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After City Council member Simcha Felder announced he would propose legislation to ban feeding pigeons, bird lovers joined forces and, yesterday, held a rally at City Hall. Armed with posters like "Save Our Right to Feed Wildlife," "Have U Known Anybody Killed by a Pigeon?", "Pigeons are Beautiful Birds," and "Felder's Pigeon Bill is Poop!", the pro-pigeon protesters spoke out for their feathered friends. One demonstrator told City Room, "We are voices for the wildlife in New York City that we would like to preserve."
Felder's reasoning for a stop on pigeon feeding is that pigeon poop - an estimated 25 pounds over a year - damages city infrastructure and suggested the city needs a pigeon czar to deal with the issue. And he's not the only one with the bird on the brain: City Council member James Oddo had suggested pigeon birth control (approved by PETA and the Humane Society), after pigeon poop created gross conditions at the St. George ferry terminal. City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Mayor Bloomberg also seem to support a ban on pigeon feeding. This week, Felder was the subject of a New Yorker Talk of the Town piece, where he told Ben McGrath:
"Yesterday, I was having lunch in City Hall Park with a colleague, and this squirrel comes over, literally up to my feet, and he stands up,” Felder said. “I’m eating a bar of chocolate. I said, ‘What, are you kidding? You’re with them?’ It ran away, but five minutes later dozens of pigeons, like something out of some spook movie, show up, and they’re all over the place. I said, ‘Get a camera!’"
Of course, Felder isn't immune to teasing. The other day, during a community breakfast in Borough Park, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly gave him a plastic bird and a certificate which was, Kelly read, "in recognition of your dedicated work to protect the city from an imminent quality of life danger...Overfed pigeons pose a threat to the safety and well-being of every New Yorker. We are grateful for your leadership and courage in raising awareness of this issue." Kelly was joking. We think.
People for Pigeons is the umbrella group organizing smaller bird clubs; here's their website.
Top photograph from the pigeon rally by
Mira (on the wall) on Flickr, bottom photograph of Commissioner Kelly and City Council member Felder by Eli Shapiro
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There is nothing about pigeons that is too like. KILL ALL PIGEONS AND RATS!
If you want nature move to Montana or Ohio.
If one can't smile when advocating animals and holding a sign that says "POOP," your sense of humor has permanently been extinguished.
Arrgh! What's wrong with these people? When did feeding stray birds become a right in the Constitution? Soon they will start advocating their right to feed mice, rats and roaches.
I am all for pigeon birth control, amazingly something I agree with the PETA nuts. It'd be tough to put condoms on pigeons though.
Forgive me for pulling the entitlement card again while commenting on a Gothamist post, but since when do you have a right to do create a health and standard of living threat in public?
Feed animals on your own property. If you're so lonely that you need to feed pigeons to keep you company, buy a parakeet.
Since when do these politicians how so much freakin time to waste on such a non issue?!?
Love them or hate them, they're still very very dirty little birds with terrible habits and they need to be controlled. The birth control idea is brilliant, I think!
Pigeon lovers should consider that with less pigeons around, the ones that remain will be possibly happier and healthier, and maybe even go on to go to get a college education!
As I walked down the street today and observed all the cooing pigeons pecking away at the sidewalk detritus, I realized that there are several that are aesthetically more interesting than the average grey on grey pigeon. Perhaps there should be a group of individuals that trap and breed those and the others should be KILLED! I know it sounds somewhat NAZI like, but I think if the pigeons were better looking perhaps people wouldn't want to kill them all.
Just a thought.
Jeez, the proliferation of pigeons (and rats) is primarily a result of all the trash and garbage that all the slobs in NYC drop on the street. You don't see nearly as many pigeons in cities where residents pick up after themselves. NYC is a virtual pigsty.
The bottom line is: people, if you want less pigeons, throw your trash in the receptacles provided for that purpose. Fines also need to be strictly enforced for littering.
The old woman with the poop sign in front looks like the old bag who feeds pigeons in front of my job DAILY! If you cross her or suggest that she's doing something wrong, she goes ballistic. Totally unreasonable and a REAL BEEYOTCH.
the people who feed pigeons are the bitter loser people in life who don't have anything going on in their lives so they need to feed pigeons cause they know that the pigeons will shit on everyone and they get a secret joy out of that.
There should be a ban on feeding those idiots who support feeding the pigeons.
I like the bald guy in the picture who has pictures of pigeons on his poster. What the fuck is that suppose to mean? Is the small type shown on the poster the sperm counts of pigeons that procreated in Bryant Park prior to 9/11?
one could feed them rat poison and have them drop out of the sky mid flight. it would be like an apocalyptic omen.
I don't feed any birds, but I think that it's ultimately O'K to get pooped on once or twice a year... also, if you think that feeding pigeons is exactly the same as feeding rats- think twice: there are no birds in subway stations, and there are A LOT plastic garbage bags on the streets EVERY DAY, that are not accessible by pigeons, but available to rats.
Good observation doza.
KILL ALL PIGEONS AND RATS!
What about birth control for certain Gothamist commentators? I'd be up for that.
I think that all of you should think about what you are saying. I attended the rally. These people genuinely care about this issue. can you stand to look at Pigeons, or hear them if it brightens the life of another human being. It is a right to be able to feed any bird that we want. Do you really want our government to have this much control? And that bald man in the front is one of the kindest people I've met in a long time. Maybe you should stop judging and jumping to conclusions please and take some time to look around and realize how bleak the city would be without a bunch of birds.
humans are the real NYC problem!
Quite simply, this discussion misses the point: Simcha Felder reportedly wants to be Comptroller -- the guy who watches the city purse strings. Felder -- an honorable man, a religious man, an MBA in accounting -- proposes spending something over $5 million on ovotrol (fed to pigeons during the breeding season; pigeons breed year 'round...), and at least $500,000 more for the seed used to carry the ovotrol (yup, Felder wants the city to feed the birdies). He wants to use live hawks and accipitrine robots to rip the pigeons apart -- in public (so edifying for tourists...). He wants to create a new government job -- that's another $750,000 at least for a low-level assistant commish plus support staff and nicely furnished office. Your taxpayer dollars. Uh huh. Genuinely stupid move.
Let folks feed the birds. They are actually kind of nice animals (much cleaner that dogs, cats, ferrets). You can't get sick from them (the city says so, as does the state and federal governments). They clean up after folks who lunch in the parks (depriving rats of all those pizza crusts and left-over hot-pretzel bits).
As for the brainless folks who can't tell the difference between life and a Woody Allen movie ("rats with wings" traces to "Stardust Memories"), well, they couldn't find that place where de sun don' shine, with both hands and a road map.
I think the Romans enjoyed watching Christians get mauled and eaten by lions. Those filthy, disgusting Christians. It was so much fun to watch them as they died. Die! Christians! Die! They shouted. Robert Frost: "And when at times the mob is swayed to carry praise or blame too far, we might choose something like a star, to stay our minds on and be stayed." Maybe this is too deep for the Gothamist. Act local, think global. In the last 200 years we have destroyed over 97% of North America's forests. That would be 97% of the habitat rightfully and joyfully known as "home" to an incredible array of animals and birds. Now extinction is just a word that people seem to have accepted along with global warming. It should be a no brainer to ask ourselves how to make our urban environment more green, not rid it of every living creature. The streets of NYC are not an indoor lobby and we should demand city planning that includes wildlife and parks and yes, pigeons.
Romans and Christians blah Blah Blah! I hope you pigeonlover gets pooped on by pigeons on a daily basis. Sterilize all pigeons NOW!!
Ah, That putz Felder. Complete Meshuggener. It's always Israel-this, Israel that; what's he done for New York? Now he is worried about a little pigeon poop? This is what we need to spend tax dollars for? Nah.