The Downfall of the Rats of the Sky
- Amelie Janssen & Lina Tjarks
- Feb 25
- 9 min read
How Limburg’s referendum to kill their town’s pigeons made international news
Disclaimer: All quotes and secondary information have been translated from German to English by the authors.
Not much is happening in Limburg an der Lahn's city centre on this rather chilly yet sunny February day. The 35000 people town is located in Hesse, the middle of Germany, with hilly windy streets displaying the historic architecture and a dome drawing in small groups of day tourists. The town is also anticipating this week's national federal elections. Political discussions can be overheard in cafes, supermarkets, and streets as parties try to win over undecided voters in the pedestrian zone. However, this is not the only vote that has kept the people in Limburg occupied. A seemingly much smaller matter - one with grey ruffled feathers and a strong appetite for anything edible - has kept the Limburgers in a chokehold for more than half a year.
Last summer, the city of Limburg held a public vote to decide whether to kill its local city pigeon population. The vote results were close, but 53 per cent of the Limburgers chose to eliminate the animals. This dark day for pigeons and animal lovers ended up on international news for its controversial yet seemingly democratic decision-making. Two reporters from The Glass Room set foot into Limburg to try and understand how 700 pigeons managed to divide a city and its people.
From Local Drama to Global Outrage
Imagine looking at the news and reading: "The German town where every single pigeon is being slaughtered" and "Uproar After German Town Votes To Wipe Out Its Pigeon Population". Absurd, is it not? And even more absurd to find out that the headline is just the beginning of an even more outrageous story about a little German town at war with its feathered inhabitants.
Once the referendum was made public, local animal protection initiatives started to post about the topic, which led to wider attention from bigger, nationwide organizations such as Menschen für Tierrechte. Stefani Richter, public speaker of the organization, tells The Glass Room: "Without the social media, the Limburg case would not have been noticed to this extent". Similarly, the German Federation for Animal Welfare learnt about the referendum through social media. "It took on a certain dynamic. There were influencers like Malte Zierden, who got involved and were loud", says Lea Schmitz, spokesperson of the organization. Zierden, a German influencer and animal activist, posted multiple Reels on Instagram about the situation in Limburg, which reached up to 2.7 million views per clip. The viral videos sparked a heated online debate, leading to masses of new pigeon lovers. Already existing pigeon campaigns started trending, such as #RespektTaube (an established campaign by the German Federation for Animal Welfare).
Old Problem, New-Found Urgency
The Limburg pigeon crisis has lingered in the background for over a decade. The beginning of the debates can be traced back to 2011 when a Kassel court declared that stray pigeons could be considered pests, given that the number of pigeons per square meter in the city centre exceeded a threshold. Animal rights activists and local parties concerned have since called for a different approach, but no action has been taken. Meanwhile, the pigeon population continued to rise, and by early 2023, a count showed 700 to 1,000 pigeons in Limburg, meeting said threshold. Suddenly, everybody cared about the pigeons: "They are taking over the city when you look at all of the dirt they are bringing.", an inhabitant of Limburg tells The Glass Room.
According to the Augsburger Modell, a city council meeting was initially planned for May 2023 to decide how to build pigeon houses. The model aims to lower animal reproduction rates by swapping eggs with artificial ones. However, this meeting took a drastic turn, and it decided that the pigeons had to be murdered to ensure the health and safety of the Limburgers. The method of choice? Snapping their necks.
On November 13, 2023, the city council allowed the slaughter. This decision quickly backfired. Animal rights groups, including Menschen für Tierrechte, were outraged. Richter pointed out that humans initially caused the overpopulation. "The city pigeons are escaped carrier pigeons that their owners abandoned", she explains.
'Pro-pigeon' protesters gathered in front of Limburg's town hall, and the debate eventually turned into a public vote on June 9, 2024. The referendum's outcome was in favour of killing the pigeons. But who will take on this time and labour-intensive task of snapping 700 necks?
A License to Kill
Berthold Geis, a falconer from Hesse, has been known for his work and dedication in the field for years. "I always say: A dead pigeon can't lay eggs." Geis had tried several times to obtain a special permit on the subject, and finally, he succeeded in 2011 with a ruling from Kassel. "The ruling now allows me to catch and kill feral urban pigeons nationwide, subject to certain legal conditions. This is the only way to reduce the population in the long term.", Geis writes on his website. The drastic approach is part of an intergenerational family business, which his daughter is part of as well. With The Glass Room, he speaks more about his out-of-the-ordinary lifestyle: "Immediately, when I'm done at the office, I'll go out, then they'll [the pigeons he captured in traps] be killed. Of course, by snapping their necks. Then they are gutted, frozen and later fed to my birds of prey".
His reputation is why the leading parties turned to him as an expert for the city's meeting in May. Geis was the only expert invited, and the city followed his advice that killing was the best solution. The city's spokesperson, Johannes Laubach, could not specify why he was the only one invited and why animal rights groups that were part of prior discussions were excluded. Regardless, he clarified it was not the mayor's decision. "The administration also follows these committee meetings, but in the end, politics is self-determined - they decide whom to invite", Laubach says.
The Glass Room spoke to Sebastian Schaub, a Limburg Green Party's district executive member. "It came out in interviews afterwards that Geis had probably visited all political groups except ours in the run-up to the May meeting." Could this have influenced the election? Possibly.
However, The flyers, handed out shortly before the election and signed by the three ruling parties, could have swayed some voters. A citizens' initiative, "Stop the pigeon killing!" discovered that they contained misinformation. In an analysis on the initiative’s website, the flyer was described as a populist tactic to sway public opinion without engaging in genuine dialogue or presenting factual evidence. In it, for example, pigeons are portrayed as dirty, unhygienic animals that pose severe risks to the citizens of Limburg.
Are City Pigeons Really That Bad?
While the photo of a pigeon eating fries is funny, the Limburgers are less amused. "They say they're the rats of the sky. If rats were running around here, people would probably react differently. That's what I think," says an employee of the tourist office. When asked how the vote would go if it were today, she replies: "I would be in favour. The killing sounds bad. But it's just getting out of hand."
"Look at the situation for restaurants and their outside spaces. If someone were sitting there, they would enjoy their Schnitzel, and then a pigeon would sit on it. Would that be so nice?" a local server asks. Probably not. Unless you make something else out of the situation, an older gentleman suggests: "It used to be common practice to put the pigeon in the frying pan. Have you ever tried them? Stuffed pigeon breast is delicious. You should probably eat them rather than only kill them."
All jokes aside, one thing all involved parties seem to agree on is that the pigeon population must still be reduced. Schmitz tells The Glass Room: "From an animal welfare point of view, we are also interested in ensuring that there are fewer urban pigeons. But not by acting contrary to animal welfare but by acting in line with official guidelines. Then it is also in the interests of the animals if we take action".
Problems with the Solution
The solution Geis proposed in the referendum has legal and practical shortcomings regarding animal welfare. Schmitz explains that the Animal Protection Act requires the mildest method to be applied before harming animals. "Killing should always be the last resort," Schmitz says.
Similarly, Richter tells The Glass Room that what makes the Limburg case special is letting the public make this "ultra-radical decision that gives the order to kill." According to her, it is questionable if a city can hold a referendum on a matter that possibly violates the Animal Welfare Act. "It is complicated because at what point do animals become harmful to people's health, and how can this be proven?" Richter says.
Regardless, even if the city proceeds with its original plan to kill the pigeons, this does not solve the problem. Richter explains: "Killing pigeons is a bottomless pit". While it may seem like the easiest and quickest way to resolve the issue, it would not be a sustainable solution, as pigeons were bred to 'overbreed'. "The overpopulation of pigeons is a man-made problem", she explains. Schmitz says that even the proposed idea of Gut Aiderbichl, an animal rescue based in Austria, to take in 200 animals would not make a difference in the long term. "To control and keep an overview of the issue, it requires pigeon houses and volunteers to invest time and money into looking after the animals," she says.
"It is not witchcraft to find an animal-friendly solution, and other cities have shown that it can be done", Schmitz says. According to her and Richter, such a solution would be the Augsburger model. "Of course, it is a question of money, but how much cheaper can it be to keep paying someone to kill this many animals continuously?" Richter says.
Malte Zierden offered his support to the city in tackling the financial hurdle that comes with the pigeon houses. This would eliminate one of the main reasons against the Augsburger model. "We didn't reject that offer entirely," Laubach, the city's spokesperson, says, "But we have, of course, pointed out that we now have to consider a city council resolution confirmed by a citizens referendum. And part of this resolution is that there will be no pigeon houses for now."
Schmitz feels the responsible parties in Limburg are closing their eyes to the root of the problem. "Now that they have the public legitimation through the referendum, they do not see a reason to invest time and resources into finding more suitable solutions."
What's next for Limburg?
The city is tired. Tired of the pigeons but even more so of the debate. The Glass Room asked Schmitz if she thinks that the public and media attention made a difference in the case, to which she replies: "I don't think the city of Limburg expected this to be met with such massive criticism. I think they thought 'let's just decide to kill the animals here and that's that".
But over the past year, there have been multiple death threats towards both sides of the conflict, and there are several open court cases about harassment and threatening behaviour. As Laubach says, times were challenging for the people working for the city and the press office. "Some of the colleagues have had a strong reaction to what was going on, and there was also a longer period of illness for some."
However, it was also not easy to be 'pro-pigeon'. Julia Becker recalls a situation when she went from door to door as part of the Limburg pigeon initiative before the vote last summer. "A guy opened the door and told me that he would wring my neck, just like the pigeons’", Julia tells The Glass Room.
"It's a Limburg thing. If the people think that some crazy people from the big city want to impose something on them, they shut down completely", Schaub attempts to explain the reaction of some citizens. He says that in the end, the referendum was not even truly about the pigeons anymore. "It was a bit of a defensive stance and probably also why this vote turned out the way it did". Becker says this development is symptomatic of the city's generally more tense and polarised climate. "People feel more comfortable to say more extreme things out loud that would not have been ok to say a couple of years ago".
When The Glass Room asks Geis how he handles being a central part of this debate, he said he was not too impressed. "I have always been someone who did not care what others think of me". In fact, Geis says that the discussion has positively affected his business. "It's been a great advertisement. You would not believe how many cities and private people have since approached me to ask for my help".
So this is not only happening in Limburg but in other, maybe even bigger cities in Germany? Geis says that he is not permitted to tell any details. Nevertheless, he says he has "taken care" of pigeons in many places in Germany. He says that what makes Limburg different from other cities is that they actually made this information public. Asking what he thinks of Limburg's ongoing debate, he is eager to help the city if they eventually decide to kill the animals. "I would start my work tomorrow if they would call me".
Even though no pigeon was officially harmed yet, their days may still be counted after all.
"The whole situation is pretty uncertain right now. In the end, the city needs to make a decision. In some way or the other", Schmitz says. After more than a year of debates, protests, threats, viral videos and international attention, the citizens of Limburg remain as clueless about the pigeons' future as the animals themselves. So the next time you come across an absurd headline online, you too could find that the truth behind it is even more outrageous than a small German town would lead you to believe at first glance.
Comments