How pigeons' plight shows we need to take more care of city wildlife

The hotel describes itself online as “the spirit of Glasgow” and a “truly iconic sight”. I emailed asking if there were plans to resolve the issue of the dead birds. No response five days later, I phoned the RSPB for advice, who suggested dialling 101. Police Scotland’s Wildlife Officer dropped in the following day to make sure management were aware that, while Scots law doesn’t criminalise the unintended killing of pigeons, the disturbance of wild birds nesting does constitute a wildlife crime.

Until it warps for the worse – as all commercial digital social spaces do – the NextDoor website still has the ability to facilitate productive local discussion. Checking in on updates while I was away travelling, community knowledge from other posters revealed previous bird rescue attempts at the site and that other posters were registering their own complaints about the worsening mass of flesh and feathers.

The day before the net was finally brought down, 2 June, I witnessed eight dead birds enmeshed in it. Responding to my query this week as to whether they planned to use bird netting again, the hotel said it is going up again on Sunday, with new anchor points to fix the net to the sides. The problem, they say, was that fixing points broke off over time and allowed the pigeons to get in.

Built-up low income housing used to be known as rookeries. City pigeons, banded in the grey tones of wet and dry cement, are the poor birds of Britain from which it’s easy for the eye to flit away. Their worn feet are an ugly reflection of the inhospitality of industrial urban spaces, and there is often a ripple of displeasure and disgust at their mention. But young children, with their uncynical powers of observation, are drawn to pigeons and in any public square can be seen gravitating towards flocks. When, for a spell, I was Editor of the I-Spy books, I lobbied for I-Spy In the City to feature a close shot of a bird peering into the camera, planetary orange ringed eyes looking back with curiosity from the perspective of a toddler.

Killing time recently in George Square, I watched a family of tourists charmingly take pictures beside a man with a bag of breadcrumbs, swapping places to one by one take their turn in shot. On my own recent travels, the airy cooing of woodpigeons nesting in the tufa rock tower of the Neapolitan island of Ischia was as memorable and particular to the trip as the mind-bending historical sites of ancient Rome, where pigeons have strutted across the centuries.

Our modern cityscapes have advanced little in figuring out a non-contemptuous coexistence with indigenous wildlife. Avian friendly design advocacy around the world focuses most often on reflective surfaces. Birds struggle to perceive glass as a barrier.

In Toronto, animal conservation groups recorded in a single day more than one thousand dead birds around the Circa Central Park, a block of floor-to-ceiling window apartments. NYC’s Lights Out campaign targets tragic flight towards illuminated skyscraper windows.

Among the many criticisms made of the Scottish Parliament’s now 25-year old hulk is that it is very attractive to nesting birds. The poetry of doves being drawn to Scotland’s centre of democracy, perching on the building’s most recognisable design feature of branch-bedecked windows, is discouraged on sound biohazard grounds.

The building has a problem with waste blowing back through vents the birds, unsurprisingly, like to congregate around. Pigeons have on occasion run amok through MSPs’ offices, delightful to imagine. A tacked-on assortment of nets and spikes turning Holyrood into a fortress failed to shift them, and now falcons circle several times a month.

The displacement of resident birds by half was reported months back as a victory, despite, as Edinburgh Evening News reported, the idea of bringing in hawks having been dismissed on first suggestion in 2008. “Officials warned in a report it would be a ‘PR disaster’ if hawks were to start eating pigeons alive in front of visiting schoolchildren.”

The area around the Glasgow Grosvenor Hotel is a busy thoroughfare, especially on a summer weekend, with families visiting the Botanic Gardens and supporting local cafes and bars. On Sunday afternoon, WestFest filled Vinicombe Street while, across the road, there was a strip of dead wildlife. The Grosvenor Hotel bills itself online as “Glasgow’s premiere gin bar in the vibrant West End”, its restaurant Bo’Vine claiming “Our Byres Road restaurant has become a favourite for those seeking prime Scottish beef, fine wines, good friends and great times.” For all of May guests could stroll past Pigeon Guernica towards a date night, £24.50 duck breast au jus.

To reduce unnecessary cruelty to wildlife caused by ill-planning and complacency, I believe there should be a Scottish legal requirement for bird-dissuading mesh to be of a specific maximum gauge, small enough to prevent birds, whether pigeon or sparrow, from entering, with the deterrent for lax maintenance of tears and tethers a fine for each wild bird trapped and left for dead on the premises.

Our wildlife is one of our richest assets. At every point in our urban planning we should be striving harder to live in harmony with it, and designing in knowledge of all that lives around, including corporate complacency. There can be no justification for leaving wild creatures to a slow death.