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City councilor calls for action against ‘dangerous’ pigeons

A Taipei City councilor on Sunday urged the government to deal with the noise and environmental pollution caused by pigeons at the Da-an Public Housing project, which she said “severely endangered” public health and affected the living quality of residents.

“The seemingly harmless pigeons, which come in flocks to nest on the eaves, have become a nightmare for the people living here,” said Taipei City Councilor Lin Yi-hua (林奕華) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT).

DROPPINGS

Lin said the pigeons nesting on the buildings come mainly from nearby Da-an Forest Park and that their droppings posed a significant health hazard to the elderly and children.

“Every pigeon produces 12kg of droppings per year,” she said. “Research shows that pigeon feces contain Cryptococcus neoformans, a kind of fungus that can cause pneumonia and meningitis,” said Wong Wing-wai (王永衛), director of the city’s Division for Disease Control and Prevention.

“People with weak immune systems, such as the elderly and children, are the most susceptible,” he said.

NO HELP

Residents in the area said that the pigeons had been a problem for more than 20 years, but through all those years the city authorities have done nothing to help them get rid of the birds.

“Every day at about 5am the pigeons wake us up,” said Chow Yin-hua, an elderly resident.

“Their feces are not only smelly but also impossible to clean, as they are on unreachable windowsills and eaves on the outside of the building,” she said.

The residents said the city government should get rid of the pigeons.

“Strategies like spikes and nets have had little success,” Chow said.

NO FEEDING

Lin said the government should begin by making it illegal to feed pigeons, which could help control the number of birds in the area.

She said that some cities in the US, such as Los Angeles, had tried to reduce their pigeon populations by lacing rooftop feeders with drugs that make the birds infertile.

The drug, OvoControl P, interferes with egg production and helps control the size of the population without using poisons or electric fencing, the New York Times reported.

“Every big city, such as New York and London, has a pigeon problem like this,” Lin said.

“The Taipei City Government should begin to take this problem seriously because there are no effective measures or restrictions in place right now,” she said.

She said the government should study measures in other cities and draw up a plan to tackle the problem.
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