May 4, 2024 3 min read

Thomas P. Hoving was an esteemed director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, but he secured his place in history outside the world of art thanks to a remark he made during a brief stint as the city’s parks commissioner in June 1966.

Meningitis cases were cropping up throughout Gotham, and Hoving pinpointed pigeons as the culprit, describing them as “rats with wings.”

The tag has stuck in the 58 years since. If you live in or near a city, chances are you do in fact think of pigeons as annoying winged critters who pounce on pizza crusts, scattered potato chips and whatever other forms of litter they can feast on in streets or on sidewalks. But pigeons were once highly prized centuries ago in the Middle East, valued for their meat and their waste, which was used as a fertilizer. Pigeons were also a status symbol in France until the French Revolution, with the well-to-do sometimes showing them off in specially-designed cages.

The pigeon is perhaps the most derided of birds, but it may be about to get a break in Pennsylvania.

On Monday, the Pennsylvania House Judiciary Committee approved a measure that would prohibit live pigeon shooting in the commonwealth. Pennsylvania is one of the few remaining states that still allows the practice, which has shooters firing their guns at pigeons after they have been released into the air either by hand or from a box. Animal rights groups claim many pigeons are not killed outright during these events, but instead succumb slowly to dehydration or starvation after they have been wounded.

Pigeons may not be beloved household pets like cats or dogs, but breeding them to be tossed in the air and shot hardly seems humane. And we should add we have no problem with hunting, but live pigeon shoots hardly constitute hunting. Where is the sport in it?

State Rep. Melissa Schusterman, a Democrat from Chester County, explained, “True hunters know that pigeon shoots have nothing to do with hunting and damage the reputation of the sport of hunting.”

If the measure is approved by the House, makes its way through the Senate and is signed by Gov. Josh Shapiro, it would make organizing a pigeon shoot, or allowing one, a summary offense.

We no longer allow bear baiting, dogfighting, cockfighting or greyhound racing in Pennsylvania. Pigeon shoots need to be added to the list.