Pigeon trap

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Pigeon Traps in Action

These are pictures of bob wire pigeon traps in action. These traps were not built from my plans but were the inspiration for it.

This trap is ideal for catching feral pigeons which can quickly accumulate in large numbers and create a health hazard. The design makes use of ‘bob wires’ which allow the birds to push past in one direction but which will not swing back the other way.

As with all the traps featured in the book there are rules governing their legal use.

In the book details are given for creating a bob wire entrance and sizes of cage to mount it in.

In this picture the door is clamped to a length of timber to show how it would look. In a real trap it would be screwed to the bottom rail of the cage.

You may occasionally capture a ringed bird amongst the feral birds. Sometimes this is a racing bird that has joined a feral flock but just as likely it’s a bird on route which has stopped for rest and food. Either way any ringed bird should be separated from the others and released as quickly as possible. If a particular bird is recaptured over several days, make a note of the ring number and contact Royal Pigeon Racing Association. Racing Pigeons have a high financial and emotional value to their trainers so every effort should be made to return them unharmed.

This was a trap I built as a bit of an experiment. The bobwire doors work on the same principle but this trap can be dismantled and put away for storage.

In this picture you can see how the doors work, with the pigeon pushing through the bobwires to reach the grain - before finally being captured.

Click the image on the left to see a Youtube video of how the trap works.

If you’ve never seen bobwires before then here’s what they look like.

Commercial bobwires (available in the shop) have a hollow plastic ‘T’ bar which is slid onto a mounting wire or bar.

Bobwires

Alternative ‘Doors’

I can’t take credit for this one. It was sent to me by ‘Talpa’ of South Wales who found that some of the large ferals had managed to push the bobwires out of shape and escape.

Talpa has gone for the Ground Funnel approach, an example of the passive door principle described in Trap Making Step by Step.

Peter B, from Redditch used this cage to try and catch pigeons using the ‘prop and string pull’ method. After buying a few bobwires he was able to convert it into a much more successful trap.

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