“Are you a pigeon fan?” Susan Joyce asks within seconds of our interview beginning. As the founder of the National Pigeon Advocacy Association, Joyce is eager to discuss her passion.
“Opinions on pigeons are absolutely changing for the better,” she says confidently. “We’re helping to drive that shift, and I like to think I’ve played a part.” Her organisation is feeling the positive effect, with hundreds signing up to volunteer and support her ambitious six-year plan (more on that shortly). In September, 130 of the most devoted members gathered for the first sell-out conference in Staffordshire, with another 300 joining online via Zoom. And with plans already in motion for an even bigger event this year, the movement is growing fast. Attendees come from all walks of life – from university students to pensioners, with a fairly equal gender balance – but Joyce has noticed one common thread among them.
“Many come from marginalised communities – neurodiverse, ethnic minority, and LGBTQ+,” says Joyce, 50, who is queer. “They understand the kind of hatred pigeons face because they experience it too. Pigeons are the underdog they want to root for.”
Although they’ve long been seen as underdogs, pigeons are now benefiting from a surge in positive attention. “PigeonTok” has become a viral sensation, and a popular social media account, A View from a Bridge, recently featured a man passionately explaining why pigeons “deserve their time in the sun”. Thousands of followers agreed, commenting things like: “Pigeons are really having the comeback they deserve.” Even Rizzle Kicks’ Jordan Stephens chimed in, simply posting, “He Knows.”
Interestingly, pigeons are also becoming a symbol of empathy on dating apps, with users advocating for them to express their compassionate side.
How it all began
Despite now devoting her life to pigeons, working seven days per week, being their voice, Joyce initially wasn’t overly fond of the species, but that all changed 15 years ago, while she was working as a veterinary nurse in Wolverhampton.
“The girl who looked after the pigeons left her job, so I had to take over, and my first thought was ‘Oh no’, but I quickly realised I’d been missing out, and I became addicted to them,” she recalls.
Joyce believes more must be done to help pigeonsAnd now she wants to “change the misconceptions” that tainted her view of the bird. Ugly? “The purple and green iridescence around their necks looks incredible when it shines under sunlight.” Dirty? “I’ve never caught a single disease from them, and it’s extremely uncommon for that to happen. They clean themselves in puddles, and shake the feathers to get rid of mites and lice. If anything, they clean up our mess by eating the food humans drop.” Stupid? “They can recognise between 30 to 60 words, see themselves in the mirror, and it’s thought that modern pigeons navigate using road systems.”
“I like talking about pigeons,” she sweetly adds.
In 2020, she took her passion up a notch by setting up a sanctuary in West Wales, to support injured and abandoned pigeons.
“Even when there were 400, I could recognise every single one and tell you their name, because they each had their own personality and look,” she says. Her favourites were Romeo, who would bring his “wife” Juliet, a dandelion flower each morning, and Sir Ian McKellen, who would “put on a show” by cooing, bowing and fluffing his wings up. After four years, it closed down due to financial difficulties, with the birds moving to a friend’s sanctuary, and this was when Joyce decided to try to alter the wider landscape.
The pigeon plan
“We can look after millions of pigeons by making legislation and governmental change,” she says.
“If I woke up tomorrow and there were not a single feral pigeon on the streets in the UK, I’d be really happy, because they suffer from starvation, injuries and high mortality rates.” Therefore, her end goal is small, healthy flocks that live outside town centres, and instead in parks or designated areas, so more people can enjoy them, rather than seeing them as pests. She doesn’t agree that not feeding pigeons is the way to do this, saying that the “tenacious” animal will just raid bins and eat food that could make their faeces toxic. Her idea is instead to be given a building to care for them in each town.
“Each week our volunteers will feed the flocks outside and, eventually, inside the building. We can close that window when the majority of the flock is there, treat them for diseases and take away their eggs so they don’t have babies.”
Although population management through egg removal is ethically complex, because it can be seen as intrusive, can be classed as controlling human intervention, and can cause stress to animals, Joyce argues: “The pigeons won’t know and it’s the best way to be kind. Everybody is a winner.”
Joyce says the rising numbers aren’t sustainable – there are estimated to be more than five million breeding pairs of wood pigeons, five million feral pigeons (rock doves), and 800,000 collared doves — but she doesn’t blame the bird.
“Pigeons in towns – usually rock doves – once lived on cliffs, but thousands of years ago, people realised that they could breed them for eggs and meat, and use them for communication, so they domesticated them. We made them get used to hanging out in cities, we changed their physiology so that all they really eat is grain, and essentially, took their contraception away. If it’s too cold, or if there’s a food supply shortage, many birds will stop having or step away from eggs, but several pigeons were bred out of that ability.
“I understand the complexity of the animal, and their suffering at the hands of people. It drives me every single day, and so I do not take time off,” she continues. “I don’t think about what shoes to buy, or where to go on holiday, my interest is solely in making everything better for pigeons.”
Joyce and some of her feathered friendsThere have been endless personal sacrifices for Joyce. She put her life savings into the sanctuary, and her work is unpaid, so she’s living off her supportive partner’s wage. She is planning to use a credit card to fix her broken van, so she can continue driving around the country to give talks on pigeons, and sometimes can’t afford to eat.
“There is a lot of hardship in this, and I’m not having an easy time, but I will keep going because we are about to break through on things. If I give up now, then the last 10 years have been for nothing.”
She adds: “Pigeons’ lives are such a struggle, but they get on with it.”
After putting down the phone, I spot two pigeons perched on the roof of the flat opposite my own. They are pecking gently at each other, and I notice the colourful turquoise necks glowing in the afternoon sun, perhaps for the first time. In answer to Joyce’s earlier question of whether I’m a fan, I think I could be.
Learn more about Susan Joyce’s work at nationalpigeonadvocacyassociation.co.uk
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