Case Study 1. Walton on Thames Bridge, Surrey, United Kingdom
Walton Bridge is a road bridge across the Thames River in England carrying the A244 road between Walton-on-Thames and Shepperton, and crossing the Thames on the reach between Sunbury Lock and Shepperton Lock.
The bridge is the first Thames road bridge which is on both banks upstream of Greater London. The bridge is the sixth on the site. Before the first bridge, the site had a ferry dating at least to the 17th century.
Over 500 pigeons were living and nesting in this bridge, although several works with spikes and nests were done with no effect, causing huge damages and excrements.
This amazing job was completed by a British Pest Control Company. During one week they cleaned the bridge, removed the spikes and placed 9500 trays with ByeBirds. After the installation, only a couple of pigeons where going to the bridge during the night to an old nest site, and required a second line of trays on that corner. Since this second line was installed no more pigeons have been seen in the bridge.
Moreover, some ducks and swans where nesting on the ground right under the bridge causing also damages and dirtiness in the area. After the ByeBirds application was completed on the bridge targeting the pigeons, they also felt disturbed and stopped nesting there, moving into the forest and avoiding under bridge crossing.
Case Study 2. Saint-Nicolas de Maule Church, France
The Church of St. Nicolas is a Romanesque and Gothic edifice which dates back to the XI century that is located in the French town of Maule, in Yvelines, Île-de-France. It was classified as a historic monument by decree of 19 March 1883.
About 60 pigeons living in the church were causing damages on the roof, bellfry and facades.
This job was done during the maintenance of the facades of the church in November 2014. ByeBirds was applied in two of the four facades of the bell tower.
After the application all the pigeons regrouped on the other side of the bell tower without returning to the areas with ByeBirds. The other two sides of the facades will be done during the spring of 2015 as the Parrish and government are very satisfied with the results.
Case Study 3. Newbury Racecourse, Berkshire, United Kingdom
Newbury Racecourse is a racecourse in the civil parish of Greenham, adjoining the town of Newbury in Berkshire, England. It has courses for flat races and over jumps. It hosts one of Great Britain’s 31 Group 1 flat races, the Lockinge Stakes. Queen Elizabeth II spent her 86th birthday at Newbury Racecourse watching the races from the Royal Box were two of her horses were competing.
This construction was an undertaking major building project at Newbury Racecourse to build luxury flats on the grounds of this famous landmark. With the first phase being completed, a pigeon problem had occurred when birds started roosting on the roof gardens, leaving droppings on the balcony and footpaths below the structure. Several other passive methods were used to try to stop the problem without effect.
As soon as the work was completed, the pigeons reorganized on the new structure and used it as a roosting and nesting site – pigeons particularly like ledges and sheltered areas which offer a good view of potential predators, so these buildings were almost a perfect habitat – much to the disapproval of the new owners of the flats.
In this case it was important to provide a solution that required little or no maintenance, be unobtrusive but effective, and most importantly it had to be performed by keeping the prestigious image of the building.
Pigeons were using the building as a courtship area attracting quite a lot of birds during the day, between 30 and 50 or so in a flock at any time. No nests, but lots of fouling on the penthouse flat balcony below on two blocks of apartments.
After cleaning everything, ByeBirds was fixed on leading edges of the roof and now no birds use the area neither day nor night. The flock has completely left the place.
Case Study 4. The Jerónimos Monastery, Lisbon, Portugal
Built by the Infante Henry the Navigator around 1459 and classified in 1983 as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, it is the most important monument of Portugal. Placed besides the sea, they had the problem of seagulls roosting in the roof and nesting. They tried other systems before, the last one was ultrasonic devices that only lasted for 1 month, and afterwards seagulls were staying besides the speakers without being disturbed. They had a population of about 40 seagulls and 9 nests. The excrements were damaging the monastery year after year and urged a solution. They partially recently replaced part of the roof as can be seen in one of the pictures.
The trays were placed at a distance of 30 cm with about 40 g of ByeBirds. The bigger quantity of ByeBirds was due to the size of seagulls and the high population.
After the installation, during a few days, some seagulls were still staying in some area of the building while most moved away. As it was done in spring during the reproduction season, seagulls made new nests in other places and didn’t come back again.
Case Study 5. Széchenyi Themal Bath, Budapest, Hungary
The Széchenyi thermal bath in Budapest is the largest medicinal bath in Europe. Built in 1913 in Neo-baroque style to the design of Győző Czigler, the bath can be found in the City Park.
Despite having spikes and nets, many pigeons lived and roosted in the building, where they could find several areas for nesting. This is the same for the park and the area nearby the zoo, which are places where they also had access to food. Pigeons normally gathered around the main facade, and therefore it has been severely damaged because of their excrements.
During the installation many kilos of them had been found and removed from the ledges of the windows. Then, the cleaning process was completed by brushing these areas before placing ByeBirds.
As shown in the following photographs, ByeBirds Ivory White was placed on the main facade of the baths, being barely noticeable to the human eye due to ByeBirds’ discretion. The work was done by climbers, who hang themselves down the building and used staircases at the same time to accomplish the work. Once the work finished a couple of pigeons, male and a female, approached a window without being able to land because of the presence of ByeBirds.
