Don’t Mess With Meadowlands Falcons

This tidbit was in environmental writer Jim O’Neill’s story in The Record yesterday on the environmentally aware cleanups after Jets and Giants games at MetLife Stadium:

Another challenge for that staff: birds. Starlings and pigeons love to roost in the stadium’s open steel beams, and bird droppings require more frequent power washing.

To reduce the use of water, stadium officials tried installing fake owls to scare the birds. “Within days the starlings were nesting on the owl heads,” said Henry Rzemieniewski, the cleaning operations manager.

Then they brought in a falconer, who released his trained falcon to fly around the stadium and scare the birds away. But a native wild Meadowlands falcon appeared, attacked the falconer’s bird — and killed it.

Finally, the stadium installed fine mesh netting high in the exterior rafters — barely visible to fans, but so far a success at keeping the birds from their favorite roosts, and reducing water used for power washing.

A link to the story is here.

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