Is it really wise to enrage them?
Some crazed Park Slope resident has apparently taken it upon himself to cure the neighborhood of its “winged rodent” population.
This guy (and one of his neighbors) is apparently so inconvenienced by the pigeon poop near his residence that he is now resorting to lacing bird feeders and local parks with rat poison and anti-freeze. The anonymous resident posted this long, disturbing rant on the Brooklynian website imploring others to stop feeding these “nasty” pigeons that carry “vile diseases.”
And he’s not just staging these deadly feeders outside his own building. The poster is actually bold enough to say that he is sprinkling the poison around a local park where people “who seem hell bent on trying to erase their life’s sins” are feeding the pigeons bread.
But what about all of the other innocent animals (and children) who might inadvertently pick up the poison, you ask?
Him and his neighbor “understand the dangers of this tactic, but are willing to accept the collateral damage.” His Orwellian defense: it’s for the greater good.
Thankfully, many other commenters on the site were shocked and outraged. Some, however, offered helpful alternatives to poison (such as contacting a sporting range and asking them to gather up the birds in large nets to use for target practice).
So is there really someone deranged enough to poison a public park so he can keep the pigeon population in check? Or is the entire post a joke? We’re off to investigate.
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There’s an odd (homeless) fellow who feeds constantly feeds pigeons on my street (7th). Hundreds of them gather as he dishes out seed, usually in the same spot. Thankfully I sold my car when I moved here, but would be pretty pissed if I had a vehicle parked nearby, getting crapped on every day. Bird poop will eat into car paint if not cleaned off.
There’s an odd (homeless) fellow who feeds constantly feeds pigeons on my street (7th). Hundreds of them gather as he dishes out seed, usually in the same spot. Thankfully I sold my car when I moved here, but would be pretty pissed if I had a vehicle parked nearby, getting crapped on every day. Bird poop will eat into car paint if not cleaned off.
Quite a few of these violently anti-pigeon people appear to have latent toxoplasmosis. Recent (last five years or so) confirms and expands the view that encysted T. gondii (acquired in one or another way from cats) can — does… — result in all sorts of interesting delusional behavor. A very good summary, conservatively stated, can be found at the Stanley Medical Research Institute’s site, searching on “toxoplasmosis”. I was surprised to find that the seroprevalence of toxo in the NE United States (that’s us, among others) is around 30 percent — about three times the conservative number for nation-wide infection. Whatever: Two simple facts. 1) Poisoning and other approaches gets you dead pigeons, but not fewer pigeons (in fact, it is possible to get a short-term surge in overall numbers). 2) The annual USGS bird population survey suggests a stable, slightly (0.25%-1%) declining pigeon population in New York. This largely ties into environmental poisoning, so your Park Slope Poisoner will get his way, eventually — fewer pigeons and fewer children both.
how do you get pigeons to leave