4 ms·
> Here in Sweden someone had pigeons flying to their balcony all the time and they got reported for keeping them as a pet. The city dropped them off in another
by vageli 8y ago
> Here in Sweden someone had pigeons flying to their balcony all the time and they got reported for keeping them as a pet. The city dropped them off in another town but they flew back and were ordered to be put down because native species are not allowed to be kept as pets and they were unwilling to adapt to not living on the balcony.
If the motivation of these laws is to protect the animals, I can't think of a more backwards response.
- wallace_f 8y agoWait until you hear about all the ways government applies that same authority to "protecting" people
- dddddaviddddd 8y agoUnless the intention is to preserve wild behavior and prevent domestication, i.e. removing some individuals from the population to (in a way) preserve the species.
- tapland 8y agoProbably. Some cockatiels that proved very hard to catch this summer after they escaped were ordered to be put down by some hunters as well. They can survive our winters in urban areas and pose a risk to the native birds.
- VBprogrammer 8y agoIt's really weird around London to see flocks of parakeets. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feral_parakeets_in_Great_Britain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feral_parakeets_in_Great_Brita...
- mcv 8y agoBut they're pigeons. Balconies are their natural habitat. I don't think there's any species of bird that's more at home with humans.
- ams6110 8y agoPigeons hardly need protecting. They are nuisance animals in most areas.
- nkrisc 8y agoThey become a nuisance when people try to domesticate that. Which is why there are laws against doing so.
- mattnewport 8y agoPigeons are a nuisance without any assistance from people trying to domesticate them.
- fourthark 8y agoThis is probably the real motivation, not concern for the wildness of the birds. Neighbors thinking you harbor disease and so on.
- TeMPOraL 8y agoIt's not just about "neighbours harboring disease". Pigeons are the B-17 of animal kingdom, they carpet bomb everything with their excrement as they fly. You start feeding them, and suddenly the entire block has to clean their balconies and cars every day.
- nkrisc 8y agoIt may not protect the individuals in this case but it does help protect the "wildness" of the animals as a group.
- megaremote 8y agoThen you are being ignorant. The idea is not to protect a few animals, it is to protect all animals, and all pigeons in this case.
- mcguire 8y agoLikely the neighbors were complaining about the side effects.