SAN CLEMENTE : Deaths of Pigeons at Pier Investigated

State Department of Agriculture investigators are looking into the recent deaths of 123 pigeons on or around the San Clemente Pier, city officials said.

The birds plummeted onto the pier and into the ocean within a few minutes after consuming a birth control drug intended to control the pigeon population in the area.

“They just started falling out of the sky,” said Capt. Lynn Hughes of the city marine safety division. “It was within just two or three minutes after the filling of those trays” containing a mixture of corn and a chemical intended to sterilize the birds.

Hughes said the deaths two weeks ago were probably attributed to the use of the drug Avitrol, which in light doses will make pigeons sick and disoriented.

Officials at the exterminating company that set out the feed trays said they were baffled by the pigeon deaths.

“They were supposed to be feeding on untreated corn” as a prelude to feeding on corn treated with a birth-control drug, said Mike Lawton, a spokesman for Western Exterminators of Capistrano Beach. “It’s a mystery at this point in time how the Avitrol got in there.”

Lawton said that tests done by the Department of Agriculture showed the presence of Avitrol in the stomachs of the deceased birds. He said the company occasionally uses the drug to control pigeon populations.

“We don’t like to kill birds,” he said. “That’s not what our job was here.”

Lawton said the birth-control effort called for the pigeons to initially feed on untreated corn as a means of bringing them to the same area to feed every day. The company then planned to gradually add doses of Ornithol, a drug that sterilizes the female birds, to the corn.

The City Council approved a plan last year in which Ornithol was used, Hughes said. The drug was fed to the San Clemente pigeons six months ago, and no pigeons were harmed by the treatment, Hughes said.

“We went the most expensive route in order not to kill them,” Hughes said.

Hughes said the Department of Agriculture regulates the extermination industry. Agriculture officials get involved “to make sure that their licensed companies are following safe practices,” he said.

“What happened here was an obvious indicator that something went wrong, and they want to make sure that it doesn’t happen again.”

Last year, the City Council voted to use the most humane of several options available to reduce the population of about 400 pigeons that live on the pier, said Hughes.

The marine safety officer said pigeon droppings were creating a health hazard at the pier. In a report to the council last year, he indicated that two city employees have been forced to take permanent disability stemming from a disease contracted from coming in contact with pigeon excrement.

The sterilization method used by San Clemente has been effective in other places, including San Diego’s Balboa Park. There, the pigeon population was reduced from thousands to a few hundred in less than a year.