Dear Sir,
Please can we make a plea through your newspaper to a resident of Butterwick Court who throws food out for birds onto the green between there and Grange Court to stop, for the following reasons?
For months now there has been large quantities of various foodstuffs put out; fish, bacon, chicken carcasses, buckets full of rotten apples and huge amounts of bread. This has resulted in rats visiting in broad daylight, foxes and an enormous influx of crows.
Two dogs have been hospitalised on drips due to dashing off and eating it before their owner realised what they were doing and one has been left with an ongoing condition. The Environmental Health Officer has been out to investigate and agrees that there is a problem but cannot act unless the person responsible is identified.
Last week a large amount of woolly stuff was left out, I presume for nesting material, and the neighbourhood warden had to come out and remove it before it blew everywhere!
We are now troubled by a murder of crows, which are normally fairly solitary birds, there can be up to forty at a time in front of our houses and the massive problem that we have with them is that they are damaging our roofs by pecking out the mortar.
I don’t know why this behaviour is occurring, perhaps a dietary deficiency, but last Autumn five of the residents facing the green had to pay £200 each to have their ridge tiles re-pointed.You can watch and hear them on your roof as whole chunks of mortar fall off. It is now happening again and is a huge cost to us all, the crows have begun to nest nearby and their numbers are going to multiply, increasing the problem significantly.
Apparently we are not allowed to shoot them so we are appealing to the better nature of this person to cease throwing food there.If caught the council have said they will be prosecuted. I am not against anyone feeding wildlife but please do it in your own garden, this is causing enormous and expensive problems for other residents.
Unhappy residents of Grange Court and Brafferton Close