three birds sitting on a ledge with New York City in the background

This bird pesticide is legal, but recent deaths are stoking controversy

“Both physically and psychologically, it’s an awful way to die,” says one conservationist of the bird poison Avitrol. Cities around the U.S. and Canada agree—and some have banned it.

Avitrol, an EPA-registered bird pesticide, often causes birds to fall to the ground, convulse, and die—a reaction that horrifies onlookers. The product is banned in many places, including in New York City.

Photograph by George McKenzie Jr.

“It’s OK,” Bonnie Siegfried said softy, trying to comfort a convulsing pigeon wrapped in a fleece blanket. The bird’s body was twitching violently, its beak chattering as she held it in her arms. The pigeon died after about a half an hour as Siegfried, who lives in London, in the Canadian province of Ontario, waited for an animal control officer to arrive. She later posted a video of the pigeon to Facebook.

In the weeks after that incident in late August 2020, several London, Ontario residents and neighbors reported seeing numerous pigeons in distress—falling out of trees, flapping their wings, convulsing, gasping in distress, and dying. A necropsy later concluded the pigeons had been poisoned with Avitrol, a

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