Unlike the beloved Bert on Sesame Street, I've never been all warm and fuzzy about pigeons. I usually wear a look of disgust when I see someone feeding them. However, I've never had a desire to punt one into the endzone either.
Yesterday, I Twittered about a pigeon that was stuck in a contraption on top of the roof my south facing windows look out on (click for my POV). (By the way, the sound of a pigeon trying to escape from an aluminum bowl resembles nails on a chalkboard.) The pigeon was still there today and had a visitor who appeared to be laughing down at his doomed brethren (see sketch). This was starting to bother me a bit. I was concerned about the pigeon. Not knowing how long it takes for a pigeon to starve to death, I really did not want to struggle with that guilt for a long time, but I wasn't sure what to do.
In a bit of random Friday conversation at work, we ended up chatting about pigeons. My co-workers care as much as (if not more than) I do about not letting helpless things suffer. They demanded encouraged me to take action, and immediately, I was sent a phone number for the local SPCA.
I went on the roof to check on the pigeon before calling to confirm that the pigeon was alive. It was in the vent and trapped in the space below the inner dome with nothing to grab on to and not enough room to spread its wings.
I called a few numbers before I got to the right one. The only number that matters is 415 554-9405 which I suppose you can call for your animal rescuing needs in San Francisco. I didn't get the feeling the guys on the phone cared about the pigeon trapped on the roof, and I was feeling a bit silly about calling. However, a woman showed up a couple hours later in an official looking khaki uniform with a net ready to go into action. She seemed to care even about the lowly pigeon. Within a minute, the pigeon flew away. She said that pigeons usually nest in those spaces, but this pigeon was unable to get out. It doesn't say much about the intelligence of this particular pigeon.
This experience sadly was the most interesting episode of my week.