been named. The fungus did not contribute to the death in December of a second patient infected with the same pathogen, say experts.
What is it?
Cryptococcus is a yeast-like fungus that lives in the environment.
It can be found in soil contaminated by pigeon droppings.
How can you catch it?
People can become infected if they breathe it in.
The child who died in December at the hospital in Glasgow had been exposed to the fungus.
Experts say the probable source has been traced to a room on the rooftop of the hospital. Pigeon droppings appeared in the room via a small break in the wall which was “invisible to the naked eye”, Scottish Health Secretary Jeane Freeman confirmed.
The hospital says it has put infection control measures in place and no further cases have been reported.
How risky is it?
Most won’t get sick, but vulnerable people with already weakened immunity can get very ill with a chest infection or meningitis.
Expert Prof Hugh Pennington says it is very unusual to see cases in the UK.
“It is common in other parts of the world, particularly tropical parts, in the US and countries like that where they have more problems with this particular kind of fungus. But in the UK, very uncommon.
“There are cases in people who have problems with their immune systems. They’re the people who are at risk with this kind of bug.”
Cryptococcus infection cannot spread from person to person.
How dangerous is pigeon poo?
Breathing dust or water droplets containing contaminated bird droppings can lead to several diseases, including a flu-like illness called psittacosis.
Salmonella – a bacterial infection that can cause diarrhoea – may also be present in some bird droppings.
If you are cleaning up or come into contact with droppings, you should take precautions. Wash your hands and clean any exposed skin before eating, drinking or putting your hands near your mouth.
Likewise, if you are feeding or handling birds, wash your hands afterwards.
If you have a compromised immune system, including from HIV/AIDS or cancer, you should not clean up droppings.
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor or 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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Contact us at 1 877-4-NO-BIRD,(604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
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