For some time now, the pigeons of Barcelona seem more arrogant, daring, superb... You pass by their edge and they don't take flight, they continue there calmly, on any curb. Suddenly you feel a threatening shadow, you put a hand to your face and a pigeon flies past you just a couple of centimeters! Sometimes they even bump into you.
Or they go and sit in a group on a table on a terrace and at full speed report the remains of a tapas or a kebab before the waiter has time to collect them. As if they had finished losing respect for people, for people. In addition, there are so many, more every day... Don't you get the impression that lately there are more pigeons living in Barcelona than ever before?
Technicians from the City Council's Animal Welfare area point out that Barcelona's pigeons have grown fat and settled down, that they have become accustomed to being fed by so many people and also to stumbling on succulent leftovers everywhere that they have already buried a good part of their most natural instincts, that these birds already see us as a simple source of fast, simple and immediate food, and that on top of that they have become super demanding.
Put yourself in the plumage of a pigeon, in its skin. What need do you have to dig up tree after tree in search of fruit when you have a barrage of chips, pan dishes and pizza crusts within reach of your beak? Do you know how burdensome it is to fly from one tree to another? Identifying the most nutritious fruits and seeds and extracting them is much more complicated. In the end, have the pigeons of Barcelona become imprudent, confident, careless, idiots? Are the pigeons of Barcelona, of the big cities, getting dumber every day? Your world here has become a free buffet! And the starch is fatal for them. In addition, this heat also contributes to the fact that most of them are stunned, exhausted. It is already known that heat and overweight are a fatal combination.
In reality we are witnessing a slow degradation of the city pigeon as a species. And yes, the problem is basically their overfeeding, here is the origin of the strange behavior of these animals, as pointed out by Joan Carles Senar, head of research at the Natural Sciences Museum of Barcelona, a scholar of birds who live in urban environments.
"The problem is that in the city we provide so much food to the pigeons that we have altered the natural selection of the entire species - explains the scientist - so that only the specimens that are best prepared, the most ready, the most ingenious, the most skilled and determined, but also the most contented, the laziest, the most dull and silly. And the truth is that pigeons have never been very smart. His role has always been that of prey. But in the city they hardly have predators. How many pairs of falcons are there in Barcelona?, three, four...? And the seagulls started eating them in the eighties. A silly pigeon is not afraid of anything. That's why they get hit by cars."
Currently, the life expectancy of a Barcelona pigeon is two years, while that of a country pigeon is six. And in this way, generation after generation, the pigeons of Barcelona transmit and inherit diseases and gradually go extinct while multiplying their numbers in an exaggerated way.
Barcelona has been suffering from a large overpopulation of pigeons for several years now. Not a few citizens know them as "the rats of the air". The dimensions of this problem are, however, somewhat blurred. Sources from the City Council's Animal Welfare area indicate that when the density of pigeons is between 300 and 400 specimens per km2, it is necessary to establish population control measures.
The same City Council sources estimate that at the moment the density of pigeons in the Catalan capital ranges between 1,300 and 1,700 specimens per km. This is a purely indicative estimate. The last counts of pigeons in Barcelona date from the years 2017 and 2018, and then they counted a population of around 103,226 individuals, with a fairly wide margin of error, of around 22,000 individuals up and down.
Senar, the expert at the Museum of Natural Sciences, says that the situation has not improved in recent years. "The problem is that the distribution of contraceptive feed, a measure with a strong political component, is not effective. Political correctness greatly influences the treatment of animals, but in reality its results are highly questionable. For the last eight years, the City Council has opted for these methods. But while the pigeons have so much food so easily, installing contraceptive feed dispensers is a waste of money. It is of no use."
Consistory sources indicate that Barcelona has 47 contraceptive feed dispensers, "prepared to cover 36 pigeon colonies. We install them based on criteria of density and inconvenience caused".
The drug inhibits the development of the egg yolk and produces reversible infertility. Apparently, these colonies were reduced by 60%. But the incidence of this percentage in the total population of pigeons in the city is rather low. Municipal technicians also recognize that as long as pigeons continue to have so much food within reach of their beaks...
It has been years since the City Council banned the sale of feed for pigeons at the stalls in Plaça Catalunya. In addition, from time to time, the City Council launches awareness campaigns so that people do not feed these birds. Feeding animals is not prohibited in the city, but feeding them on the street is. However, the matter is not as simple as it might seem.
It is not just a question of convincing tourists not to take these colorful photos surrounded by birds in Plaça Catalunya. Many people who feed pigeons on a regular basis do so to alleviate their loneliness. His behavior is the reflection of a more serious problem. In fact, Barcelona City Council has a training program so that the informants in charge of raising awareness among the population are very aware of these issues.
"In Basel they asked the population to stop feeding the pigeons and they managed to reduce the population in a very important way - remembers Senar, the expert - it is clear that there people pay much more attention to the authorities ".
