How can I get woodpeckers to leave my house alone?

How can I get woodpeckers to leave my house alone?

Once you know why woodpeckers are hammering on your house, you can develop strategies for stopping them. Take a look at Can Woodpecker Deterrents Safeguard My House? for ideas on how to deal with troublesome woodpeckers.Wood Pecker Problems

Researchers at the Lab of Ornithology have performed studies relating nuisance woodpeckers. One study, External characteristics of houses prone to woodpecker damage, found that lighter colored aluminum and vinyl sidings are less likely to be damaged by woodpeckers. Another paper, Assessment of Management Techniques to Reduce Woodpecker Damage to Homes, tested six common long-term woodpecker deterrents: life-sized plastic owls with paper wings, reflective streamers, plastic eyes strung on fishing line, roost boxes, suet feeders, and a sound system which broadcasts woodpecker distress calls followed by the call of a hawk. Researchers found that nothing deterred woodpeckers all the time, and only the streamers worked with any consistency.

Homeowners have reported some success deterring woodpeckers with windsocks, pinwheels, helium balloons (shiny, bright Mylar balloons are especially effective), strips of aluminum foil, or reflective tape. Other people keep woodpeckers away by covering an affected area with burlap or attaching bird netting (the kind designed for gardens and fruit trees) from overhanging eaves to the siding. If you use netting, make sure it is taut and set at least 3 inches from the siding to avoid birds pecking through it. Close off openings on the sides to prevent birds from becoming trapped between the netting and the house.

You may also want to plug the holes with wood putty to discourage further activity. If a woodpecker has dug a roost hole into your house, make sure there are no birds inside before sealing it up.

Never use any sticky “repellent,” such as Tanglefoot Pest Control, Roost-No-More, or Bird Stop, outdoors. These types of products can fatally injure birds and other animals.

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Revival of the Passenger Pigeon?

Revival of the Passenger Pigeon?

Revival of the Passenger Pigeon? Not to be confused with the carrier pigeon (a domesticated bird trained to transport messages), the passenger pigeon is believed to have constituted 25 to 40 percent of the total U.S. bird population at one time. Its main nesting area was in the region of the Great Lakes and east to New York, where it relied on mixed hardwood forests to protect and sustain its massive flocks of up to 5 million birds at a time on a diet of beechnuts, acorns, chestnuts, seeds and berries, along with worms and insects in the spring and summer. Passenger pigeons built low-hanging, flimsy nests that often left eggs on the ground, but were able to successfully reproduce thanks to their sheer numbers: Predators such as raccoons, foxes, possums, hawks, eagles and snakes could gorge themselves on pigeon eggs without exhausting the supply.Passenger pigeon

This system, known as “predator satiation,” quickly broke down when humans became the species’ primary predator. Though humans had long used passenger pigeons for food to some extent, and farmers had killed them for causing damage to crops in such huge numbers, this didn’t reduce their numbers–until a mass slaughter by professional hunters began in the 1800s. Ironically, the birds were particularly vulnerable to such hunting because they nested in such large numbers. With no laws restricting the number of pigeons killed or the way they were taken, hunters placed baited traps or decoys, shot at nesting sites, knocked the birds out of their nests with long sticks or placed pots of burning sulphur under the trees so that fumes would daze the pigeons and cause them to drop out of their nests.

By the 1850s, hundreds of thousands of passenger pigeons were being killed for private consumption or sale, sometimes for as little as 50 cents a dozen. The cheap pigeon meat was fed to slaves, among others. By 1860, people noticed that the number of passenger pigeons had decreased, but no action was taken to stop the mass killing. Passenger pigeons had largely disappeared from American skies by the early 1890s, and the last known sighting in the wild occurred in 1900. “Martha,” the last known surviving passenger pigeon, lived all of her 29 years at the Cincinnati Zoological Society. After her death in 1914, she was frozen into a 300-pound block of ice and shipped to the Smithsonian Institution, where she was mounted for display as part of the museum’s bird collection, one of the largest in the world.

Now, nearly a century after Martha’s death, scientists believe they can bring her species back to life, using techniques worthy of the 1990s science-fiction/action blockbuster “Jurassic Park.” With funding from Revive and Restore, a group dedicated to the de-extinction of recently lost species, the young biologist Ben J. Novak is spearheading efforts to use DNA taken from passenger pigeon specimens in museums and fill it in with fragments from a living species, the band-tailed pigeon. The reconstituted genome would then be inserted into a band-tailed pigeon stem cell, creating a germ cell (an egg-and-sperm precursor). When the germ cell is injected into young band-tailed pigeons and these pigeons reproduce, their offspring would come as close as possible to expressing the passenger pigeon genes. The “de-extinction” process is different from cloning, in that it uses a variety of DNA from different passenger pigeons, meaning that the offspring produced would be as unique as any bird from an original passenger pigeon flock.

Most experts acknowledge that recreating the passenger pigeon in this way is technically possible, based on the success scientists have had mapping the woolly mammoth genome by using elephant DNA, among other experiments. But significant challenges still exist, particularly when it comes to reintroducing the passenger pigeon into the wild, given the vastly different ecosystem it would encounter in the modern world. Much of the bird’s breeding and wintering habitats are gone due to deforestation, and its primary breeding season food (beech mast, the nuts of a beech tree) now exists only in limited quantities. And with likely flocks of only a few thousand of the new pigeons (as opposed to 5 million) the species’ mass tactics of survival wouldn’t be able to protect them from predators.

Novak, for one, told the Washington Post that he believes people are sufficiently committed to the de-extinction of the passenger pigeon to overcome such obstacles. History may help his cause, as the extinction of the passenger pigeon did play a significant role in arousing public interest in the need for stronger conservation laws. In any case, only time will tell, as scientists estimate it will take at least a decade to produce a flock of new passenger pigeons large enough to release into the wild.

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Japanese pigeon skips local race, lands on Vancouver Island instead

Japanese pigeon skips local race, lands on Vancouver Island instead

Japanese pigeon skips local race, lands on Vancouver Island instead

A Japanese racing pigeon truly went the distance, after he overshot a 1,000-kilometre race in his native country and instead traveled across the Pacific Ocean and ended up on Vancouver Island.

The remarkable bird was tracked back to Japan, where he was released May 10 in the northern province of Hokkaido to take part in a local race.

The one-year-old bird was set to compete along with 8,000 other pigeons in his native land, but instead was discovered on June 6 at Canadian Forces Base Comox near Courtenay, B.C.

The bird was turned over to the Mountainaire Avian Rescue Society, where staff nursed him back to health.

Maj Birch, founder and manager of MARS, told CTVNews.ca Friday that the male bird was very ill.

“He was very weak, very thin and we did a test and found that he had a very heavy parasite load,” she said, adding that the bird was treated with a combination of fluids, food and medication.

Birch said she is not sure how the pigeon was able to make the trans-Pacific crossing, or which route he took. She added that this is not the first bird from Japan to end up on British Columbia’s shores.

“We don’t actually know whether he took that route or whether he managed to catch a freighter or several freighters” she said.

“There’s no way of knowing that, so we can only imagine that he had a wonderful journey,” she said with a laugh. “Because he was found at our air force base, maybe he rode the plane.”

Thanks to a tag on the bird’s leg, the society was able to identify and later contact the owner of the champion pigeon.

Owner Hiroyasu Takasu said he was shocked to hear the bird had survived.

“(Birds) usually reach their limit in a week, with no food or water. This is a superior pigeon,” he told ABC News.

He noted that only around 20 per cent of the birds that raced last month were able to finish the race.

He added that the bird was never given a name, because pigeons are only named after they return home.

However, Takasu declined to have the bird returned to Japan by plane, citing fears that excessive travel might put added strain on its health.

This led to some initial searching to find the pigeon a home, as he is essentially considered an “illegal alien” who arrived on Canadian shores without being imported, Birch said.

“I was concerned that there may be issues in trying to find a home for him here,” she said, adding that the society is not a sanctuary but a rehabilitation centre.

Luckily, an official with the Mid-Island Racing Club in Nanaimo, B.C. has agreed to adopt the bird. The club is reportedly considering breeding it to produce more “superior” pigeons.

This may be a smart move, as it was the pigeon mother who reportedly won the local Japanese race.

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Pigeon King scam, 7-year prison term for Galbraith

Pigeon King scam, 7-year prison term for Galbraith

Pigeon King scam, 7-year prison term for Galbraith.

KITCHENER – The folksy force behind a huge pigeon-breeding scam targeting conservative religious communities was sentenced Tuesday to seven years in prison.

Arlan Galbraith, 67, was convicted of fraud for luring hundreds of Canadian and U.S. farmers – mostly Mennonites, Amish and Hutterites – to raise birds at lucrative buy-back prices.

Investors lost an estimated $20 million when Pigeon King International, based in offices in a Waterloo commercial plaza, collapsed under its own weight in the summer of 2008.

Galbraith, who got his hands dirty and often did media interviews in overalls, insisted the eight-year-old business was a legitimate venture that was sabotaged by critics jealous of his success.

But after a month-long trial in Superior Court in Kitchener at which he entertained onlookers while representing himself, jurors concluded otherwise in December.

They accepted the prosecution’s contention the business was an unsustainable pyramid scheme that required more and more new investors to pay existing ones.

Crown attorney Lynn Robinson, who argued for up to 12 years in prison, called a former salesperson for the company to explain why Galbraith targeted traditional communities for sales.

Bill Top, who later resigned and actively warned people about the pigeon scam, said he once heard Galbraith and his former wife ridiculing those groups for their simple lifestyles.

“The strongest comment he made … was they were aliens and he didn’t know why they would live that way in this day and age,” Top told the hearing. “He thought it was a joke.

“It was business. It was money in his pocket. I don’t know if there was a

While promoting the scheme, Galbraith portrayed himself as the saviour of the family farm for giving farmers an opportunity to make money breeding pigeons.

Under the terms of five or 10-year contracts, he agreed to buy all the offspring back at rates virtually guaranteeing lucrative profits.

Early investors were told he intended to sell pigeons to hobbyists interested in them for sport.

But by the end of the scheme, Galbraith’s pitch had morphed into establishing a vast network of breeders to process baby pigeons for meat and rival the chicken industry.

Although he had plans drawn up for a plant in a remote area of northern Ontario, it was still years away from being built.

In the meantime, Galbraith’s obligations under the buy-back deals had mushroomed to more than $350 million.

Had investors been found to cover that amount, jurors were told, the commitment over the next decade would have been more than $3 billion.

Despite bringing in $42 million in the last four years, Galbraith also went personally bankrupt after the collapse of the company. As a result, there was no hope of restitution for victims.

“There is no money at the end of the rainbow to give back to these folks,” Robinson said.

After ignoring pointed advice from judges and representing himself at the complicated trial, Galbraith finally hired a lawyer for the sentencing.

David North stressed Galbraith didn’t live a lavish lifestyle or sock away money, redistributing it instead to other investors. Farmers who got in on the deal early actually made money.

Arguing for a sentence of less than six years, he also said Galbraith has lost up to 40 pounds since going into custody following his conviction.

“It would be a crushing sentence for someone who is quickly becoming an old man,” North said of the prosecution’s call for nine to 12 years. “And to what end, to what end?”

Looking gaunt and worn in a dark suit hanging off his frame, Galbraith was uncharacteristically silent when given that opportunity to address Justice Gerry Taylor before the prison term was imposed.

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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.

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homing pigeon mystery solved

homing pigeon mystery solved

Homing pigeon mystery solved. According to Keeton, a mystery of pigeon released at Castor Hill and the town of Weedsport consistently took the same wrong turn when they departed. Meanwhile, birds that were released from Jersey Hill tended to head off in random directions, but with one exception: all of the birds that departed from the hill on 13 August 1969 returned home successfully having taken the correct bearing. Explaining that Keeton had already ruled out the possibility of a disturbance in the local magnetic field, Hagstrum recalls, ‘Bill asked if we geologists had an idea what might be going on at these sites’.Pigeon Mystery

Several years after Keeton’s lecture Hagstrum came up with a possible solution to the problem when he read that pigeons can hear incredibly low frequency ‘infrasound’. Explaining that infrasound — which can generated by minute vibrations in the planet surface caused by waves deep in the ocean — travels for thousands of kilometers, Hagstrum wondered whether homing pigeons are listening for the distinctive low frequency rumble of their loft area to find their bearing home. In which case, birds that could not hear the infrasound signal, because the release site was shielded from it in some way, could not get their bearing and would get lost. Hagstrum decided to investigate the meteorological conditions on the days of unsuccessful releases to find out if there was something in the air that could explain the pigeons’ disorientation. In The Journal of Experimental Biology, he publishes his discovery that Keeton’s lost pigeons could not hear the infrasound signal from their home loft because it was diverted by the atmosphere.

However, to make this discovery, Hagstrum had to first reconstruct the atmospheric conditions on the days when pigeons had been released from the three locations. Having successfully installed a complex acoustics program — HARPA — with the help of USGS computer scientist Larry Baker and using accurate temperature, wind direction and speed measurements taken at local weather stations on those days, Hagstrum reconstructed the atmospheric conditions. Then, he calculated how infra sound travelled from the loft through the atmosphere, refracting through layers in the air and bouncing off the ground, to find out if Jersey Hill was shaded from the loft’s infra sound homing beacon and how the signal from the loft was channeled by the wind and local terrain to Castor Hill and Weedsport.

Amazingly, on all of the days when the birds vanished from Jersey Hill, Hagstrum could see that the loft’s infrasonic signal was guided away from the ground and high into the atmosphere: the birds could not pick it up. However, on 13 August 1969, the atmospheric conditions were perfect and this time the infrasonic signal was guided directly to the Jersey Hill site. And when he calculated the paths that the loft’s infrasonic signal traveled to Castor Hill and Weedsport they also explained why the birds consistently took the wrong bearing. The terrain and winds had diverted the infra sound so that it approached the release site from the wrong direction, sending the birds off on the wrong bearing.

Explaining that the birds must use the loft’s infrasonic homing beacon to get their bearing before setting the direction for their return flight according to their sun compass, Hagstrum says, ‘I am a bit surprised that after 36 years I finally answered Bill Keeton’s question to the Cornell Geology Department’, adding that he is particularly pleased that he was able to use Keeton’s own data to solve the pigeon mystery.

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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.

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Rare pigeon heist in Abbotsford

Rare pigeon heist in Abbotsford

Rare pigeon heist in Abbotsforda group of pigeons

Police have charged a 29-year-old Abbotsford man with stealing some rare pigeons, and they believe he may be part of a ring responsible for numerous livestock and fowl thefts in the Fraser Valley.

William James Balice was arrested on Canada Day after 365 birds, mostly pigeons, were reported stolen June 28 from a farm in the 2700 block of Lefeuvre Road. He has been charged with possession of stolen property and break and enter.

Abbotsford Police Const. Ian MacDonald said the stolen purebred pigeons are highly sought-after by the bird-show community and sell for $60 to $100 per bird.  The breeds taken included the American Roller, the Muffed Tumbler, the West of England Tumbler and Helmet.

Balice was allegedly found in possession of some of the birds, and had listed them for sale on craigslist.

MacDonald said the rarity of the pigeons made them easy to identify, but tracking down the other missing animals has been more difficult.

Abbotsford Police created a position, called LEO (livestock enforcement officer), to deal specifically with the thefts of chickens, pigeons, ducks, goats and sheep.

The incidents began last fall. Two Abbotsford sites were hit in November and February, resulting in the heist of 5,300 pigeons that are sold as meat — known as squab – for $4 to $10 each.

Also this year, close to 20 Boer goats were taken from a property on Downes Road, and hundreds of chickens were stolen from two Abbotsford farms at the end of May.

In Langley, the thefts included 22 lambs, six ducks and 65 chickens from three properties in March. One of those farms was also targeted in December, when 17 ducks were taken.

A farm in Chilliwack was hit in November, when seven pregnant goats were stolen. Six of them were later located on a property in Langley. At the time, Chilliwack RCMP estimated that 60 goats had been swiped from the community.

Balice next appears in Abbotsford provincial court on Friday on the charges related to the pigeon heist. He is also scheduled to plead guilty that day to a previous charge (from March 18) of driving while prohibited.

Balice is also among a group of five charged with break and enter, theft and trespassing in Maple Ridge on March 29, and is next due in Port Coquitlam provincial court on July 13.

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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.

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