Electronic pest control and Greys

[Babette8008]

Hello! I wanted to know whether anyone has found any problems with their birds or Greys after having installed electronic sound wave pest controls intended for the ridding of rodents. My Grey was having episodes of falling off her perch and looking unstable and wobbly.

I took her to the vet recently and all her blood work came back normal and no lead, etc. The vet recommended a neurologist. I realized that she may have been affected by the electronic emitters that I plugged into 4 outlets in the space she was in. I mentioned this to the vet and she said she had never heard of that, but it is possible. Since we unplugged them, I see that she is geting back to herself. I wanted to know if any of you have similar experiences or have heard of this. The only data I have uncovered online is migratory birds beginning to be affected by the cell phone tower emitters and other types of electronic waves.

[dblhelix]

No personal experience but I have always thought those devices would be potentially bad for household pets. Most animals hear and see at different frequencies or wavelengths than we do. If something is designed to deter, annoy, disrupt "pests" its reasonable to expect they would do something similar to our pets.

 

It seems your first hand experience is powerful data that these devices may in fact cause problems for birds. If you noted a problem that came up when you introduced the devices and then went away when you removed them that seems like a pretty sound evidence. If you do use them, certainly dont use them in the same room as the bird. B)

[Dave007]

I've used them for years. Birds can't hear them. Neither can dogs or cats.

[judygram]

Hello Babette8008, why don't you introduce yourself in the welcome room and tell us a little more about you and your grey.

[dblhelix]

Interesting Dave. Have you used them in the same space as your birds? Babette8008 indicated that the emitters were plugged into 4 outlets in the same space the bird was in. Seems suspicious to me, but tough to know for sure. Either way I would not want to "surround" my pets with high frequency pest deterrents. I could see using them elsewhere around the house though.

[danmcq]

There are several white papers on this subject. They can and do affect our Avian friends.

 

Here is a link to just one PDF written by the University of Hawaii on this subject:

 

http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1009&context=vpc2

 

Also, here is a link to several articles:

 

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=electronic+pest+control+effects+on+animals+birds&hl=en&rls=GGLR,GGLR:2005-47,GGLR:en&um=1&ie=UTF-8&oi=scholart

 

Hope this helps all in coming to an understanding of this.

[dblhelix]

Great info Dan! The effect of ultrasonic frequency on birds appears to be in question. My guess is that these pest deterrent devices are advertised as if birds cannot hear them etc, but who knows how they gathered data to make the claim. In addition, the integrity of the data is subject to scrutiny. Many many products, even in the highly regulated human drug world for example, are claimed to be harmless only to later be irrefutably proven differently. None of us should jump to conclusion w/o having reasonably solid data to support it. If I had installed these things in the room of my bird, shortly later noted the bird acting strange, removed the devices and observed my bird returning to "normal" I would highly suspect the device...<br><br>Post edited by: dblhelix, at: 2008/04/19 20:47

[Dave007]

Mark

I use 3 in the bird area, 2 in the basement area, 2 in a certain part of my garage,1 in the laundry room. The ones in the bird area are approx 18 feet apart. The ones I purchased specifically name off the animals that aren't affected. There might be different types that're being spoken about right now. Many people up in this mountainous region have birds and also use them...in order to protect their dogs and cats from various run ins with insects and mice.

 

This is from the link that was provided here

 

*******Rats, mice, and other small mammals can hear sounds that are ultrasonic

for man, so acoustical s t i m u l i for them could be inaudible to man. Bi rd s,

however, generally have ultrasonic l i m i t s lower than that of man, and for them

audible sounds must be in man's sonic range."""""

 

Post edited by: Dave007, at: 2008/04/19 21:01<br><br>Post edited by: Dave007, at: 2008/04/19 21:06

[dblhelix]

Thanks Dave. Fully agree that there could well be differences in the devices being used. Who knows, maybe some of them emit a sound in the frequency birds can hear simply by being plugged in (the ballast or electronics inside) that "could" be disturbing Babette8008's grey, completely outside the scope of the intended repellent frequency. Many things could be going on here, maybe the bird simply was freaked by "seeing" the new item in the room. It still stands out to me that devices introduced, bird acts wierd, devices removed, bird acts normal. Could be a fluke, but seems compelling that something about the device was related to the birds distress.<br><br>Post edited by: dblhelix, at: 2008/04/19 21:11

[Babette8008]

Thank you for your response! We didn't want to use poison in the house and bought them to handle a growing problem of rodents. It really worked on the rodents, but had no idea it would effect my Grey. I have other birds, and don't see the simlar problem in them.

Perhaps it is because the Greys are super intelligent..have higher perceptions, and I've seen them categorized along with the dolphins and elephants.

Yes, I've totally removed them from the area where she is. She really is almost back to her normal self already.

[Babette8008]

Thank you for the article!

Babette is doing amazingly better since we unplugged the four emitters. They were tiny plug ins and there were several to a package, so to handle a rodent problem, which it did, we installed the four..but it was a large vaulted ceiling room. When the blood tests came back normal and the Doctor mentioned a neurologist, I happened to realize the possibility of the ultra sound causing the problem.

[Dave007]

I doubt that it has to do with any ultrasonic device. Greys have their times of being clumbsy. Out here, people also use larger ultrasonic devices to repel moles, voles, small rats and field mice. Those waves have no effect on the wild birds either. If a person goes to a large Home Depot, all types of large and small repellers are sold and none affect birds. The only thing that birds would be frightened of are the exact same things that would frighten a person such as gunfire, chain saws and other loud electric devices, thunder that we hear etc. The electronic zapper devices that's used for flying insects in backyards also gives out an ultra sonic noise but birds can't hear that too. The sound plus a special type of low flourscent lite is what draws the insects to the zappers. I also have 2 of those outside, 1 near 3 hummingbird feeders and 1 near a pole that has 4 bird feeders hanging from it.

The avian vets out here would definitely know about any devices that would be harmful to birds, both pet birds and wild birds.

[Babette8008]

To all who responded about my Grey and the ultra sound pest controllers. She really is back to normal, she isn't unsteady on the perch, she is holding her food again, and her appetitie is back. Before I removed the sound plug ins, she was afraid to eat with one foot holding on and now she is even dancing again, keeping rhythm to the music. She had really shut down normal behavior until I realized what could be the problem. Again, my other little parrot did not seem to be effected and my dogs and cat are fine. At least the emitters don't go through walls, supposedly, so if I need to use them I can use them in other parts of the house. I'm very relieved that she is doing better and that I have some forum friends who have given supportive communications.

[Babette8008]

Hi and thanks for the invite. I'm new to forums and don't know how to join the, live chat? What should I look for?

[Dave007]

Babbette

 

Another add on concerning the outside ultrasonic zappers...the only so called effect that the zappers have on the birds is that when the machine is on, the ground feeding birds gather under the zapper and wait for the dead bugs to fall so they can eat them. Out here, the frogs and toads do the same thing.

[danmcq]

Mark is spot on and it is entirely possible that Dave's Ultrasonic Units particular Model number does not come with in Avian hearing range. There are significant differences from model to model and application such as to drive off the smallest insects only or cats and dogs or rodents etc. They all have various ranges of hearing and thus, the Ultrasonic model would be selected for the appropriate application.

 

Birds have good ears but they tend to hear things differently than us. Within sounds birds recognise and remember something akin to absolute pitch whereas we humans perceive sounds via relative pitch. Very few humans can hear and remember absolute pitch. Relative pitch however allows us to hear a tune in one octave and still recognise the tune in a different octave. Birds cannot do this. Birds do however recognise 'timbre' (a fundamental note combined with harmonies). Recognising timbre and harmonic variations gives birds great versatility in the sounds that they can respond to, and in some cases reproduce.

 

Birds also hear shorter notes than we can. Humans process sounds in bytes about 1/20 of a second long, whereas birds discriminate up to 1/200 of a second. This means where we hear one sound only, a bird may hear as many as ten separate notes. This is because we can not perceive the intervals occurring higher than 1/2 of second. A bird could hear a drum beat 200 times in one second, if a drummer could ever move their little sticks that fast. It would sound like one beat to us.

 

In birds as a whole, the known hearing ranges vary from a lower limit of below 100 hertz to over 29000, though not all birds have this range.

 

So it is entirely possible the model Babette8008 used, was in fact in his Greys hearing range and was driving the porr guy bonkers.

 

How would you like to listen to the "White Noise" of a TV that lost reception for days? It would hurt my head!!

 

I love it when you guys start a thread that makes me research. I just have to know!! :-) So thank you!! B)