Twelve years ago we published an article here on barganews entitled ” Difficult time for the pigeons in Barga Vecchia ”
We said then – “life just got difficult for the pigeons that roosted under the eaves of the roof of Palazzo Pancrazi, the 500 year old town hall building in the centre of Barga Vecchia. This morning work started on putting up physical barriers to keep the pigeons on the move. A series of light alloy spikes which create a very small visual disturbance to people on the ground but create a very large disturbance for the birds when taking off and landing. This is the second time that these spikes have been used around the outside of the Palazzo Pancrazi to keep the pigeons away – the last time the birds retaliated by rocking the lines of spikes until they dropped to the ground.
That time they were made of plastic and were just one single line of spikes.
This time they are alloy and containing a series of 5 spikes in a line.
Any bets on how long these will last ?”
The answer came just seven months later almost to the day that they were expelled from their roosting places, the pigeons were back in force and settling down in their winter residence high above the piazza – article here
Four years later in 2011 we published another article in which we said – “Four years has now passed and the pigeons are gradually taking over the Palazzo Pancrazi once again and it seems that so far nothing that the Comune can do will stop this problem. A quick tour of the search engines on the net reveals that there are other solutions to this problem, some more drastic that others: pigeon food laced with anti conception drugs, bringing hawks and of course trapping or shooting the pigeons.”
Fast forward to 2019 and this morning workmen were once again hard at work installing more strips of light alloy spikes on the ledges and windowsills of Palazzo Pancrazi.
