Probably the second-worst thing that ever happened to pigeons was Woody Allen calling them “rats with wings” in 1980, prompting a bad reputation that the birds just haven’t been able to get rid of. (The worst thing that ever happened to pigeons was the extinction of the carrier pigeon in the late 1800s/early 1900s. These pigeons once existed in such multitudes, they would darken the sky for hours as they flew overhead; sadly, their sheer numbers led to a carefree attitude in hunting them, and they went from a population of millions to zero in a short time span.)
Contrary to popular belief, pigeons are quite interesting, useful animals. They were domesticated thousands of years ago (Darwin, in fact, was a little obsessed with pigeons), can be trained as athletes (called “racing pigeons”), mate for life (aww!), and have evolved to be able to digest a much wider variety of food than their ancestors. More recently, scientists in the U.S. and England have utilized pigeons to help collect data on air quality by strapping tiny, pigeon-sized backpacks onto the pigeons’ backs and tracking the data as the birds fly around.
They’re more reliable than your car’s GPS
Probably one of the most famous cool things about pigeons is their ability to always find their way home. You’ve probably heard of “homing pigeons” before, right? But how do they do it? Past studies have investigated the roles of olfactory cues, sun and magnetic compasses, and the use of long, linear landmarks such as roads, railway lines, and rivers. Interestingly enough, despite hundreds of years of research on the matter, there still doesn’t appear to be a consensus on how exactly pigeons have such an uncanny sense of direction.
In 2013, a study in the Journal of Experimental Biology found that homing pigeons use low-frequency sound waves, called infrasound waves, to make an acoustic mental map of their location. The researcher examined 14 years’ worth of data from 45,000 pigeons to determine that the only times the birds got lost were when these infrasound waves, due to wind or difficult terrain, were unable to reach the pigeons’ home loft. This sound block appears to have inhibited the birds’ ability to figure out their orientation relative to home, indicating that sound plays an important role in their ability to find their way home.
But in a 2015 study in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, scientists found that vision, too, plays a major role in homing pigeons’ abilities. The left and right halves of bird brains are thought to act more autonomously than ours, because they don’t have a corpus callosum, the part of the brain that passes information between brain hemispheres. So for this study, the researchers placed eye patches on first one, then the other, of the birds’ eyes to see how limited vision might affect their sense of direction. Two groups of birds were trained to return home, first with the left eye covered or first with the right eye covered. The pigeons formed new routes after switching eyes, meaning that their brain hemispheres do indeed learn and act independently.
It’s worth nothing that, despite having full use of both eyes and ears, plus the ability to read a map, I can recount multiple instances wherein I panicked because I was “lost,” only to find out I was within two or three blocks of home. Multiple instances, you guys. I would be a terrible pigeon.
They can detect cancer
So, pigeons have built-in GPSs. You still seem unimpressed. Well, did you know that pigeons can also detect cancer? Aha, now I’ve got your attention!
It’s true: a 2015 study in PLOS ONE found that pigeons, with a little training, can distinguish breast tissue from tumors on biopsy slides. The researchers showed 16 pigeons touchscreen images of microscope slides of either benign or malignant breast tissue, and within two weeks, the pigeons had achieved 85% accuracy in identifying malignancies. Interestingly, if the assessments of multiple pigeons on each slide were added together (the researchers called this “flock-sourcing,” which may be the cutest adaption of crowdsourcing I’ve ever seen), accuracy reached 99%. The pigeons had a harder time identifying suspicious masses in mammogram images, which, to be fair, is something doctors have trouble with too, even after of years of training.
Nonetheless, this suggests that pigeons could be used as trained medical image observers and could help researchers figure out better ways to train pathologists and computer systems by determining the impact of color, contrast, brightness, and image compression artifacts on diagnostic performance.
They’re highly intelligent
Which brings me back to my original point: pigeons are actually highly intelligent creatures. A 1995 study in the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior found that pigeons could distinguish between paintings by Monet and Picasso (though the study didn’t determine which artist the pigeons preferred, so we may never know if they’re more into cubism or impressionism). A 2008 study in Animal Cognition found that pigeons, like large-brained primates, recognize themselves in mirrors and videos.
In a study presented at the 2011 Society for Experimental Biology Annual Conference, researchers determined that feral, untrained pigeons can recognize individual people and are not fooled by a change of clothes. Two researchers, of similar build and skin color, wearing different-colored lab coats that covered most of their bodies, fed pigeons in a park. One of the researchers ignored the pigeons, whereas the other researcher shooed the pigeons away; in subsequent sessions, even when the “hostile” researcher acted neutrally toward the pigeons or switched lab coats with the other researcher, the pigeons recognized and avoided the “hostile” researcher.
Lest you think this is a one-off occurrence, a 2012 study in Avian Biology Research confirmed that pigeons can recognize a person they have encountered before, based strictly on facial characteristics. The researchers trained a group of pigeons to distinguish between photographs of familiar and unfamiliar objects. These pigeons, along with a control group that had not been trained, were then shown photographs of pairs of human faces, one familiar and one the pigeons had not previously seen. The trained birds were able to recognize and classify the familiar people using only their faces, whereas the birds without prior training failed.
So, to recap, pigeons can identify cancer, recognize human faces, and find their way home. Which leaves me with one burning question: do they also play fetch?
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 Bird Gel and the best Ultrasonic and audible sound devices on the market today.
Voted Best Canadian wholesaler for Bird Deterrent products ten years in a row.
Pigeon/Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosting / Vancouver Pigeon Control /Bird Spikes / Bird Control / Bird Deterrent / Pigeon Deterrent? Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest /Seagull deterrent / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons/ What to do about pigeons/ sparrows , Damage by Sparrows, How To Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests/ De-fence / Pigeon Nesting/ Bird Droppings / Pigeon Dropping/ woodpecker control/ Professional Bird Control Company/ Keep The Birds Away/ Birds/rats/ seagull/pigeon/woodpecker/ dove/sparrow/pidgeon control/pidgeon problem/ pidgeon control/flying rats/ pigeon Problems/ bird netting/bird gel/bird spray/bird nails/ bird guardContact us at 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD, (604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Are you a business owner or property owner that has a bird problem on your premises? Then this is the blog for you!
Here are reasons you should get bird netting!
Bird netting is set up to prevent birds from reaching certain areas, encouraging them to move on to an easier roosting place. Netting can keep birds off windowsills, rooftops, away from your ventilation and roof top air conditioning units. It can take a professional to know just where to place the netting so that it will be the most productive and the least noticeable for customers.
The benefits of using Bird Netting?
Netting is a great solution against pretty much any type of birds, especially the likes of pigeons and gulls, sparrows and starlings, who are known to cause problems
Bird netting is highly versatile and can be fitted to pretty much any size that you need to cover
Bird netting protect structures
Netting is environmentally safe and can withstand a wide range of environmental conditions
Netting can last many years
Netting is virtually invisible when installed correctly
Bird netting or anti-bird netting is a form of bird pest control. It is a net used to prevent birds from reaching certain areas.
Bird protection netting comes in a variety of shapes and forms, The most common is a small mesh (1 or 2 cm squares) either extruded and bi-oriented polypropylene or woven polyethylene.
The color most used is black (as the carbon black UV inhibitor offers the best protection against solar rays), but also bird netting may be available in other colors like white (usually white netting is woven or knitted and has an even smaller mesh size as it will serve as a double purpose anti-hail net for the protection of fruits during summer hail storms or late spring during flowering) or green (usually used in home gardening and mostly sold at retail outlets for the DIY farmers).
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.
Contact us at 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD, (604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon / Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosting / Vancouver Pigeon Patrol / Bird Control / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons/ What to do about pigeons/ most common types of sparrows , Damages Caused by Sparrows, How To Keep Raccoons Away, Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests?de-fence, Pigeon Nesting and Breeding Patterns and Behavior What Do I Do With a Bird Trapped in My Wall? Professional Bird Control Company Keep The Birds Away From Your Business Why Are Raccoons Considered Pests?
It starts as a slight scratching. You suspect mice or rats at first until you hear the faint tweeting that means only one thing: A bird has become trapped behind your wall. Unfortunately, getting the bird out is a lot harder for you than it was for it to get in. Accept that it will probably mean cutting a hole in your wall. You also need to figure out where the bird got in and cover the hole with a metal screen to prevent it from happening again.
Lure It Out
Luring a bird out of a wall sounds logical. The bird got itself in, therefore it should be able to get itself out. This can work in some cases, but usually the bird becomes trapped between two walls and doesn’t have enough room to fly. If it sounds like the bird is moving up and down in the walls and you know where it entered, you can try luring it out. Place a bright light near the entrance to the wall since birds often fly toward light. Open any windows in the room and close it off to other areas of your house. Playing recorded birdsong near the entrance can help assure the bird that it is safe to come out; otherwise keep it very quiet in that room. Placing birdseed near the hole won’t work because birds have a poor sense of smell. If the bird is not out within a few hours, it probably can’t get out on its own.
Cut It Out
If you have the right tools and some construction experience, you can try to free the bird yourself by cutting a large hole in the wall above the bird. Cut shallowly into the drywall to avoid cutting into the electrical wires. Make the cut neat to make patching the wall easier. Once the piece of the wall is removed, the bird may fly out suddenly. Open any windows and doors to the outside to allow it to escape. If it doesn’t fly out, reach in with a gloved hand and carefully pick it up. Don’t release it until you are outside.
Call In an Expert
The safest, simplest method of dealing with a trapped bird is to call in a professional wildlife control expert. Look in the phone book under “pest control” or “animal removal services” to find one. Although they will charge a fee, they will get the animal out with the least amount of damage to your wall and home. In some cases, the cost of paying for animal control is less than paying a contractor to repair the damage done to your home.
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. source
Contact us at 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD, (604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon / Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosting / Vancouver Pigeon Patrol / Bird Control / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons/ What to do about pigeons/ most common types of sparrows , Damages Caused by Sparrows, How To Keep Raccoons Away, de-fence, Pigeon Nesting and Breeding Patterns and Behavior What Do I Do With a Bird Trapped in My Wall?
Nest building is very simple and often consists of a few stiff twigs. The male will pick the site. They prefer small flat areas away from the ground. Look for nests along building ledges, bridge supports, air conditioning units, window sills, and the like. In crowded flocks, pigeons will even forgo nest building and lay eggs directly on a protected ledge. The young are fed pigeon milk, a liquid/solid substance secreted in the crop of the adult (both male and female) which is regurgitated. More eggs are laid before the first clutch leaves the nest. Breeding may occur at all seasons, but peak reproduction occurs in the spring and fall.
Pigeon Breeding
Pigeon are monogamous and a mating pair will typically have three or four broods a year. The female will usually lay two or sometimes three eggs at a time. The eggs are a solid bright white color. The eggs take roughly 18 days to hatch and then another 35 days before the fledglings leave the nest. Breeding may occur at all seasons, but peak reproduction occurs in the spring and fall. A population of pigeons usually consists of equal numbers of males and females.
Pigeon Cycles
Pigeons are not migratory. Their natural instinct is to stay near their birth site. This trait gives the pigeon a very determined personality when it comes to roosting at a particular site, much to the dismay of the inexperienced pest control technician. The daily cycle of a pigeon is to roost at night, feed in the morning, and loaf in the afternoon. The seasonal cycle begins with courtship in the early winter, then nest building in late winter and breeding in the spring. However, in warm climates, breeding will occur year round. Pigeons molt once a year in late summer.
Life Expectancy: Varies greatly from 3-5 years through to 15 years dependent on many factors, including natural predation and human interference. Predation: The wild pigeon is predated upon, almost exclusively, by the peregrine falcon, a bird that is also found living and breeding in coastal regions.
Behaviour
As gregarious animals, feral pigeons tend to nest in flocks. Once they settle, they tend to nest at the same place for the rest of their lives. Pigeons are extraordinarily intelligent. Even when removed from the nest, they will return back to it. The distance doesn’t play a role—pigeons have “built-in” compasses in their bodies which provide tremendous help with orientation. No matter how far away from their home they are released, they will still find their way back.
Feral pigeons breed rapidly. They lay two eggs, up to six times a year—depending on the food available. If a local population is decreased, pigeons from other areas flock to take advantage of the abundance of food. Thus, poison often causes population boom rather than decrease. source
What Attracts Pigeons
Basically there are two things that attract pigeons to your house or garden:
Food: Pigeons are not very pretentious when it comes to food. They could eat various scraps, leftovers, seeds, your dog/cats food, anything left behind. So don’t leave anything food-worthy in your garden.
Living space: the attic or the air space between last floor and roof is the perfect place for a pigeon to live. Close all entrances if you don’t want to have pigeon droppings and insects feeding with them.
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.
Contact us at 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD, (604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon / Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosting / Vancouver Pigeon Patrol / Bird Control / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons/ What to do about pigeons/ most common types of sparrows , Damages Caused by Sparrows, How To Keep Raccoons Away, de-fence, Pigeon Nesting and Breeding Patterns and Behavior
Avians aren’t the source of COVID-19, but some do harbor pathogens that can infect humans. Here’s what you need to know and how to stay safe.
COVID-19, the viral disease gripping the globe, is not bird-related. Researchers believe it likely came from bats. Still, this pandemic understandably provokes fear about wildlife diseases and so provides an opportunity to clear up confusion surrounding the question, “can birds get you sick?”
Karel Schat, professor emeritus of avian virology at Cornell University, says that birds generally pose a “very limited threat to humans,” at least not directly. If you want to admire the birds from afar in your backyard or your local park, you don’t have to worry about contagion. But if you are in contact with a bird with its excretions such as feces or saliva (that includes filling bird feeders), he advises observing common hygiene practices, including not touching your face and washing your hands right after. That’s because birds can carry some viral, bacterial, or fungal pathogens that cause human illness—think Salmonella or West Nile Virus. And if you see a dead bird, stay away from it and don’t touch it, he says (though you may consider reporting it to your state or local wildlife agency, which can come to remove it and may be tracking dead animal clusters).
Wild birds do also pass diseases to farm animals and vice versa, and that can pose the more indirect threat to human health. One of the most well-known examples of this is with avian influenza. A recent outbreak of a bird flu on a quail farm in the Philippines, for example, resulted in the culling of 17,000 quail to stop the spread.
Bird flu strains live in a bird’s gut and become exposed in fecal matter. Birds being birds, they may peck at their droppings and become infected that way. In more confined settings, like on an industrial farm or in a dense colony, airborne fecal particles can find their way into a bird’s eyes or respiratory tract, offering another avenue for infection. That is how bird flu spreads among birds.
Few strains of bird flu can cause serious harm to humans, and none are currently active in the United States, says Schat. “Fortunately, the transmission of those avian influenza virus strains from human to human has been fairly limited,” Schat says. “But it is a continuous problem that is in the chickens, it is in the ducks, and maybe in some wild birds, and it can always get to humans.”
The particularly deadly avian flu H5N1 strain, however, has occurred intermittently across Asia since 2004. It has led to 455 human deaths from about 861 recorded cases, mostly across the Middle East and East Asia, according to the World Health Organization (there have been no cases in the United States). These sporadic cases are largely in people who have close contact with infected live or dead birds, often before home slaughter— and spread from person-to-person is unusual, the health agency says. Still, health officials closely monitor for outbreaks and mutations of H5N1.
In general, it is contact with other animals, including humans, that gives any wildlife viruses— including coronaviruses and avian influenza— the best chance to mutate and shift into new strains. These types of interactions, however, mostly occur in settings that include many different species of animals in close proximity, like a live animal market. Habitat loss may also increase the amount of interaction between wild animals, farm animals, and humans. Even with these ample opportunities to interact with other species and mutate, avian influenza viruses seldom change into anything that poses significant risk for humans, says Schat. Still, given that deadly influenza outbreaks have occurred, the risk is always there, though it is lessened when birds are not kept with other species.
Birds, of course, do carry other diseases they spread amongst themselves (this is why it’s important to keep your bird feeders clean). For example, Newcastle disease, a virus common in chickens but also found in more than 200 bird species, is a well-known scourge that inflicts flu-like symptoms along with severe eye irritation in birds. Though it is mostly found in poultry, Newcastle was hampering Toronto’s Cormorant population as recently as 2018. While Newcastle is a nasty bug for birds, it does not pose a significant threat to humans. Birds also carry coronaviruses, but not the one that causes COVID-19. For example, the coronavirus that causes avian infectious bronchitis is a well-known scourge in the poultry industry, and many chickens are vaccinated against it, according to Schat.
Beyond influenza, the biggest virological threat birds can pose to humans is from the West Nile Virus, which has been in the United States since 1999. It is likely that an infected mosquito, surviving a flight from somewhere in the Middle East, brought the disease to the U.S., says Schat. Over time, this mosquito must have infected at least one bird by feeding on it, thereby making it a carrier for more mosquitoes to feed on and become infected as well. As the virus moved from this “mosquito zero” to birds, and to other mosquitoes feeding on those birds, particularly crows and jays, it eventually spread to humans. In 1999, hundreds of birds and seven people around the New York-New Jersey area died from the virus, but it continues to kill today. In the past year, per the CDC, 51 people died of West Nile in the United States.
So, while close contact with bird poop may not be a part of the everyday experience of most people, mosquitoes are a constant threat during the summer in many parts of the world, and they can serve as a conduit between birds and humans.
Overall, the lesson is: Whether you handle wild birds, or you admire them for afar, getting infected by one is something you probably don’t have to worry about, just as long as you maintain the same hygienic habits you’re probably already sticking to in this time of COVID-19. In other words, wash your hands and don’t touch your face. And please, unless you’re a scientist or trained worker with a purpose, leave the bird poop or any dead birds alone.
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.
Contact us at 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD, (604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon / Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosting / Vancouver Pigeon Patrol / Bird Control / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons/ What to do about pigeons/ most common types of sparrows , Damages Caused by Sparrows, How To Keep Raccoons Away, de-fence,
Ever heard of ice pigeons? No? keep on reading to find out what they are!
Ice Pigeons
The Ice pigeon is a breed of fancy pigeon developed over many years of selective breeding. Ice pigeons, along with other varieties of domesticated pigeons, are all descendants from the rock pigeon. In 1846, Charles Darwin is known to have crossbred the Ice pigeon in order to ascertain colour patterns.
it is one of the oldest of the German color pigeon breeds and was developed over many years of selective breeding.The breed is actually from the South Germany. And it was first developed in the region from eastern Germany to western Poland, with most early breeding in Saxony and Silesia.
Where Do They Live?
And it was first developed in the region from eastern Germany to western Poland, with most early breeding in Saxony and Silesia. The Ice pigeon and other varieties of domesticated pigeons, all are descendants from the wild or feral rock pigeon.
Appearance
This pigeon is an average sized bird which is named and known for it’s ‘ice-blue’ coloration. It’s head is slightly oblong, and have smooth head.
It has several varieties, which are differing in the type and color of their wing pattern. But the basic color of these birds is a pale grey.
Eyes of these birds are of different color depending on the variety. The black barred and checked version has orange to yellow orange colored eyes. And all other varieties have black eyes.
Ice Pigeon | Breed Profile
Breed Name
Ice
Other Name
Polish: Lazurek; German: Eistaube
Breed Purpose
Exhibition, ornamental, pets
Special Notes
Beautiful, calm and gentle in nature, good for ornamental purpose, good for exhibition, good for raising as pets
Breed Class
Small to medium
Climate Tolerance
All climates
Flying Ability
Average
As Pets
Good
Color
Many
Rarity
Common
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.
Contact us at 1- 877– 4– NO-BIRD, (604) 585-9279 or visit our website at www.pigeonpatrol.ca
Pigeon / Pigeon Patrol / Pigeons Roosting / Vancouver Pigeon Patrol / Bird Control / Surrey Pigeon Control / Pest / Vancouver Pigeon Blog / Birds Inside Home / Pigeons in the cities / Ice Pigeons
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About Pigeon Patrol:
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