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#68241 05/01/02 07:26 PM
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Bean, the first of your two sites also has a lot on goose control. Click on those words, and up poop sepveral more clickable lines, under these headings:

Border Collies
Turf Grass Goose Repellents
Exclusion Methods: Goose D-Fence
Cleaning Equipment: Goose-Poop Buster
Scare Devices, with five separate clicks for High-tech Distress Calls; Cannons/Scare Guns; "RoboGoose" Remote controlled goose robot; "Dissuader" Hand-held Laser; and Gator Guard (floating replica of an alligator head))

The link for robogoose claims, "Equipped with headlight eyes and two-way voice communication. Optional remote video, tear gas and pepper spray, us proud Canadians can flush terrorists from caves, pursue them down corridors and record and observe them as their population decreases. Look at us as affordable and small Canadian tanks."


#68242 05/01/02 11:28 PM
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What US brand was marketed as "The Champagne of Bottled Beers"?

Turns out it's Miller


and more than that, it's "Miller's High Life". Trust me see bio!. My best friend from the sixth grade on called me "High Lights" for thirty years and would not be corrected, so I stopped trying. He came from a staid Long Island conservative Republican Methodist family, could trace his ancestors back to Germany 1591, never drank nor did his parents, knew only the shape of the sound of the words but never saw a label. A forgiveable mondegreen, I would say.



#68244 05/02/02 09:42 PM
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I wish I could say that I was making this up, but here is an article from the National Post (April 29th) on how the Canadian goernment is dealing with the problem of pigeons on Parliament Hill.

Pigeons being shooed off Parliament Hill by a professional 'We've tried it all'

Tim Naumetz
Southam News
OTTAWA - The federal government is paying $4,800 a month for a "pigeon shooer" to keep the messy birds off Parliament Hill.

The Public Works Department turned to the shooing approach after testing a range of other ways to keep pigeons off the statues, ornate stonework and hidden corners of the Hill, an official said.

"We've tried various methods, from putting in electrical wires, spikes, sonic devices -- you name it, we've tried it all," said Louise Proulx, a department spokeswoman. "The shooing is only temporary, it's a tryout and we're doing that maybe for the next couple of months."

The shooer has already been seen scaring away birds with a long yellow pole.

The concern is not with the birds themselves, but the droppings they let loose at random, even in the ceremonial porte-cochere space under the Peace Tower. The statue of the Queen has been bombed.

Until the pigeon shooer came on board this spring, the department spent $1,800 a month for a commercial high-pressure washer to clean the bad spots regularly. The hose-down had its own negative side effects. "It was damaging the stonework," Ms. Proulx said.

Initially, Hill denizens believed a crew of pigeon-shooers had been hired, because more than one was spotted scaring away birds with a long yellow pole, and one of the shooers himself said there were two shooers on duty.

Not so, said Ms. Proulx. The government is not that extravagant.

"One guy was teaching the other guy how to do it," she explained.

The cost may seem high, but Ms. Proulx said the shooing will take place 12 hours a day, seven days a week. She was unable to explain how that would be done with only one shooer.

The department assigned the high-priced shooing work to a local contractor it hired four months ago for other outdoor cleanup jobs on the Hill, such as sweeping up cigarette butts around doorways, picking chewing gum wads from the walls and maintaining the new RCMP security post at a main entrance.

The shooing cost is in addition to $3,700 the department was already paying the cleanup company, although Ms. Proulx said the shooer will also tidy up the grounds, when he's not busy with pigeons.

"To add the extra duty of shooing the pigeons, it adds $4,800 per month," she explained.

Alliance MP Peter Goldring said it looks suspiciously like costly government make-work.

"What if the pigeons attack one monument after he shoos them away from another?" said Mr. Goldring. "Then he'll need a vehicle to jump from monument to monument, and the vehicle will have to be environmentally friendly, and if the pigeons attack his vehicle while he's shooing them away from the monuments, then we'll need those high-pressure washers to clean his vehicle."

Don Boudria, the Public Works Minister, argued the expenditure was unavoidable.

"I don't know about you, but I don't particularly enjoy what the pigeons do around here, including the destruction of the property that their excrement has caused."



#68245 05/02/02 10:02 PM
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Ha! they should try owls-- fake ones work-- but only if they have some moving parts, and, if they get moved once a day or so.. even pigeons figure out the at an owl that never moves is not going to harm them.

several companies sell owls.. the cheap $19 ones don't work to well at all.. the $29 to $49 dollars ones are pretty effective.. and this is on NY pigeons. (commonly referred to as flying rats.) we've also had some success with falcons.. they leave dropping too, but the don't roost on any available edge the way pideons do, and a falcon family eats 2 or 3 pidgeons a day. doesn't seem like much-- but it really good for the building near the falcons nest.. pideons aren't so stupid as to hang around, and wait to become dinner.

one co-op on 5th ave had a falcons nest on a ledge out side its window.. the price of the apartment was higher.(almost 10%)it was a considered an asset!


#68246 05/03/02 01:34 AM
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We have one of those in Denver, but the PETA people became irate when the feathery farrier began to use iron for the pigeon shoes. The shoes (which are so heavy the birds cannot fly, thus making them unable to get up onto the monuments to befoul them)were originally put on with tiny little nails, but now they're trying a cyanoacrilate (Crazy) glue.

PETA has proposed that we provide little purple outhouses which the pigeons would be trained to use instead of crapping on the golden dome of the State Capitol Building. Purple is apparently the only color that pigeons can distinguish. They also want us to provide solar or some other renewable energy form for keeping these things warm during the winter. I imagine that you will be hearing more about these purple pooper heaters in the not-so-distant future.



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