In Sale town centre there are signs on all the lamp posts asking people not to feed the pigeons because they are a health hazard.
This has more or less cleared all but the most optimistic of the flying rats from the centre
So today I’m sat outside the coffee shop, it’s cold but bright and I’m enjoying my coffee.
Along trots Miss Dozy McStupid with a sodding great bag of breadcrumbs and other assorted goodies and proceeds to scatter this crap on the ground outside the coffee shop…for fucks sake woman are you daft?
In next to no time there are dozens of pigeons fluttering around, crapping and spreading god knows what else all over the place. :mad:
The coffee shop owner comes outside:
CSO: “What the hell are you doing, can’t you read?”
DMcS: “They are all gods creatures, and they need feeding” :dubious:
CSO: “Look, just bugger off and take your breadcrumbs with you”
DMcS: “Have you no pity for the poor wildlife” :smack:
CSO: “Wildlife? wildlife?..pigeons are a health risk, they carry all manner of disease”
CSO then walks back into shop and returns with a broom and amall shovel, proceeds to sweep up the crumbs.
DMcS then asks for them back!! :smack: :smack:
What a fucking moron, but it did provide us with a bit of light comedy
Frankly, the public health risk from pigeons is low, but far from zero. Histoplasmosis, cryptococcosis, and psittacosis are all infections known to be transmitted to humans via pigeon droppings.
These organisms can also be found in sparrow droppings, but it is the sheer volume of pigeon droppings, found where people also congregate, that is felt by public health experts to significantly raise the risk for human contagion.
Can I also join in this rant, though with sea gulls?
Hey, you stupid fucking tourist. Sea gulls suck just as much as pigeons, if not moreso, because of their hideous screeching. And when you feed them, they lose their fear of humans AND associate humans with a free lunch. So you have things like a sea gull attacking me for a sandwhich when I was 5, biting my hand pretty severely.
So FUCK OFF if you’re going to come to my town, spend your days on the beach getting burnt, and feeding these disgusting creatures. Because YOU get to leave, but WE have to live with the bastards.
Ok, but you have to concede that “attempting to scavenge food while it is being eaten without any concern to the soft fleshy bits holding the food” might seem an awful lot like being attacked to a five year old.
Well, GorillaMan and Manda JO pretty much covered it. The sea gull might not have harbored any ill will towards me, but he still swooped down and snatched the sandwich outta my hand, catching my fingers in the process.
I hope you choked on the peanut butter, stupid sea gull.
Is there any evidence that stopping the public from feeding pigeons will result in fewer pigeons? Or is this a “common sense” thing, not subject to the scientific method?
I’m not sure if that’s the hope as much as an attempt to cut down on pigeons associating all humans with food sources and congregating where they see/expect to see humans and increasing the annoyance/risk of disease factor.
What I’ve been told about this (no cite) is that less food = less prolific breeding of new pigeons = gradual reduction in pigeon numbers where they aren’t getting fed. Plus the likelihood that existing pigeons might stray further afield looking for rations rather than hanging about the town square…
Pigeons, to the extent that they serve any purpose at all, serve only the purpose of cleaning up the edible debris that inevitably accumulates in a city. The population of pigeons should be exactly the right size to keep their local city clean; when the food runs out, the population should diminish. By feeding pigeons extra food, you are supporting a pigeon population that is out of balance with the “natural”–i.e., inevitable, pre-existing–food supply.
Or, as I said to a woman feeding bread to pigeons in a Seattle park, “Why would you want to turn that bread into pigeon shit?”
Let’s include those damn ubiquitous geese that have taken over every office complex parking lot in the Northeast US. Those boids have been known to threaten humans (myself among them)
