[HN Gopher] The overengineered solution to my pigeon problem (2022)
___________________________________________________________________
The overengineered solution to my pigeon problem (2022)
Author : cyb0rg0
Score : 66 points
Date : 2025-11-03 00:48 UTC (6 days ago)
(HTM) web link (maxnagy.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (maxnagy.com)
| cyb0rg0 wrote:
| TL;DR: I built a wifi-equipped water gun to shoot the pigeons on
| my balcony, controlled over the internet by a python script
| running openCV reading the camera image of my old iPhone.
| vivzkestrel wrote:
| mind sharing a video or a blog post that explains how it was
| made
| skopje wrote:
| i think that was a summary of the article, which you can
| click on! haha!
| Marshferm wrote:
| Our solution: feed the pigeons in a separate place where they
| congregate in wait. And it works.
| codingbot3000 wrote:
| Over time this will increase the amount of pigeons close to
| your place.
| comrade1234 wrote:
| I really only wanted to see funny videos of pigeons being
| squirted but nothing...
| hermitcrab wrote:
| Yes, really needs a video of it in action.
| Peteragain wrote:
| The pussy wetter has many good ones, and a sound track .
| secondcoming wrote:
| The only thing that seemed to work for me was putting a thread
| across the railing where they used to land. I glued some cheap
| hooks to the wall either side of the railing and ran a thread
| over and back.
|
| I'm not sure why it worked. They either can see the thread and
| get put off, or they don't see it and freak out when they land on
| it. I've tried both black and white thread and both seem
| effective. It did snap once probably due to a pigeon being caught
| out but that's not a problem.
|
| It doesn't getin my way either as the thread is loose enough for
| me to rest my arm on the handrail without it breaking.
|
| My balcony has been crap free for about a year now and it cost
| like PS2 to do.
| em500 wrote:
| I did pretty much the same thing, after I observed that they'd
| always land on the railing first before hopping into the
| balcony. A thread worked very well as a deterrent. I guess
| they're just picking someone else's balcony now.
| camgunz wrote:
| There's a cat in our neighborhood that shits on our back porches
| multiple times a day (I have no idea how this is possible, maybe
| it means the cat will die soon!), and I finally got a huge
| industrial fan and hooked it up to a motion sensor. Mischief
| managed.
| lostlogin wrote:
| Has the shit hit the fan?
| neuroelectron wrote:
| A loud bang works and you don't have to aim
| codingbot3000 wrote:
| It sounds as if he had neighbours in the same building :-D
| growt wrote:
| The neighbours probably won't approve
| DeathArrow wrote:
| Then you have to imagine another device to deal with the
| neighbours.
| growt wrote:
| I like the way you think. If the loud bang takes care of
| the pigeons, the water gun is available.
| jijijijij wrote:
| I shoot them with a "pea shooter", a cardboard pipe with a
| balloon attached to one end, loaded with dry lentils or rice.
| Stretching/charging and releasing the balloon makes a loud,
| directed thump noise, but by itself it's quickly ignored by
| pigeons. They need to be actually hit by the load to care. (BTW
| I can confirm, although quite violent, pigeons seemingly don't
| readily learn from this experience... They are really fucking
| stupid.)
|
| They are adapted to city noise, honking, construction sites...
| Unless you use flash powder charges (like they do at airports),
| noise won't scare them reliably. And your neighbors, dogs and
| the cool birds won't be happy about frequent reality shattering
| explosions. The stuff they use at airports got enough power to
| blow off hands.
| jyounker wrote:
| > They need to be actually hit by the load to care. (BTW I
| can confirm, > although quite violent, pigeons seemingly
| don't readily learn from > this experience... They are really
| fucking stupid.)
|
| That doesn't sound stupid to me. Rather it sounds like
| they're willing to put with a lot of annoyance in order to
| get food.
| rollulus wrote:
| As always there's someone on the internet a step beyond. Meet the
| pussy wetter: https://pussywetter.com/
| paulhart wrote:
| Is there a repository for that? I'd like to dissuade certain
| species from my porch but not others...
| Peteragain wrote:
| That really is a step beyond!
| intralogic wrote:
| How does this work with a fixed gun? Perhaps its not a narrow jet
| as I was assuming. Is a broad cone or mist spray sufficient?
| croisillon wrote:
| previously:
|
| May 2022, 103 comments -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31377985
| dlisboa wrote:
| Once in the Netherlands I saw the simplest solution to pigeons:
| they stretched a fishing line an inch or two over the balcony
| railing, so when pigeons would try to land they'd land on the
| fishing line and be off balance, flying away to a more stable
| place.
|
| Seems it worked because the balcony was spotless. I've seen
| similar on European churches.
| ludicrousdispla wrote:
| In my experience, crows seem to be quite an effective natural
| deterrent.
| jijijijij wrote:
| You can make friends with crows.
|
| They seem to really like peanuts and, if you offer them shell
| included, it's a somewhat selective package tailored to them
| (although great tits try, you may bribe them with sunflower
| seeds in selective feeders). I read reports of people sometimes
| receiving gifts from befriended crows in return, too, so it's
| possible to form complex relationships. Anyway, the downside is
| their beautiful singing voice... Magpies are a little less
| noisy, but they are very shy. Crows also seem to attack birds
| of prey, so you may not get blessed by the occasional falcon or
| hawk sighting anymore, if a murder of crows protects your
| balcony.
| perihelions wrote:
| Downside is they're intelligent adversaries who won't permit
| you an out, once they've classified you as a food source.
| Mine have surrounded my apartment and tap on the windows from
| every angle. There's no place to hide. I'm not even allowed
| to sleep in late.
| jijijijij wrote:
| Don't discourage The Fellowship publicly. Mind you, crows
| can hold a grudge for more than a generation. You should be
| grateful, your lineage is destined for vita servitutis
| cornicinae. Ave corvus!
| NoiseBert69 wrote:
| Resistance is futile.
|
| We found your HN account _craw craw craw_.
|
| Food. Now.
| bob1029 wrote:
| I'd much rather have a pigeon problem than a crow problem.
| jyounker wrote:
| I came here to day that. I am slowing building a crow air-force
| on my balcony in Berlin. No pigeons.
| jijijijij wrote:
| Maybe a lasting solution would be a convenient, dedicated resting
| rod laced with a little ceasium-137. You know, so they would be
| willingly placing their gonads on a gamma emitter. I'd say you
| likely sterilize most, with only a small chance of creating a
| supermutant nemesis. You could also add some phosphor to attract
| mosquitos at night.. and sterilize them, too.
| Mikhail_Edoshin wrote:
| We have a pigeon on our balcony. We picked him when he was only a
| week old and now he lives with us. Our balcony is isolated from
| the street, so every morning we open a window there so Theodor
| (his name; although we're not sure, maybe he is she), so Theodor
| can go out and fly. In the evening he returns; sometimes he gets
| stuck somewhere due to rain (they do not fly in the rain) until
| dark (they do not fly in the dark either) and returns in the
| morning. We worry a little when this happens.
|
| He is not strictly a pet, we try not to turn him into one and
| hope he will find a spouse in the spring. In the meantime we'll
| build him a small house that may serve as a nest if he is so
| inclined. We've read a few books about them and joined a chat of
| people who keep pigeons, en masse or just adopt a pigeon who
| needs it.
|
| We do not do that often but about once a week we catch him and
| sprinkle with a dust against parasites. Pigeons are very pleasant
| to touch. The feathers have a silky feeling and they are warm,
| warmer than people.
|
| There are a lot of excrements, of course. We covered the balcony
| with cardboard to protect and wear a dedicated pair of slippers.
| Yet we see these little piles with satisfaction because they mean
| that Theodor eats well and is healthy. By the way it must be a
| good fertilizer; old books say it was a source of income for the
| pigeon keeper.
|
| So maybe you can make friends with pigeons instead of shooting
| them. The balcony is too small anyway (see "The pattern
| language"). Give them a bath (they love to bath), make them a
| feeder. (You can strategically position it so that excrements
| will mostly fall outside.) They are very lovely creatures.
| hermitcrab wrote:
| Charles Darwin was a 'pigeon fancier' (not as dodgy as it
| sounds), so you are in good company.
| yegle wrote:
| > Pigeons are very pleasant to touch. The feathers have a silky
| feeling and they are warm, warmer than people.
|
| My first language is not English, so I learned this late:
| pigeons are perceived as dirty birds due to its presence in
| urban environments, but they are the same species of doves
| which is perceived as clean. In my first language they are just
| called "pigeon" and "white pigeon".
| yapyap wrote:
| Huh, I wonder if this is an universal thing because over here
| in western europe i dont mind pigeons just flying around
| wiml wrote:
| In English there is also the name "rock dove" for pigeons
| (but I think technically rock doves are the wild ancestors of
| both white doves and city pigeons).
| base698 wrote:
| I started a project this year similar to this with rats. It's now
| two axis with tracking and a stereo camera with depth detection.
| The amount of hours I've spent on it is astounding but I've
| learned a lot!
|
| Also, ended up swapping the Pi I started with to a jetson.
| mnemonet wrote:
| https://xkcd.com/382
| econ wrote:
| Cats also don't work. The pigeons eventually kill them by
| pretending not to notice then flying away at the last moment
| while the cat is in mid air. The cat then plunges n stories down
| again and again.
|
| I don't think the pigeons will attack your network any time soon
| in the foreseeable future.
|
| I'm very disappointed there is no video of this weapon in action.
|
| A fun expansion would be to play a soft sound before shooting for
| familiar customers.
| ho_schi wrote:
| Solution: Cut food supply through humans trash. Don't allow
| people to drop food on the ground in city center or elsewhere.
| And make life for some natural predators comfortable, like crows.
|
| When I first saw how two crows shared a pigeon I was impressed.
| vjerancrnjak wrote:
| Let's solve the problem with ingenuity, not brutality.
|
| Brutality is lazy. Dealing with animal overpopulation by
| introducing carnage. I know nature is indifferent but Homo
| sapiens should not be.
| hypercube33 wrote:
| Clearly you don't live near trains that carry grain. They leak
| corn all over and are basically a breeding ground for pigeons.
| assemblyman wrote:
| As an aside, pigeons are deeply misunderstood. Here's a very nice
| article about it:
| https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240620-why-do-people-pe...
|
| From the article: "One study found that, between 1941 and 2004,
| there were just 207 reports of pathogens transmitted from pigeons
| to humans - anywhere in the world. In all, there were 13 recorded
| deaths. The true number may be higher, but it would have to be
| off by several orders of magnitude to compete with the scale of
| infections from other domesticated animals - particularly some of
| those with more favourable reputations."
|
| I occasionally (2x per week per location) feed a group of pigeons
| both in my apartment building's garage as well as my grocery
| store's open parking lot. They love sunflower seed kernels
| (unsalted since salt can be really bad for them) which has led to
| me hoarding sunflower seeds every time I go food shopping. They
| now recognize my car and swoop in as soon as I drive up to a
| parking spot (which is not consistent at the grocery store).
| Hopefully, one day I'll convince myself to stop/slow working and
| dedicate my free time to studying animal communication and
| behavior with some ML involved.
| RealityVoid wrote:
| Noble outlook, probably nicer animals than we give them credit,
| but it's a bit harder to be charitable when they are shitting
| all over your balcony.
| mzhaase wrote:
| Please don't feed them. They destroy balcony plants and shit
| everywhere.
| righthand wrote:
| Feeding pigeons is a bad thing. For one the pigeons are not
| starving and you are over feeding them. The other issue is that
| you are training them to depend up humans for food. You are
| also aiding in creating unnaturally large pigeon populations
| since they are overfed.
|
| Many places it is illegal to feed the birds. Media has created
| this stupid meme where people think it's a hobby to over feed
| birds in cities.
| skopje wrote:
| using opencv for image diffs is common quick hack, but shadows
| will ruin this (bright sun all of a sudden), not to mention
| nonpigeons haha! hate to say it but yolo/ssd work good for this:
|
| https://github.com/jpvoelz/pigeon-detector
| maxmunzel wrote:
| Hey, author here -- thanks for posting it again!
|
| As of 2025 the pigeons are back and version 2 with aiming and a
| microphone array for target acquisition is still work-in-
| progress. I'm heading to bed now, but I'll happily answer any
| questions tomorrow.
| bikeshaving wrote:
| It's funny when engineers accidentally create/recreate weapons of
| war to scratch an itch. Like when Mark Rober et al tried to do an
| egg drop from space only to realize they were essentially
| creating precision-guided missiles.
|
| https://youtu.be/BYVZh5kqaFg?si=Ml6e24BO9iiUL6d6&t=650
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2025-11-09 23:00 UTC)