MILFORD — Residents are being warned to keep their eyes to the sky next week when the Board of Health begins a pigeon control program intended to scare the birds away from the Town Hall’s historic bell tower.
Officials will use the poison Avitrol on corn kernels and, soon after ingestion, some pigeons are expected to fall to the ground dead.
“We’re doing this out of necessity to protect the historic building,” Health Agent Paul Mazzuchelli said of the problem of mounting pigeon droppings in the 19th century Town Hall bell tower.
Mazzuchelli said the public is being notified early to avoid what happened last summer when dozens of dead pigeons “fell from the sky” after officials at Milford Regional Medical Center tried to rid the building of the birds by poisoning them. They did not inform the public of the pigeon eradication plan.
“There were 15 pigeons dropping on the Store 24 parking lot,” recalled Middle School East Principal Joseph Pfiel of the day he looked across the street to the store’s parking lot and watched pigeons “falling from the sky” all around his car.
“I wish they had notified us. It was alarming to a lot of people,” Pfiel said yesterday.
Because the poisoning program was done in late summer at the height of the West Nile virus scare and at a time when cases of deadly Eastern Equine Encephalitis were turning up in the area, officials quickly became alarmed at the report of dead birds.
About 12 to 15 of the dead birds were sent to the state testing lab in Jamaica Plain. Mazzuchelli said the results were negative, but until officials found out about the poisoning program at the hospital, they were at a loss as to why the birds were dropping dead around town.
The situation was so bad that selectmen decided in November that if pigeons in Milford were to be poisoned again, the public should be notified first.
While other methods have been tried to keep the pigeons away, including hanging a plastic owl and snake from the tip of the bell tower to scare away the birds, officials said they were only temporary deterrents.
Mazzuchelli said the Board of Health recently received permission from the Division of Fisheries and Wildlife to conduct the poisoning program. Although pigeons are not a protected species, the use of the poison Avitrol is restricted and therefore a permit was necessary, he said.
The program will start with a prebaiting phase during which Mazzuchelli will put out whole corn kernels on the ledge of the bell tower. The kernels will be glued and strung to a basket and lowered onto the ledge so the kernels won’t blow off in a wind or rainstorm. Once the pigeons begin to accept the bait, the Avitrol will be added.
Mazzuchelli said those birds that ingest the corn will begin to exhibit peculiar behavior very quickly. They may wobble or fall backward or “fall from the sky,” dead within 30 minutes, he said.
It is hoped that only a few birds will eat the bait and that the other pigeons will learn the tower is not a good place to roost, Mazzuchelli said. If any other birds, such as robins, are seen eating the bait, the program will be stopped temporarily.
“Everything is being done properly,” he said. All environmental concerns have been addressed.
If anyone sees a pigeon acting strangely or a dead pigeon they should contact the Board of Health at 508-634-2315, and the bird will be picked up. If a cat or other animal gets to the dead pigeon before the Board of Health or animal control officer, residents should be aware that even if the animal eats the bird, they will not be harmed by the poison, Mazzuchelli said.
Mazzuchelli said the poisoning program is a last resort to save the bell tower from the continuing damage caused by pigeon droppings.
The poisoning program would cost about $6,500 to $6,900, but because the health agent will do it with the help of a certified adviser, the cost to the town will drop to about $2,000.
If netting was used in the bell tower, the costs would be $40,000 or more, Mazzuchelli said. “It’s a very expensive process,” he said of the netting, which would be difficult to put up because of the architectural design of the tower.
If poisoning fails and the pigeons return to roost on Town Hall, it may have to be repeated.
A fishing boat surrounded by seagulls.
No one knows exactly how long the pigeons have roosted downtown, but for decades pigeons have flocked to the high towers of St. Mary’s Church, Town Hall, the vacant granite buildings of the old Stacy School and the Granite Building and to the roofs and ledges of other tall buildings such as Middle School East. The bird droppings have created a nuisance and potential health hazard for students, staff, parishioners and residents, Mazzuchelli said.
At Town Hall, the pigeon problem was so bad years ago that the moisture began penetrating the ceiling in the third-floor hall after pigeons flew into the rafters through broken attic windows, Mazzuchelli said.
Mazzuchelli said employees could actually smell the pigeons in certain areas of the building, including the lower level. Even now on a hot, musty day, some people say they can still smell the remnants of pigeons in the building.
While the pigeons left Town Hall last summer after a fire in the clock tower located just below the bell, they returned in recent months creating a mess in the open tower. Pigeon droppings are now covering the historic Holbrook Bell and once again seeping into the floor and ledges of the building.
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