RT Journal Article
T1 Feral pigeon (Columba livia var. domestica) management in low-density urban areas: prevention is better than cure.
A1 Farfán-Aguilar, Miguel Ángel
A1 Díaz-Ruiz, Francisco
A1 Duarte, Jesús
A1 Real-Giménez, Raimundo
K1 Palomas - Control
K1 Ecología urbana
K1 Fauna urbana
AB Currently, there are naturalized populations of feral pigeon (Columba livia var. domestica) worldwide with an estimated globalpopulation between 165 and 330 million individuals. Feral pigeons are adapted to urban environments, creating problems relatedto human health, damage to architectural structures, unpleasant soiling, and foul odors. Thus, local governments usually implementmeasures to reduce feral pigeon populations in cities to a suitable size. We monitored a feral pigeon trapping campaign toinvestigate the use of cage traps as control method in residential zones.We analyzed efficiency (daily capture rate), effectiveness(defined as the number of feral pigeons captured relative to the total number of potential pigeon captures), animal welfare,selectivity (the proportion of captured feral pigeons in relation to the total number of captured animals), and the effect on feralpigeon abundance. All procedures were conducted in compliance with current European and Spanish legislation. Overallefficiency was 0.25 feral pigeons/trap-day, effectiveness was 22.5%, and selectivity was 99.7%. Over the study period, therewas a decreasing trend in abundances. A significant decrease was found in the relative abundances of feral pigeons after 2 monthsof extractions, and population abundances remained low up to the end of the extraction period. The use of cage traps was a usefuland effective method to reduce local feral pigeon populations in isolated urban areas with low building density in which the feralpigeon population has not yet reached high densities.
PB Springer Nature
YR 2019
FD 2019-07-12
LK https://hdl.handle.net/10630/29876
UL https://hdl.handle.net/10630/29876
LA eng
NO Farfán, M. A., Díaz-Ruiz, F., Duarte, J. y Real, R. (2019). Feral pigeon (Columba livia var. domestica) management in low-density urban areas: prevention is better than cure. Urban Ecosystems, 22(6): 1027-1035. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11252-019-00879-1
NO Política de acceso abierto tomada: https://v2.sherpa.ac.uk/id/publication/16460
DS RIUMA. Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Málaga
RD 12 abr 2026