by Pigeon Patrol | Mar 23, 2023 | 4-S Gel Bird repellent, Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Law, Bird Netting, Bird Spikes
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.”
Source
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
by Pigeon Patrol | Mar 16, 2023 | 4-S Gel Bird repellent, Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Law, Bird Netting, Bird Spikes
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.”
Source
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
by Pigeon Patrol | Mar 6, 2023 | 4-S Gel Bird repellent, Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Law, Bird Netting, Bird Spikes
Pigeons are found in most large metropolitan areas, and Quebec cities are no exception. These invasive birds have adapted to humans and are largely unbothered by our presence.
Unfortunately, they are not exactly man’s best friend. Pigeons carry a number of diseases that are dangerous for humans. It’s important to know what diseases they carry and can spread to humans so that we can better protect ourselves.
The professional exterminators of E.Exterminator explain which diseases pigeons can transmit to humans.
Pigeon diseases
These flying rats have the annoying habit of hanging around just about anywhere, making them notorious disease-spreaders. While some diseases, like coryza or trichomonosis, are not transmissible to humans, there are 5 main diseases that we can catch from pigeons.
That’s why proper pigeon pest control is so important to stop the spread of these diseases.
Paratyphoid
Paratyphoid is caused by Salmonella bacteria, an infection that’s found in many species. The illness can affect your joints, intestines, or genitals.
The bacteria are transmitted via direct contact with an infected pigeon, contact with pigeon droppings or through contaminated food and water.
SYMPTOMS
In humans, the paratyphoid symptoms are similar to stomach virus symptoms. You should see a doctor if you think you may be infected.
Histoplasmosis
Histoplasmosis is a dangerous respiratory infection that’s spread by bats as well as pigeons. It is caused by the Histoplasma capsulatum fungus and by inhaling pigeon droppings. More precisely, the fungal spores are to blame.
These spores are dangerous because they travel through the air and are easily inhaled.
SYMPTOMS
Despite these scary symptoms, don’t panic. Most cases of histoplasmosis are asymptomatic. If you do have symptoms, see a doctor ASAP.
Source
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
by Pigeon Patrol | Feb 25, 2023 | 4-S Gel Bird repellent, Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Law, Bird Netting, Bird Spikes
With less than six months before the District of North Vancouver’s pigeon prohibition takes effect, bird buffs and transparency watchdogs beseeched council on Monday to take a second look at the bylaw.
Council’s recent decision to bar residents from owning or harbouring pigeons anywhere in the district was a misuse of power, according to Guy Trotter, who previously served as a volunteer on the district’s official community plan monitoring committee.
The bylaw hurts one pigeon-keeping resident, Kulwant Dulay, and helps one pigeon-opposed resident, Coun. Betty Forbes, according to Trotter. The councillor was the only district resident to file a recent complaint about pigeons, Trotter added.
“I don’t care about pigeons one way or the other,” Trotter told council. “I do, however, care about good governance.”
The pigeon issue was first broached in a district public hearing on backyard chickens in May 2017 when Forbes, prior to winning a seat on council, asked council to re-examine their 1971-era pigeon bylaw.
“We have a pigeon bylaw?” responded a surprised then-mayor Richard Walton.
Allowing it might sound cold, Forbes suggested banning pigeons due to the possibility the birds would depress real estate values. Forbes explained she’d spent a lot of money to keep her backyard “prim and proper,” but her attempts to entertain outdoors were marred by the sight of her neighbour’s “ramshackle” pigeon coop.
Forbes also sent the district a 1,400-word missive outlining her concerns about the keeping of backyard chickens and pigeons.
Forbes was elected to council in 2018. But before being sworn in, Forbes sent an email complaining about the pigeons to district staff and requesting a remedy, according to Freedom of Information documents provided to CBC News. From April to June of 2019, Forbes and Coun. Lisa Muri had three email exchanges in which the subject line referred to pigeons.
In an April 24, 2019 email, Muri wrote to Forbes: “It will be fine, we can wave (sic) the hearing . . . if we need one.”
Council voted 4-2 to ban pigeons, with Couns. Mathew Bond and Jordan Back opposed. Forbes recused herself from council discussions and votes on the subject.
However, her emails were the subject of scrutiny for lawyer and district resident Vincent Santacroce.
“She and Coun. Muri exchanged cryptic emails about the matter,” he told council on Monday.
“I don’t believe ‘cryptic’ is appropriate,” Muri responded.
“I’ll give you a dictionary,” Santacroce replied.
The bylaw was both rushed and sloppy, according to Santacroce.
“Why was there the need for such an overhaul?” he asked. “Was there a pigeon scourge on the district worthy of an Alfred Hitchcock movie?”
Addressing criticism at the end of Monday’s meeting, Forbes offered a two-minute statement in which she mentioned the word “pigeon” once.
“If I have erred in any way I assure council and the community that it was done inadvertently and in good faith with my understanding, as a new councillor, of the conflict of interest rules,” Forbes said.
Forbes requested “additional training” for herself and her council colleagues on the issues of conflict of interest and freedom of information.
Following the meeting, Kulwant Dulay seemed distressed at what might happen to his pigeons but said he’ll try to persuade council at future meetings.
“If nothing happens . . . I’ll hire a lawyer,” he said.
Forbes received strong support from frequent council watcher Corrie Kost as well as 2018 council candidate Peter Teevan.
After explaining that a Google search revealed pigeons are classified as pests due to their ability to spread disease, Teevan defended Forbes’ actions.
“As a matter of happenstance, Ms. Forbes became Coun. Forbes and she did the proper thing according to conflict of interest regulations,” he said.
The bylaw will benefit district residents, according to Kost.
“Any one of us could have been negatively impacted then, and in the future,” he said.
Council should re-examine their decision, countered Andy Hansen, who said he has raised pigeons for most of his life.
“We get a lot of peace and love out of [keeping pigeons],” he told council.
Council failed to distinguish between feral pigeons, which might perch on a neighbour’s roof, and homing pigeons, which are trained to return to their coop, Hansen explained.
“They’re pets,” he said. “We have feral cats everywhere too. Do we ban all cats?”
Dulay’s coop is clean and tidy, according to Lynn Valley resident Krista Page.
Page spoke at council in support of her neighbour Dulay. In the spirit of community, it’s vital to try to “work things out as neighbours,” she told council.
Forbes’ comments on the issue were both vague and disappointing, according to Vancouver Poultry and Fancy Pigeon Association director Givo Hassko.
“I’m glad that I don’t live next door to a council member,” he said.
Source
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
by Pigeon Patrol | Feb 15, 2023 | 4-S Gel Bird repellent, Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Law, Bird Netting
A week after a dove — dyed pink from head to claw — was found on the streets of New York City and brought to a local bird-rescue organization for medical treatment, the bird has died, largely from toxic paint-fume inhalation.
“We are deeply sad to report that Flamingo, our sweet pink pigeon, has passed away,” announced the Wild Bird Fund on Facebook and Instagram regarding the domestic king pigeon breed. “Despite our best efforts to reduce the fumes coming off the dye, while keeping him calm and stable, he died in the night. We believe his death was caused by inhaling the toxins.”
The loss of the pigeon made headlines around the world, and the organization took the opportunity to speak on the evils of dove releases, noting, “Domestic birds — birds raised in captivity — should never be released to the wild. They will die of starvation or predation … ‘Dove releases’ sound romantic, but take away the decorations and Instagram photos, and they are the equivalent of dumping your helpless pets on the side of the road. This is no way to celebrate anything.”
The situation also reignited discussion of so-called gender-reveal celebrations, as that’s been the theory behind the bird being dyed pink and released.
“It has to be a gender reveal,” noted one of many commenters in one of several posts from the Wild Bird Fund (which did not respond to Yahoo Life’s request for comment but told a local ABC affiliate the same). “I had the same horrifying thought,” responded another commenter, with others adding, “Gender reveals are so dumb,” “Stupid freaking gender reveals” and “I will never understand the lengths straight people go to for gender reveals.”
What they’re referring to is the tradition of announcing the expected baby’s sex anatomy — not gender, incidentally, which refers to the expression of social constructs of boys and girls or women and men, and therefore not something that could be known in utero. This is often done through elaborate, made-for-Instagram displays of pink or blue, in the form of colored smoke bombs, glitter explosions and even fireworks. Or, in the likely case of Flamingo — as well as a bright blue dove that was given aid by the Connecticut-based Animal Nation rescue in 2021 — dyed birds.
“We had one that came in last year dyed blue and unfortunately didn’t make it either. Such a horrible industry for these innocent animals,” noted the rescue in an Instagram comment below the post about Flamingo. On its own post about the blue bird, Animal Nation said, “We’ve heard of pigeons and doves being dyed for gender-reveal parties or simply a ‘wow’ factor — and to have one come in like this broke our hearts. When a bird is dyed and gets wet, the water is absorbed into the dye making their feathers less water repellent which takes away their number one defense — their ability to fly.”
Bottom line, say many, holding sex-reveal parties is a practice that has got to go — for both environmental and gender-stereotyping reasons.
“I think there are a lot of points to keep in mind, things like how plastic confetti and glitter and balloon bits all contribute to plastic pollutions … sequins are all made of plastic, glitter is a microplastic, which NOAA has acknowledged can be part of marine debris,” Elizabeth Brandt, national field manager for Moms Clean Air Force, a nonprofit of mothers campaigning against air pollution, tells Yahoo Life. (NOAA is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.)
“You just have to keep in mind that it’s exciting to watch a balloon go up in the air but not if it comes back down in a pond, and if a bird eats it. That’s not what you had in mind with your celebration,” she adds. “People also don’t always consider that plastic is made up of fossil fuels, and their production facilities, for those who live next to them, have health impacts.” Smoke bombs can also wreak havoc, depending on what they are made of; those with potassium chlorate release toxins into the atmosphere.
Recent examples of environmental hazards from these celebrations have included California’s El Dorado Wildfire, started by such a party’s pyrotechnic display gone awry; a similar wildfire in Arizona, the Sawmill Fire, caused by a massive blue smoke bomb and resulting in $8 million in damage; a Tannerite explosion in New Hampshire so strong it cracked a house’s foundation and turned the area’s tap water brown; a Miami helicopter flyover shooting blue confetti into the ocean, prompting an environmental group to call it out for “illegal dumping” and the pollution of an entire river in Brazil after one couple had the bright idea of dyeing a waterfall blue — in the midst of a local drought, no less.
“So many ways to do a gender-reveal party and they chose just the one that has an environmental impact,” Brazilian forestry engineer Vanessa Costa said in a tweet translated by the Washington Post at the time.
Regarding fireworks, Brandt says, “Nobody wants to start their journey in parenthood with starting a forest fire, but that’s happened; the parents were charged with multiple crimes in the El Dorado fire. … Is this really what you want to be remembered for? Is this the sort of stress you want when you are bringing another form of stress in already by becoming a parent?”
These reveal parties, she notes, “are meant as celebrations as this new era of life … and we can honor that people are excited about having a baby … [without] knowing glitter that went on to pollute the environment.” After all, she adds, “our children inherit these problems. And that’s very motivating me.”
There have even been reveal-party deaths, including those of two people related to a stunt involving flying a plane in Cancun and that of a party guest in Tennessee, where a piece of shrapnel instantly killed a woman after the parents-to-be inadvertently built a pipe bomb to explode their colored smoke. And, of course, the death of Flamingo.
“A reminder: never dye a bird!” noted the Wild Bird Fund in a post before the one announcing the bird’s death. “And please never release domestic birds or other domestic animals to the wild. They have no survival instincts and will starve or be preyed on. Dove releases in all forms are cruel. Please celebrate your life events peacefully without harming others.”
Source
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
by Pigeon Patrol | Feb 6, 2023 | 4-S Gel Bird repellent, Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Law, Bird Netting, Bird Spikes
Pigeons are capable of switching between two tasks as quickly as humans — and even more quickly in certain situations. These are the findings of biopsychologists who had performed the same behavioural experiments to test birds and humans. The authors hypothesize that the cause of the slight multitasking advantage in birds is their higher neuronal density.
Dr Sara Letzner and Prof Dr Dr h. c. Onur Güntürkün from Ruhr-Universität Bochum published the results in the journal “Current Biology” in collaboration with Prof Dr Christian Beste from the University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus at Technische Universität Dresden.
“For a long time, scientists used to believe the mammalian cerebral cortex to be the anatomical cause of cognitive ability; it is made up of six cortical layers,” says Sara Letzner. In birds, however, such a structure does not exist. “That means the structure of the mammalian cortex cannot be decisive for complex cognitive functions such as multitasking,” continues Letzner.
Six times as densely packed
The pallium of birds does not have any layers comparable to those in the human cortex; but its neurons are more densely packed than in the cerebral cortex in humans: pigeons, for example, have six times as many nerve cells as humans per cubic millimetre of brain. Consequently, the average distance between two neurons in pigeons is fifty per cent shorter than in humans. As the speed at which nerve cell signals are transmitted is the same in both birds and mammals, researchers had assumed that information is processed more quickly in avian brains than in mammalian brains.
They tested this hypothesis using a multitasking exercise that was performed by 15 humans and 12 pigeons. In the experiment, both the human and the avian participants had to stop a task in progress and switch over to an alternative task as quickly as possible. The switchover to the alternative task was performed either at the same time the first task was stopped, or it was delayed by 300 milliseconds.
What makes pigeons faster
In the first case, real multitasking takes place, which means that two processes are running simultaneously in the brain, those being the stopping of the first task and switching over to the alternative task. Pigeons and humans both slow down by the same amount under double stress.
In the second case — switching over to the alternative task after a short delay — the processes in the brain undergo a change: the two processes, namely stopping the first task and switching over to the second task, alternate like in a ping-pong game. For this purpose, the groups of nerve cells that control both processes have to continuously send signals back and forth. The researchers had assumed that pigeons must have an advantage over humans because of their greater nerve cell density. They were, in fact, 250 milliseconds faster than humans.
“Researchers in the field of cognitive neuroscience have been wondering for a long time how it was possible that some birds, such as crows or parrots, are smart enough to rival chimpanzees in terms of cognitive abilities, despite their small brains and their lack of a cortex,” says Letzner. The results of the current study provide a partial answer to this mystery: it is precisely because of their small brain that is densely packed with nerve cells that birds are able to reduce the processing time in tasks that require rapid interaction between different groups of neurons.
Source
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
