Limburg: Rescued City Pigeons Still Face Death
After the city of Limburg agreed last year to relocate 200 city pigeons to an animal welfare facility in the Upper Palatinate in order to reduce the population, it has now cancelled the tender for catching the animals — citing cost reasons.
Because the catching costs in the submitted bid were higher than the city had budgeted, the killing is now to be put out to tender once again.
Katrin Pichl, specialist adviser on city pigeons at the German Animal Welfare Federation, comments on this.
«The scandal surrounding the city pigeons in Limburg enters its next round: the 200 rescued pigeons are now once again facing death. This is cruel and senseless. And it shows that the city of Limburg never had any genuine insight, but merely sought to wash its hands of the matter with a half-hearted sham solution in the face of public pressure.»
Animal Welfare Federation threatens criminal complaint
Animal welfare costs money. And the city must be prepared to spend it. As soon as even one pigeon is killed, we will file a criminal complaint. The animal welfare problem is particularly evident here.
At the same time, one thing must be clear: anyone who is genuinely interested in a humane and lasting solution invests money in the right place. Because removing the pigeons on a one-off basis would not solve anything anyway: the number of animals would be reduced in the short term, but would quickly rise again. Arguing on the grounds of the cost of killing is therefore not only cruel, but also absurd. As studies demonstrate, killing as a means of population control fails.
«The best investment for the city is in long-term management measures. Because the only sensible, animal-welfare-compliant and sustainable solution is and remains the establishment of supervised pigeon lofts. Once the birds lay eggs there, these can be replaced with decoys such as plaster eggs. This allows the number of urban pigeons to be sustainably reduced,» writes the German Animal Welfare Association.
Background: Citizens' referendum failed
In November 2023, the Limburg city council voted in favour of killing urban pigeons using a hobby hunter and falconer. Following a wave of outrage across the state, a citizens' referendum was called the following year. We campaigned for an animal-friendly solution with a poster campaign and mailings. Unfortunately, however, a majority voted that the Limburg city council's resolution to kill the urban pigeons should not be overturned. Shortly afterwards, it appeared as though the killing could still be averted: 200 animals were to be captured and relocated to an animal welfare facility. More on animal rights.
