A pair of hapless pigeons had to be rescued by firefighters – after they were seen dangling from the top of one of Cardiff’s tallest hotels.
The two birds were spotted hanging precariously by their feet after getting tangled in netting on the fifth floor of the Hilton Hotel in the city centre.
RSPCA Cymru were called to the scene, along with support crews from South Wales Fire and Rescue Service .
With support from hotel staff firefighters were eventually able to free both birds from the netting and release them back into the wild.
One pigeon was returned to the wild immediately while the other was released following a short spell in veterinary care.
RSPCA inspector Sophie Daniels said: “Fortunately the pigeons were rescued and are now safe and well back in the wild.
“We’re grateful to the firefighters from South Wales Fire and Rescue Service for their support in completing this rescue, which shows what we can achieve working together to protect local animals.
She added: “Incidents like this act as an important reminder that external netting can act as an obstacle to wild birds and it’s great that the hotel will be monitoring this closely to help protect the nation’s wildlife.”
Marie Fagan, general manager of the Hilton Cardiff, said: “It is situations like these which show how vital the RSPCA’s work is to protecting our animals and wildlife.
“We worked closely with both the RSPCA and fire and rescue services to help them release the pigeons and we would like to thank them for their efforts.
“We are thrilled that both pigeons were safely rescued.”
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.
Tourists sailing down the highways toward Hot Springs, Arkansas, in 1955 would have been filled with gleeful anticipation. Numerous resorts and roadside offerings were on offer to sate their recreational lust: They could drop into the Arkansas Alligator Farm and mingle with the toothsome reptiles, ooh and awe at celebrity likenesses at the Josephine Tussaud Wax Museum, or delight in the animated miniatures of Tiny Town. Or they could go to the newly opened I.Q. Zoo and watch Casey the chicken play baseball, a duck play the drums, and a rabbit dunk a basketball, to name just a few oddities.
I.Q. Zoo was the brainchild of a psychologist couple, Marian and Keller Breland, who not too long before had been working alongside the famous psychologist B.F. Skinner to train pigeons to pilot the first “smart bombs” for the United States government.
Born in 1920 in Minnesota, Marian Kruse was whip-smart, with dark hair and a gentle smile. Her parents affectionately called her “Mouse,” a nickname that stuck for life. Young Marian loved Black Beauty and begged her dad to move to a farm.
“As a child, I was terrifically interested in animals,” Marian told an interviewer in 2000*. “I was also, although I didn’t know it at the time, interested in the humane treatment of animals.”
After graduating high school as valedictorian, Marian landed a spot in a University of Minnesota psychology class taught by Skinner, the influential psychologist who earned fame (and a long teaching post at Harvard) for his theories, notably “operant conditioning,” the idea that free will is an illusion and behavior is dictated by the negative and positive results it produces. Marian became a favorite student of his; she proofed Skinner’s writings, and even babysat his kids.
Marian was zipping to the health center for treatment from a lab rat bite when she collided with fellow psychology student Keller Breland. Within a year she would graduate summa cum laude and marry Keller. The Brelands were both trusted assistants and graduate students of Skinner’s when he recruited them in 1942 to work on a top-secret government assignment: Project Pelican.
Project Pelican didn’t involve pelicans, but pigeons, a bird Skinner was fond of using in his research. Skinner believed that by following the principles of operant conditioning he could teach them to pilot bombs on the World War II battlefield. The process began with three pigeons encased in the nose-cone of a bomb.
“They had been taught to peck at a target shown on a ground-glass screen in exchange for food,” wrote John N. Marr in his essay Marian Breland Bailey: The Mouse Who Reinforced. “If the bomb deviated from the target, the pigeon’s’ pecks at the screen would transmit signals to correct the bomb’s heading.”
In 1943, Skinner went to Washington to show off his deadly flock.
“They opened the pigeon chamber and saw three pigeons pecking away,” said Marian. “This caused them several minutes of disbelief, I’d say.”
The pigeons were never deployed. “A variety of reasons had been given,” wrote Marr. “but none related to the birds’ behavior.”
Despite the fate of Project Pelican, a light had been flipped on in the minds of Marian and Keller. If they could train a pigeon to guide a bomb, they reasoned, they could probably train other animals to do extraordinary things. And if they could do that, there was probably money to be made.
They started training animals at their home, and then on a small farm in Minnesota, applying ideas gathered from studying with Skinner. The common practice in animal training was to intimidate and dominate animals; dogs and other creatures were punished for not doing what their owners wanted through physical and verbal reprimands. The Kellers’ took a much gentler approach: they ignored behavior they didn’t want and rewarded behavior they did, typically with food.
This worked remarkably well. Eventually, they started training animals on behalf of General Mills, whose labs they had used when training their bomb birds. Enter the crowd-pleasing chicken: The Brelands trained hens to perform stunts that could be used to promote chicken feed all over the country. Breland chickens played pianos and “asked” for food by pushing a button. They trained a cow to “take quizzes” by pressing light-up “yes” and “no” targets, they trained a pig named Priscilla to knock over a stack of dishes. Word of their incredible success spread and they began training animals for television and film, including Buck the Bunny, a rabbit who starred in commercials for Coast Federal Savings, picking up coins in his mouth and dropping them into a bank.
In 1955, they opened I.Q. Zoo and travelers far and wide were introduced to the wonders of the Breland menagerie. “There is no punishment involved in the training at all,” read an ad for the zoo. “Once they are trained, they will not forget, and are happy and eager to perform.” Visitors, and the media, were enchanted.
“At a little farm near Hot Springs, Ark., I saw a chicken do arithmetic problems and a rooster knock out a tune on a piano. I played a pinball game against a turkey, and invariably lost. I watched a hamster imitate Tarzan on a trapeze, a rabbit play baseball and a dozen chickens swing baseball bats,” reported a Popular Mechanicswriter in 1953.
As their success grew, so did the pool of animals they trained. They taught a reindeer to operate a printing press, they trained parrots to balance on soccer balls and rollerskate, goats to push baby carriages, and a cow to play the harmonica. They trained cats, raccoons, squirrels and even dolphins. Chickens remained a perennial favorite, they “did math”, walked on tightropes and played tic tac toe with visitors. Under the banner of their business, Animal Behavior Enterprises (ABE), they also sold coin-operated displays that housed trained chickens, and these were scattered throughout the country.
Such a contraption in Manhattan’s Chinatown captivated New Yorker writer Calvin Trillin, who wrote an ode to the chicken in 1999. “When I tell the chicken story,” he writes, “I always point out that nearly all the people I take down there have precisely the same response to the prospect of playing ticktacktoe with a chicken. After looking the situation over, they say, “The chicken gets to go first!””
Ten years after the opening of I.Q. Zoo, the Brelands had grown supremely confident in their unusual skills.
“I wouldn’t hesitate to sign a contract today to produce a thousand white rats to play tiddly winks,” Keller told the Associated Press in 1962. He would never have the opportunity to accept this challenge before his death, three years later in 1965.
Bereft, Marian also needed help running ABE and the I.Q. Zoo. Help manifested in the form of Bob Bailey, a man who had been training dolphins on behalf of the Navy.
As the Breland’s star was ascending, Bailey was working as a researcher at UCLA’s medical school. One day he spied an ad; the Navy needed a director to head up their new dolphin training program.
“How I ever got the job to this day I do not know,” said Bailey in a 2016 talk. “I had never trained a dolphin in my entire life!”
At a desert base in California, Bailey trained dolphins to detect mines and carry messages and equipment. Among the consultants he called in to help him with the task were the Brelands. And when he grew frustrated with the Navy’s obsession with learning how to communicate with dolphins, he accepted a job at ABE in 1965. After Keller died, Bob took on many of his responsibilities. And Marian and Bob continued to work on behalf of the government.
In addition to the I.Q. Zoo, Bailey told Smithsonian magazine, the team had a special set-up for training animals run covert missions.
“We had a 270-acre farm,” he said. “We built towns. Like a movie set, there’d be only fronts.”
Marian and Bob trained boobies to fly through mazes, pigeons to thwart ambushes, ravens to plant bugs, dogs to locate mines, and cats outfitted with recording equipment to surveil people.
The extent to which these animals were actually used is obscured behind government secrecy, but Bailey told Smithsonian that “We got the ravens into places. We got the cats into places.”
Marian and Bob married in 1976 and ran the I.Q. Zoo and ABE until 1990. Marian passed away in 2001; Bob continues to teach and consult on animal training. The Brelands’ and Bailey’s helped popularize the notion of training through positive reinforcement, not yelling and hitting. Among the other methods they brought to the mainstream was the use of the clicker, a much beloved tool for dog trainers today, including those who work in dog cognition labs.
In his love letter to the Chinatown chicken, Trillen described a 1999 rendezvous with Marian and Bob in California. Both “showed up in matching Hawaiian shirts, as if to underline their status as retired”. But they were nominally retired, because they had just arrived from teaching a class to guide-dog trainers in the methods of operant conditioning. And behind their vehicle they hauled a trailer full of their training tool of choice—chickens.
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.
You can stand in the 1800 block of Marshall St. in South Baltimore, look north and see the two Baltimores we love. On the left there’s a new and cool industrial-chic apartment building called 2 East Wells. On the right there are well-kept rowhouses and a line of old alley garages with wooden doors and hanging flower pots.
Marshall Street at Wells Street, on the southern edge of South Baltimore, is a place where, you might say, two cities meet: Millennials on one side, long-timers on the other. You can stand right there, in Marshall Street, and see the two things Baltimore needs: fresh new blood and sturdy old bones; urban renewal alongside a traditional neighborhood. In balance, it’s all good.
There are bound to be conflicts, though, and so we have one today, and it involves pigeons. An unfortunate dispute has developed between the owner of 2 East Wells and a couple of local fellows who enjoy pigeons and seeing them fed.
It wasn’t until after 2 East Wells opened, in 2015, that anyone complained. The apartment building boasts “spectacular rooftop decks as well as apartment terraces.” The place has a rooftop fitness center, too. None of that sounds compatible with pigeons.
So now the Owings Mills company that owns 2 East Wells blames the men for encouraging hundreds of pigeons to gather near the apartment building. With pigeons come pigeon droppings, and the aerial bombardments have made it difficult for the concern to rent some of its apartments. So says the complaint filed by Wells CRP Building LLC against Charles “Rudy” Schreiner and Carl Smith.
“The sheer volume of pigeons attracted by Mr. Smith’s feeding activities creates substantial health risks and visual blight insofar as the pigeons leave and continue to leave copious amounts of droppings on the balconies,” the complaint alleges, adding that “prospective tenants have refused to lease the plaintiff’s apartments facing Marshall Street because of the copious pigeon dropping issue.”
The company says it has had to pay for the cleaning and painting of 24 balconies. (I also noticed plastic owl decoys, the kind intended to ward off pigeons, on five of the balconies yesterday.) Wells has asked the Baltimore Circuit Court to enjoin Schreiner and Smith from feeding the birds and for $75,000 in damages to the building.
Schreiner, a 59-year-old retired longshoreman, has owned the row of garages along Marshall Street for 25 years, and Smith, 63, a semi-retired contractor, has rented one of them for 15. Smith often parks his pickup truck in a vacant lot next to the garage and works inside. He’s been feeding pigeons for years.
“Sometimes,” says Smith, “the pigeons come to me and they’ll have wire on their feet, or fishing line, and I’ll remove it for them.” One of the pigeons had a mangled toe, requiring amputation; Smith conducted the minor surgery and treated the toe with Neosporin. As far as he knows, the bird survived.
“Carl is the pigeon whisperer,” says Jim Pumphrey, who lives nearby, on Light Street.
Pigeons, wild and domesticated, are part of city life, and in South Baltimore there is a long history of residents keeping pigeons, training them and racing them over long distances. The South Baltimore Pigeon Fanciers Social Club has been around for at least 50 years.
“These pigeons here now are descendants of the pigeons that people used to keep in coops up and down Marshall Street,” says Pumphrey, a 59-year-old longshoreman who has lived in South Baltimore all his life.
A cease-and-desist letter from Kimberly Manuelides, an attorney representing the owner of 2 East Wells, arrived at Smith’s apartment in South Baltimore last June. It blamed him for a nuisance by feeding and attracting pigeons to Marshall Street. The letter warned him of legal action if he did not stop.
Now legal action has come against both Schreiner and Smith, and they have retained Baltimore attorneys Barry Glazer and Jonathan Saltzman. They’ve challenged the claims against their clients, saying the owner of 2 East Wells had other remedies, such as registering a complaint with health authorities, before filing suit. They seek $75,000 from Wells LLC in a counter-suit that claims Schreiner and Smith have been subjected to an “improper, frivolous and baseless” legal action. They called the lawsuit “malicious,” too.
Too bad, all of it: litigation from the push-and-shove of the new Baltimore meeting the old one.
Smith still feeds the pigeons, but he does so now behind Schreiner’s garage, when no one’s looking. “I can’t help myself,” he says. And he’s not the only pigeon feeder in the neighborhood, he says. Four or five neighbors also put out food for the birds.
Which raises, I should think, a significant challenge for plaintiff: Tracing excrement from the pigeons Carl Smith feeds to the balconies on 2 East Wells. As Smith says, “I have no control over where the pigeons poop.”
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.
The passenger pigeon was once the most abundant bird in North America, so numerous that they “darkened the sun with their flights.” In 1915, the passenger pigeon officially became extinct as the last bird died in Chicago. How could this have happened? In the early 19th century, massive deforestation and overhunting led to the passenger pigeon’s ultimate demise. Efforts to conserve the species were too little and too late. Read more about it!
Important Dates:
November 28, 1889: Passenger pigeons, once populous, have now become a “rarity”; however, they are still actively hunted.
May 4, 1908: An article calls for the protection of passenger pigeons from overhunting, listing facts about the species.
December 8, 1910: There is only one passenger pigeon left, spending its days in the Zoological garden in Cincinnati.
April 15, 1911: An article documents the disappearance of the passenger pigeons, and how there is a $400 cash reward for anyone who finds the nest of a passenger pigeon.
February 1913: The last passenger pigeon in the Cincinnati Zoological Gardens falls ill.
May 1915: The last passenger pigeon dies in Chicago at the age of twenty-seven years.
June 1915: There is an unfounded rumor that the US Department of Agriculture is offering a $10,000 reward for the person who finds a passenger pigeon nest.
June 22, 1916: An article claims that the passenger pigeon is not extinct, and that the bird will once again become numerous.
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.
After a profitable time of things last weekend, our Catching Pigeons column returns with the word from the training centres.
Noel Fehily forsakes the delights of Newbury and Donny on Saturday for a flight North to Kelso and an interesting tilt at the featured totescoop6 Premier Novices’ Hurdle with the highly-rated Chalonnial.
A winner on his hurdling debut at Bangor, he was asked a very stiff task by Harry Fry in the Grade One Tolworth Hurdle at Sandown on his only subsequent start. Although no match for the impressive winner, he ran a sound race to finish a respectable third, and is expected to be even more effective after enjoying a Winter break.
This is a long haul from his trainer’s base in the dark depths of Dorset, but he looks the sort to improve, and can take revenge on the Sandown runner-up Capitaine, who was well beaten a week ago and is now 3lb worse off.
Tom Symonds can land the most important race of his young career with Hollywoodien in the William Hill High Five Supporting Greatwood Gold Cup at Newbury.
The former Nicky Henderson assistant has not enjoyed the best of luck since he first took out a licence, but this lightly raced seven-year-old has always looked capable of winning a valuable event, and there has been plenty to like about the last two of his three outings this term.
Having come home a decisive five lengths clear of the useful Astracad at Wetherby on Boxing Day, he finished a very sound third behind Garde La Victoire in a good class event at Sandown. The two miles looked a tad on the sharp side that day and he should appreciate a return to this longer trip.
Hello George has not been the easiest horse to train over the past couple of seasons, but he still retains ability and should go well for Philip Hobbs in the Seniors Handicap Hurdle. He shaped well on his comeback at Exeter, and has been given a chance by the handicapper in an interesting race.
Bloody Mary has yet to see action this term, but the fact she is a fresh horse should play to her advantage in the William Hill “High 5” Supporting Greatwood Handicap Hurdle.
A smart mare in her native France, she did well in a light campaign for Nicky Henderson last season, ending with an excellent third to the very high class Limini in the Mares Novices Hurdle at the Festival. She will come on for this run, but has been working nicely and will give her mail counterparts plenty to think about.
Kim Bailey’s Harry Topper is a class performer of old and he can notch his first win since a lengthy lay-off Betway Supporting Greatwood Veterans Handicap Chase.
A former winner of both the Charlie Hall Chase at Wetherby and the Denman on this course, his training problems have meant he has barely completed the course let alone win since that 25-length thrashing of Al Ferof here just over three years ago.
However, he showed distinct signs that a return to something like his old form was possible with an eye-catching effort at Exeter last time, and he looks to have found a good opportunity to land what would be a popular success.
Sgroppino is well regarded by the Hobbs’ camp and should step up on his promising third at Newton Abbot in the Moore Of Devizes Ltd Supporting Greatwood Open National Hunt Flat Race. The form of that debut effort in Devon looks solid.
The Last Samuri, another top class Bailey-trained fencer won the BetBright Grimthorpe Handicap Chase 12 months ago on his way to a brilliant second in the Grand National, and he should go close again to landing the perfect warm up success for Aintree, despite his inevitable lumpy rise in his ratings.
However, he may just find the concession of 23lb to old rival Sego Success just beyond him. Although disappointing at Warwick last time, Sego loves this course and is on great terms with himself at the moment. He is also fitted with a visor for the first time and has a 20lb pull with The Last Samuri from last year.
The Organist has proved very disappointing since her switch to fences at the start of the season and it is no surprise to see her revert to the smaller obstacles in the BetBright Casino Handicap Hurdle.
She won three of her five starts for the Million In Mind syndicate before being sold to JP McManus, and won the Listed event for mares on this corresponding day 12 months ago. If she can repeat that form, another big run looks assured.
Miss Mirabeau can strike for Sir Mark Prescott – who celebrated a birthday this week – in the Betway Maiden Stakes at Lingfield.
By Oasis Dream out of the Listed winner Miss Corniche, she did not exactly tackle the best sprint maiden the country can offer on her debut over the minimum trip here two weeks ago, but ran a race full of promise nonetheless and gave every indication she will both learn from the outing and appreciate the step up in trip.
Earlier on the same card Red Flute looks worth an each-way interest in the opening Betway Sprint Handicap.
He’s one of two runners in the race for Denis Quinn and although not exactly firing on all cylinders so far in 2017, the chestnut has been eased in the weights and has some useful course form at this kind of level last summer.
My Target looks worth following until no longer able to contest handicaps and he can bring up the four-timer in the Sunbets.co.uk Handicap.
It’s a warm enough race and Michael Wigham also sends out the returning Mansfield on his first run for 458 days under Josephine Gordon, while Third Time Lucky and Lunar Deity shouldn’t be too far away, but My Target holds most of these on recent form and a mark of 102 shouldn’t be beyond the classy son of Cape Cross.
The best bet at Newcastle comes in the opening race as Marzouq bids to regain the winning thread in the 32Red.com Handicap.
Jeremy Noseda was full of emotion after Atalante won at Chelmsford on Thursday evening in the name of Walter Swinburn as a bit of a farewell to the great man and Marzouq has been going nicely alongside that one in his recent homework.
Noseda sends Marzouq north on a solo raid and it’s encouraging to see John Egan back in the saddle after he rode him to win his maiden at Chelmsford back in September. Last month’s third at Kempton was needed and it’s hoped the step up to a mile can bring about further improvement in the son of Spring At Last.
Veena is a thriving filly right now and is well worth keeping on side in the £10 Free Bet At 32Red.com Fillies’ Handicap.
He is David Simcock’s only runner on the Saturday card but he’s sent a few up to Newcastle in what has been a busy week for the track and the yard’s runners have not been performing badly.
The one to look out for early next week is Perfect Moment, who is going to take plenty of beating if taking up her engagement in Lingfield’s Free Horse Racing Tips At Tipsterreviews.co.uk Standard Open National Hunt Flat Race.
She was heavily punted first time out but just ran out of gas at Wetherby after racing up with the pace. She’s pleased Don Cantillon in her work since and the yard are hopeful the Milan filly can swiftly recoup those losses.
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.
