Plans under way to clear Brownsville sky of crows
BROWNSVILLE – Late afternoon along Second Street in Brownsville is reminiscent of a scene from the Alfred Hitchcock movie “The Birds.” Thousands of crows are roosting on the wooded hillside along Second Street, especially affecting the area near the Mulligan Manor senior citizens’ apartment building.
“It’s almost like a black sky down there when they are out,” said Brownsville Mayor Norma Ryan.
Ryan said the birds are creating a health hazard for the senior citizens, since their droppings can cause respiratory problems.
Bob Jameson, owner of Wildlife Pest Control Services, has discussed the situation with the Fayette County Housing Authority and has submitted a proposal for the work to get the birds to move out of the area.
Denny Barclay of the Fayette County Housing Authority said he is looking into working with the borough to resolve the problem. A contract with Jameson has not yet been signed.
Jameson said the birds are in the area year-round, but they are more obvious in the winter months. In the summer months, Jameson said, the birds primarily roost on the Washington County side of the river that isn’t as densely populated.
“Now there are hundreds of thousands of birds. They do a daily migration to their feed sites, then before they go to roost, they do what’s called staging. Their staging area is right over Mulligan Manor,” Jameson said.
Jameson said staging is the way the crows jockey for position for the best roosting spots. It is also when they release a large amount of excrement. It takes place for an hour or two before the birds actually roost.
“When they roost close to man in an urban area, they’re a nuisance with noise,” Jameson said.
Jameson said that while there is a hunting season for crows, very few are actually taken by hunters and the population has not been depleted.
Jameson said he is proposing a harassment technique to get the birds to move further out of town. He said he would use pyrotechnic devices to make noise similar to what one would hear during fireworks on the Fourth of July. The devices would be used in the late afternoon and early evening to give the birds the idea that they’d rather roost elsewhere.
“The end result is to get them to move out of where they are,” Jameson said. “Initially, it will be a two-week program. We will do an evaluation on site to determine if it needs to go into an extended plan.”
Jameson said there’s no way to control where the birds will move if they decide the Second Street hillside is too noisy for roosting.
“They would have to go where there is a group of trees to support their numbers,” Jameson said.
Jameson said the crows don’t present a problem in rural areas during the winter, though they can cause crop destruction for farmers in the spring and summer.