by Ryan Ponto | May 12, 2017 | Bird Netting
Kit Columbidae, a third-year biology major at the College of Creative Studies, has turned to a classic form of communication following the loss of his iPhone. Columbidae, whose phone was broken in a bike accident, says he got the idea when he looked up from the pavement and saw a pigeon staring at him.
“I had read about homing pigeons before, of course,” he said. “They were vital back in the day, especially during wartime. I thought they had all died out. But looking into those beady, intelligent eyes, I knew that they shouldn’t be too hard to train.”
Columbidae began his project by visiting Atkinson Farms, a local hatchery. Though the owner of the hatchery mainly raises and sells chickens and ducks, she has a longstanding personal interest in homing pigeons and decided to take Columbidae under her wing.
“Ms. Atkinson has been so helpful throughout this entire process,” he said. “Her grandfather raised carrier pigeons during World War II, so I guess you could say it runs in her family.”
Toby, the homing pigeon Columbidae has been working with — named after Atkinson’s grandfather — will be taking his maiden voyage next week.
“Toby’s done a few short flights so far, just to the apartment across the way and stuff like that. You’d think the travel time would make communication slower, but people are much more likely to respond to you when there’s a pigeon flapping about in their face.”
Zoey Brandt is a third-year English major who recently broke her phone.
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 Ryan Ponto | May 11, 2017 | Bird Netting
The ubiquitous bird of cities and towns was designed for a different environment. The pigeon’s distinctive style of flight is adapted for maneuverability in tight places – near vertical takeoffs and quick changes of direction. This adaptation to cliff and mountainside environments serves them well among our urban cliff dwellings. Curt Stager and Martha Foley discuss.
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 Ryan Ponto | May 10, 2017 | Bird Netting
NORWAY — Pigeons. Dead pigeons. Many dead pigeons and pile upon pile of pigeon poop.
According to the USDA, that much pigeon poop indicates years of pigeon populations.While the years of emptiness of the historic 1910 Odd Fellows Hall has been a thorn in the side of Main Street, a glimpse through the storefront windows yields an even more concerning problem.
According to town records, the building at 380 Main St., and its owner – Jasim LLC of Westbrook – have been cited numerous times by the town code enforcement officers since April 2013 for broken windows – access points for the pigeons.
Cruel
The most recent citation by CEO Scott Tabb in March has resulted in the windows being boarded up, according to Tabb.
However, this adherence to safety has been done at the expense of the pigeons already inside the building.
Consequently, it appears that those live pigeons trapped in the building are dying a slow death.
Town Manager David Holt says he has received complaints and referred them to the CEO.Looking from Main Street into the building numerous pigeon bodies can be seen, as well as live, barely moving birds.
In addition to pigeons, there may be structural issues with the building.
The pigeon droppings can carry the risk of disease if exposed. These include histoplasmosis, cryptococcosis and psittacosis. However, these are risks primarily for anyone cleaning the droppings as opposed to the general public.
The USDA in Augusta says it can clean up and pigeon-proof with the owner’s permission if the town is willing to pay for the service.
Holt indicated he will look into that.
Update
A call from Tabb just before press time heralded positive news for both the town and the pigeons.
“I spoke with the owner of the building, Sam Patel, and he told me coincidentally, he was planning on having someone in over the weekend to clean up the poop,” said Tabb.
Patel, a retailer in southern Maine, purchased the empty, partially renovated three-story brick building in 2012 from TD Bank. It was transferred to Jasmin LLC on Dec. 14, 2012. Since then, no action has been taken to reuse it.
In July 2013, Patel was notified the town would take court action because of broken windows in the building that had become a public hazard. Patel eventually fixed the windows, but some of them were broken again, prompting him to board many of them. It was believed that pigeons trying to escape were breaking the windows.
Tabb said he understands a nearby property manager has a key to the Odd Fellows Hall and he is reaching out to see if the building could be opened so the remaining live pigeons could be rescued.
In 2013 Maine Preservation listed the building as one of Maine’s 10 Most Endangered Historic Places List.
The Odd Fellows Hall in Norway once housed businesses and offices, as well as a ceremonial space for the Independent Order of Odd Fellows Lodge No. 16. The basement and first floor were built in 1894 after fire destroyed much of the downtown business district. The other floors were added in 1910. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
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 Ryan Ponto | May 9, 2017 | Bird Netting
It’s quite a tale.
Actually, it’s quite a tail.
When Bill Robertson went out to his garage on Lewis Drive near Jacksonville last week, he was surprised to find a pigeon wandering around inside. Thinking the bird was simply avoiding the rain, Bill and wife Colleen found it interesting that the bird didn’t appear to be scared in anyway. In fact, it was right down friendly.
“It showed up on Tuesday afternoon,” Bill said. “I was out in the garage and I was working on my tractor, and I see this pigeon walking from the back of the garage. I just opened up the garage door, and it just came walking up towards the front of the door. I thought maybe I’d trapped him in there from the night before.”
Bill said that the bird was in no big hurry to get away, so Bill thought maybe the pigeon was hurt. Getting closer to the open garage door, the pigeon flew off, going about 30 feet and landing on the Robertson’s house roof.
“The next thing I know, he comes flying back down to the driveway and comes walking back into the garage,” Bill said. “Then, that’s when I noticed the bands on his legs.”
The pigeon had two bands, one on each leg. A bluish-gray band that had no writing on it; and a green band that contained some letters and numbers that appeared to identify it.
“He just hung around there for the rest of the day,” Bill said. “We had the garage door open, and he would just walk in and walk out. He wasn’t acting like he was sick or injured, so I didn’t think anymore about it.”
Bill went off to do his mowing, and that’s when Colleen came home. She also spotted the pigeon near the garage.
Later that night, the couple went into the garage, and the pigeon was still there. He had found a small room in the corner of the garage that Bill figured reminded the bird of its coop.
“We finally got the number off of the green band on his leg, and we looked it up on the Internet,” Bill said. “We found out that it was a racing pigeon, and that it was the American Racing Pigeon Union, located in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
That’s approximately 830 miles from Switzerland County.
But wait – there’s more.
“The band had JEDDS on it, which is apparently a supplier in California of feed and everything for that particular niche,” Colleen said. “So he gave me their number and I contacted them, and they called me back and gave me the owner’s phone number.”
The band also told the couple that the pigeon is four years old, along with other information used in identification.
“We gave them the number of the band, and he got back with us and said that owner was in California,” Bill laughed. “I went ‘whoa’. He lives in Downey, California, which is just west of Los Angeles. So my wife called the gentleman out in California and spoke to him, and he said that he had noticed the bird was missing.”
That’s when Colleen told the owner just where his racing pigeon was currently located.
“He was really nice,” Colleen said of the owner. I explained who I was and I told him that I had one of his birds, and how I got the phone number and stuff. He said, ‘Where are you?’ I said, ‘I’m in Southeastern Indiana, near the Ohio River’.”
Going further, Colleen explained that they lived near Vevay, a small town they were sure the owner hadn’t heard of, but the California resident was still very confused about just where his bird was.
“I said, ‘I’m near Cincinnati, just west of Cincinnati’,” Colleen continued. “And he said, ‘Ohio? Cincinnati, Ohio?’ I said ‘I think you’re bird took a wrong turn some place’.”
Downey, California is 2,154 miles from Switzerland County, if you take the fastest route. If you take a plane, it will take four hours and 40 minutes to fly there.
No one is sure how long it took the pigeon.
Once the owner came to the realization just how far away his bird was, he decided that perhaps his pigeon now had a new home.
“He said, ‘I don’t know what happened there’,” Bill said. “But he said it was too far for him to come and get him. He told us that they make good pets, but if we didn’t want him, the guy asked us to make sure that the bird went to a good home.”
So how does a racing pigeon get from Downey, California to Switzerland County?
Tail wind?
“We had two pretty windy days right prior to that, and that day was pretty windy,” Bill laughed. “I figured that he must have gotten up in the jet stream or something!”
Bill said that the officials in Oklahoma City were skeptical that a pigeon could travel that far; and the Robertsons also contacted a racing pigeon organization in Hamilton, Ohio, who were also skeptical about the distance. Both theorized that the bird had been sold to another pigeon enthusiast closer to Indiana; but the California owner made no mention of ever selling or trading his birds, which is common among pigeon owners.
Both organizations told the Robertsons to keep the pigeon around for a couple of days and feed it some seeds and let it rest for a couple of days, and decided that perhaps the bird was waiting out the extremely rainy conditions (pigeons won’t fly in the rain, because the water weighs down their feathers, making it nearly impossible to fly, so the theory was that it was waiting on nicer weather). They told the couple once the weather was nicer, to open the garage door and see if it would leave on its own. If it didn’t, then the group in Hamilton would take the bird.
By Friday, the pigeon was still hanging around, with no apparent motivation to leave.
“The folks in Hamilton said that when you get these birds, you get them used to their ‘home’, and then you take them a short distance away and they’ll fly home, and then over time you just keep taking them further and further away,” Bill said. “I guess it’s possible that he thinks this is his home now.”
From California to Switzerland County – quite a race.
Quite a tail.
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 Ryan Ponto | May 9, 2017 | Bird Netting
It’s quite a tale.
Actually, it’s quite a tail.
When Bill Robertson went out to his garage on Lewis Drive near Jacksonville last week, he was surprised to find a pigeon wandering around inside. Thinking the bird was simply avoiding the rain, Bill and wife Colleen found it interesting that the bird didn’t appear to be scared in anyway. In fact, it was right down friendly.
“It showed up on Tuesday afternoon,” Bill said. “I was out in the garage and I was working on my tractor, and I see this pigeon walking from the back of the garage. I just opened up the garage door, and it just came walking up towards the front of the door. I thought maybe I’d trapped him in there from the night before.”
Bill said that the bird was in no big hurry to get away, so Bill thought maybe the pigeon was hurt. Getting closer to the open garage door, the pigeon flew off, going about 30 feet and landing on the Robertson’s house roof.
“The next thing I know, he comes flying back down to the driveway and comes walking back into the garage,” Bill said. “Then, that’s when I noticed the bands on his legs.”
The pigeon had two bands, one on each leg. A bluish-gray band that had no writing on it; and a green band that contained some letters and numbers that appeared to identify it.
“He just hung around there for the rest of the day,” Bill said. “We had the garage door open, and he would just walk in and walk out. He wasn’t acting like he was sick or injured, so I didn’t think anymore about it.”
Bill went off to do his mowing, and that’s when Colleen came home. She also spotted the pigeon near the garage.
Later that night, the couple went into the garage, and the pigeon was still there. He had found a small room in the corner of the garage that Bill figured reminded the bird of its coop.
“We finally got the number off of the green band on his leg, and we looked it up on the Internet,” Bill said. “We found out that it was a racing pigeon, and that it was the American Racing Pigeon Union, located in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
That’s approximately 830 miles from Switzerland County.
But wait – there’s more.
“The band had JEDDS on it, which is apparently a supplier in California of feed and everything for that particular niche,” Colleen said. “So he gave me their number and I contacted them, and they called me back and gave me the owner’s phone number.”
The band also told the couple that the pigeon is four years old, along with other information used in identification.
“We gave them the number of the band, and he got back with us and said that owner was in California,” Bill laughed. “I went ‘whoa’. He lives in Downey, California, which is just west of Los Angeles. So my wife called the gentleman out in California and spoke to him, and he said that he had noticed the bird was missing.”
That’s when Colleen told the owner just where his racing pigeon was currently located.
“He was really nice,” Colleen said of the owner. I explained who I was and I told him that I had one of his birds, and how I got the phone number and stuff. He said, ‘Where are you?’ I said, ‘I’m in Southeastern Indiana, near the Ohio River’.”
Going further, Colleen explained that they lived near Vevay, a small town they were sure the owner hadn’t heard of, but the California resident was still very confused about just where his bird was.
“I said, ‘I’m near Cincinnati, just west of Cincinnati’,” Colleen continued. “And he said, ‘Ohio? Cincinnati, Ohio?’ I said ‘I think you’re bird took a wrong turn some place’.”
Downey, California is 2,154 miles from Switzerland County, if you take the fastest route. If you take a plane, it will take four hours and 40 minutes to fly there.
No one is sure how long it took the pigeon.
Once the owner came to the realization just how far away his bird was, he decided that perhaps his pigeon now had a new home.
“He said, ‘I don’t know what happened there’,” Bill said. “But he said it was too far for him to come and get him. He told us that they make good pets, but if we didn’t want him, the guy asked us to make sure that the bird went to a good home.”
So how does a racing pigeon get from Downey, California to Switzerland County?
Tail wind?
“We had two pretty windy days right prior to that, and that day was pretty windy,” Bill laughed. “I figured that he must have gotten up in the jet stream or something!”
Bill said that the officials in Oklahoma City were skeptical that a pigeon could travel that far; and the Robertsons also contacted a racing pigeon organization in Hamilton, Ohio, who were also skeptical about the distance. Both theorized that the bird had been sold to another pigeon enthusiast closer to Indiana; but the California owner made no mention of ever selling or trading his birds, which is common among pigeon owners.
Both organizations told the Robertsons to keep the pigeon around for a couple of days and feed it some seeds and let it rest for a couple of days, and decided that perhaps the bird was waiting out the extremely rainy conditions (pigeons won’t fly in the rain, because the water weighs down their feathers, making it nearly impossible to fly, so the theory was that it was waiting on nicer weather). They told the couple once the weather was nicer, to open the garage door and see if it would leave on its own. If it didn’t, then the group in Hamilton would take the bird.
By Friday, the pigeon was still hanging around, with no apparent motivation to leave.
“The folks in Hamilton said that when you get these birds, you get them used to their ‘home’, and then you take them a short distance away and they’ll fly home, and then over time you just keep taking them further and further away,” Bill said. “I guess it’s possible that he thinks this is his home now.”
From California to Switzerland County – quite a race.
Quite a tail.
