Town council to revisit pigeon problem

Last year, Horncastle Town Council looked at several methods of humanely getting rid of the hundreds of pigeons that have made their homes on the rooves of town buildings, most prominently in the Market Place, and then leaving their droppings all over the pavements and rooftops.

At the town council’s full council meeting on Tuesday, May 10, Mr Andrew Kingston, who owns several buildings in the town centre, requested that something be done about the pigeons as they were making a mess around his properties, specifically next to the new Grace’s Boutique shoe shop on the High Street.

He said: “They are now becoming a swarm – they nest on the roof and there must be 50 or 60 of them and every morning we have to sweep the pavements and clean up the bins as they are covered in poo.”

The town council tried to combat the pigeon problem in the town several times over the past few years, with ideas ranging from employing a hawk and a pest controller – both of which would have cost thousands of pounds - to encouraging businesses to install spikes on their properties.

The council have since employed an additional member of the estates team three days a week to clean up the streets.

Councillor Richard Barker said of the appointment: “As a council we owe it to the town to address this and need to make sure the estates team are doing their job.”

Coun Angela Burchill pointed out that educating the town about the pigeon problem was also a priority:

"The only way to get rid of them is to get rid of their food and to stop people from feeding them.

"I know of several people who feed them every day and we need to tell people not to do that.”

Coun Fiona Martin, the outgoing chairman, said: “It has been an issue for months since we last looked into it six months ago, so we will ask the estates team at their next meeting to look at this again and bring it back to put it on the agenda at the next meeting.”

Horncastle is just one of a number of rural towns where pigeons’ poo poses a problem, with Louth and Market Rasen also reporting a problem over the years.