by Pigeon Patrol | Aug 10, 2016 | Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Pigeon Patrol's Services
Bald eagles aren’t just an iconic national symbol south of the border — here in Toronto, they’re the noble and brave protectors of garbage dumps.
Local landfills are plagued by garbage-eating seagulls. They harm themselves by eating unnatural food sources and can harm the environment by carrying trash outside the landfill.
The city’s eco-friendly solution to that problem? Massive birds of prey that swoop in and scare the seagulls away.
“We train these raptors to chase the gulls away,” said Stephen Bucciarelli, president of Predator Bird Services Inc. “It’s essentially their job to do it. But to them it’s not going to work, they just have fun all day flying around.”
This one-year-old bald eagle is just one of the predatory birds that scares seagulls away from Toronto landfills. It’s still young and will grow to have a white feathered head as it becomes mature.
Falconry is a practice that dates back thousands of years. The predatory birds, including hawks and falcons, were trained to catch prey as food for humans before guns became a common tool in hunting.
Within the last 40 years, companies like Bucciarelli’s have used falconry as a form of bird control.
“We’ve learned how to manage these birds so they are really comfortable at work and effective at it,” he said.
A one-year-old bald eagle is one of the predators that soars across Toronto landfills.
Stephen Bucciarelli is president of Predator Bird Services Inc. The company trains birds of prey to scare away other, smaller birds.
“He’s just learning the ropes of flying in the wind and he’s doing really well,” Bucciarelli said, adding that the eagle and its winged colleagues are so effective at their job that gulls don’t even frequent the landfills anymore — they’ve learned to stay far away.
It’s a win-win because the seagulls don’t know what’s good for them, he said.
“It’s not good for birds to eat unnatural food sources, so if we’re scaring them…they’re going to be eating from natural sources like fish rather than things leftover from humans,” Bucciarelli said.
Seagulls that are harming the environment and themselves by eating unnatural food sources at landfills better watch out. This bald eagle is serious about protecting city territory.
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
by Pigeon Patrol | Aug 9, 2016 | Animal Deterrent Products, Bird Deterrent Products, Pigeon Patrol's Services
Don’t blame the raccoons for this one.
At least one of Toronto’s new supposedly raccoon-proof green bins has been chewed up a week after it was wheeled out in Scarborough.
Brad Gates of Gates Wildlife tells Moore in the Morning it looks to him that this is the work of either a squirrel or a rat.
The bite marks on the bin’s plastic lid tell the tale.
The city’s response to the chewed up bin? Try a home remedy: sprinkle a bit of hot sauce on the lid.
“It is not indestructible,” Jim McKay, general manager of solid waste services, says of the new bin.
He says the unique part of the new bin is the locking lid. The rest of it is pretty standard.
McKay says the plastic is basically the same material and thickness as the old bins, which also had squirrel problems.
He does not sound too concerned, adding that only 0.5 per cent of the old bins would have to be replaced each year due to animal damage.
Gates adds there will be pockets of Toronto more overrun by squirrels where the new green bins will be “rendered useless”.
But Gates says there is not much that can guarantee rodents stay out.
“We see raccoons and squirrels chew through metal all the time in our business,” he warns. “As long as they can get an edge to start to open up a hole, they will begin to chew on it.”
Mayor John Tory, who has been a part of two staged photo ops in the last year to show off the new bins joked about the breach on twitter.
Speaking on the Moore in the Morning roundtable councillor Shelley Carroll says city staff has some explaining to do.
“We guaranteed to people that you gotta do the change-out, the locking mechanism will keep out the raccoons. How did they not know about this?”
The city is paying a California firm $31-million for a 10-year contract to replace and maintain Toronto’s 500,000 green bins.
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
by Pigeon Patrol | Aug 8, 2016 | Bird Deterrent Products, Pigeon Patrol's Services, Pigeon Spikes
ACTION is being taken to curb the amount of pigeon mess being left outside a Halstead shop.
The former Lalezar building, in High Street, has become a mecca for pigeons which sit on the various ledges at the front of the shop.
However, this has led to the building and the pavement below it becoming covered in their mess.
Gordon Birchell, of Birchell Steel Consultant Surveyors, which is marketing the empty building for let, said: “They are doing what pigeons do.
“We have put up the scaffolding to do something about it.
“The pigeons are everywhere in Halstead and they are an awful problem.”
Complaints about the mess outside the building were first made in November, with Braintree Council’s Street Scene Team promising to clean up the pavement.
He added that he was in negotiations with a company interested in moving into the ground floor, but declined to say what the company was.
“It isn’t a restaurant, but it is catering related,” he said.
Charity shop St Helena Hospice, opposite the restaurant, was due to move into the building this year, but pulled out after deciding the costs involved were too high.
The building, formerly a post office, was built in November 1895 and has changed hands many times in recent years.
Lalezar opened in May 2014 before closing at the start of 2015 following a gas leak and the building has been vacant ever since.
Mr Birchell said he was confident the former Thomas Cook shop, further down High Street, would also soon be occupied.
The shop had been empty for two years before being bought at auction by a London-based investor for £150,000.
The investor had planned to use the building himself, but is now planning to rent it out, according to Mr Birchell.
He said that it was “just about under offer”.
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
by Pigeon Patrol | Aug 7, 2016 | Bird Netting, Pigeon Patrol's Services, Pigeons in the News
Circle Line services were out of action after netting to stop pigeons nestling on the tracks collapsed at High Street Kensington at around 4.25pm. A train in front of the netting, and the entire station, was evacuated.One enraged user tweeted: “It is absurd that some obstruction whatever it may be is causing an entire line to go down!”
A Transfort for London (TFL) spokesman said that services were slowly making a recovery after the track was reopened at 5.12pm.The spokesman told the Daily Star Online: “It was some netting that fell from the roof of the station and on to the tracks and I think it was as a train was approaching.”Obviously we can’t have trains running on netting.
“High Street Kensington has reopened as of 5.12pm so trains are running through the stations without any problems.”As of 5.35pm, there are still severe delays between Earls Court station and Edgware Road on the District Line.There are minor delays on the remainder of the District Line.There is still severe delays on the Circle Line.
The spokesman added: “There were no injuries to passengers and staff.”
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
by Pigeon Patrol | Aug 6, 2016 | Bird Deterrent Products, Bird Netting, Pigeon Spikes
A dispute between neighbors in Palm Coast’s C-Section over the copious presence of Purple Martin birds and involving a drone, a laser pointer, the daily Apocalypse Now-like broadcasting of loud predatory bird sounds and complaints to local authorities, has escalated into a lawsuit from one neighbor against another.
Philip Lowe, 77, and his wife Sarah Thompson-Lowe, of 29 Collingwood Lane, filed the lawsuit in Flagler County Circuit Court in early April against Bryan Streetman, 47, of 25 Collingwood Lane. The lawsuit was the culmination of a series of actions the Lowes took against Streetman, including a complaint with the Palm Coast Code Enforcement division, a petition signed by 18 neighborhood residents seeking an end to Streetman’s broadcasting “shrill and screeching predatory bird sounds” from 7:15 a.m. until dark, complaints to police in mid-February, and a lawyer’s cease-and-desist letter seeking to stop Streetman from flying his drone or using a laser light in such a way as to intrude on neighbors.
Earlier this month, Streetman countered with a motion to dismiss the lawsuit against him, claiming his neighbors have no “clear legal right” to seek an injunction against him.
The Lowes have lived at their current address for 17 years. For all that time, between each January and July, they’ve maintained 24 bird gourds on their dock as nesting sites for Purple Martin birds, which are protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and the Lacey Act, their lawyer says. Aside from their elegance and aesthetically pleasing presence to many residents—including those at 31 and 11 Collingville Court, who also maintain nesting gourds—the birds help control the mosquito population.
Streetman moved in next door three years ago. In January and February, the Lowes claimed in the lawsuit, Streetman flew a drone in the rear of his property, but also above the Lowes’s property and near the nesting gourds, resulting in altercations between the neighbors. On Feb. 14, Delphine Meyers, the neighbor at 11 Collingville Court, directly across the canal from Streetman’s property, reported to the sheriff that a bright red and green laser beam was penetrating her home from a laser bird deterrent system on Streetman’s grounds. (Code Enforcement issued a nuisance citation to Streetman over the laser and noise issues on Feb. 19.)
St. Augustine attorney Marcus Thompson sent a letter to Streetman on behalf of the Lowes on Feb. 22 citing the “excessive noise” of the drone and its use of a camera as violating the city’s nuisance ordinance and, in the case of the camera, state law, which prohibits surveillance. Thompson also noted the laser incident, which was documented by a sheriff’s deputy at the scene. “It is our hope that these issues can be resolved peacefully and respectfully, without the necessity of litigation,” Thompson wrote.
Streetman turned off the laser only to place an inflatable and noisy “air dancer” device on his property as a new deterrent to the birds. According to the lawsuit, he continued flying the drone and using high-frequency noise devices, which the suit claims have affected the Lowes’s ability to sleep while creating “a serious discomfort, distress and inconvenience” to them and other neighbors. The repetitive nature of the noise is equated to harassment, according to the suit, which seeks an end to the use of those devices, or flying the drones near the nesting areas of the birds, or using laser lights.
In his response on behalf of Streetman, attorney Ryan Mitchell ridiculed the claim that his client was in any way violating the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, for two reasons: Streetman is in no way hunting, shooting, killing, wounding or trapping the birds, as the act sets out as prohibited actions. And the federal act “has clearly established that there is no private right of action conferred on individuals.” In other words, as Mitchell cites through various federal cases, it’s not an avenue in property disputes between neighbors. The same reasoning was applied to the code enforcement violation.
Mitchell was similarly dis missive of the use of the Lacey Act to back up the lawsuit against Streetman, as the Lacey Act, he argued, regulates the importation and transportation of species, and therefore has nothing to do with the present dispute.
A hearing on the dispute is scheduled before Circuit Judge Scott DuPont on June 30, in Courtroom 402 at the Flagler County Courthouse.
About Pigeon Patrol:
Pigeon Patrol Products & Services is the leading manufacturer and distributor of bird deterrent (control) products in Canada. Pigeon Patrol products have solved pest bird problems in industrial, commercial, and residential settings since 2000, by using safe and humane bird deterrents with only bird and animal friendly solutions. At Pigeon Patrol, we manufacture and offer a variety of bird deterrents, ranging from Ultra-flex Bird Spikes with UV protection, Bird Netting, 4-S Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products four years in a row.
Contact Info: 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD (www.pigeonpatrol.ca)
