Downtown Tulsa hi-tech bird repellent

If you spend much time in downtown Tulsa you must have heard all the screeching and squawking. <br><br>To some it may, be just high-pitched noise pollution, but as News on Six reporter Rick Wells explains,

Tuesday, January 14th 2003, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

If you spend much time in downtown Tulsa you must have heard all the screeching and squawking.

To some it may, be just high-pitched noise pollution, but as News on Six reporter Rick Wells explains, it's really designed to prevent pollution of another kind. Birds downtown have been a problem for years; roosting in and around buildings, dive bombing cars and people.

The folks at Trinity Episcopal Church finally cut down some trees around the front of the church. It became impossible to keep the area clean. Some birds still hang out in the bushes, but there is not the health and maintenance problem as before.

Couple of years ago, the folks at the Federal building realized they had a bird problem. It wasn't so much the birds as what they left behind. So they hired a guy to stand out here and ring a bell and make noise and he was successful. He chased the birds over to the Tulsa City County Library. They hired the same guy and he scared them back.

So then about 18 months ago they put in an electronics system. A system of bird squawking noises. It's the same one they use over at PSO." It's a sonic repeller. It uses birds own distress calls, to frighten them away. AEP-PSO spokesperson, Stan Whiteford: "The problem was on the sidewalks, primarily. But it eventually made it into the building."

A huge health and maintenance problem, but since they installed the squawking machine about five years ago, there are fewer birds. It uses 8 different species distress calls, in a random sequence. Makes 'em think something bad is happening so they move on.

Other businesses have heard about PSO's success. "What is that sound, how do we get it, we want to get rid of the birds as well.â€ Several other downtown businesses are using it.

So that screeching and squawking you hear in all parts of downtown Tulsa, day and night is just hi-tech bird repellant