Before moving back home to KY, I owned an end unit condo in Knoxville, TN. The parking was directly in front of the unit and, to the side, was a row of thick, tall firs. Absolutely beautiful, except they also were home to pigeons. I couldn’t tell you the number of evenings, even during winter time, I’d go out and spray water up into the trees to run these birds off. If I didn’t, the next morning, my car would be completely covered up. Seriously!

Before moving, the homeowners association decided the only thing to do was to cut the trees down. Well, they did. And it ruined the look of my home.

I never hated a bird up until then.

Foul Play?

Officials investigating the deadly Minneapolis bridge collapse are looking at an unlikely culprit: pigeons.

Could pigeons have played a role in the Minnesota catastrophe?

Aug. 25, 2007 - Of all the possible causes of the deadly collapse of Minnesota’s Interstate 35W bridge earlier this month-uneven traffic patterns, de-icing salts, faulty construction-the latest is the most surprising: Pigeons. Or more precisely, the waste the birds leave behind. “Pigeon dung can be a serious issue-it’s acidic and will easily eat away almost any metal,” explains engineer William Schutt, president of Matcor, a corrosion-protection firm in Doylestown, Pa. “It can wash into and then rust the bolts and rivets of bridges if they-re not cleaned and checked properly.”

The build-up of pigeon excrement on the I-35W bridge was substantial enough to be noted in several Minnesota Department of Transportation inspections over the years, pointing to the steel box sections of the bridge as a popular nesting spot. Those sections are crucial to supporting the structure, and in 1999 bridge workers placed plastic screens over openings in the beams in an effort to repel the birds. But the dung continued to pile up. A 2006 inspection of the bridge still reported “severe pigeon debris” on its steel deck truss.

Eve Conant, Newsweek

Source: MSNBC.com