Description
The Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation (RIRRC) is not only the largest landfill in the state of Rhode Island; it’s also the only one. In earlier days, each city and town in the state had its own landfill operation. These multiple facilities tended to be inefficient, inconsistent and duplicative, besides resulting in a plethora of unbeautiful garbage dumps around the state.
So the state took an unusual step: It legislated a quasi-public corporation to create one central landfill to serve all 39 cities and towns in Rhode Island. The state gave the RIRRC start-up funding, after which the corporation had to generate its own funds through commercial, residential and municipal contracts. Trucks now come every day from all over the state to tip their loads at the central site. No hazardous waste or out of state waste is permitted.
Whose Territory Is It?
While centralization effectively solved a major collection problem, it created a new issue. “We have one of the largest landfills on the East Coast,” notes Bill Jasparro, Physical Plant Manager for the RIRRC, “with an average of 750 trucks per day tipping approximately 4,000 tons of solid waste at this site. Thousands and thousands of gulls follow the trucks into the dumping area to feast on anything they can get their beaks on,” he says.
“We have everything right here that gulls crave—ponds of water and all kinds of foodstuffs in nearly endless supply. Some of these gulls have never seen the sea,” Jasparro quips.
Various species of gulls nest, raise their broods, and litter the area with unsightly droppings—splattering walkways, parking lots, and the windows of RIRRC’s many buildings clustered on 1,200 acres. “These gulls are so well-fed and healthy that their droppings are gigantic,” Jasparro attests. “It goes with the landfill business,” he says.
“There’s new garbage every day, and the gulls stick around for easy pickings in the open arena where the trucks tip into our facilities.” Whatever they can grab is fair game. Throughout the day, they’re digesting the food and doing what comes naturally,” he says. “And the mess they deposit on public surfaces and cars—and on one unlucky inspector—is intolerable.”
“We know we can’t totally eliminate the gulls,” Jasparro explains, “but we need to control them.”
Lessons in Bird Control
A federal and state regulation permits the RIRRC to kill 500 gulls annually, which helps a little, but hardly puts a dent in the overall population of thousands upon thousands. And they’re multiplying.
“We tried many approaches,” notes Jasparro, who has been with the RIRRC for eight years. Disruption techniques covered the gamut. “We used Screamers,” Jasparro says, “which are like firecrackers. It scared off the gulls, but only temporarily.” The same fate befell the “Bangers” they tried. “It’s like shells going off,” Jasparro explains. “Before I joined the RIRRC, my predecessor used tuna line—a kind of thick wire fish line—stringing it on all the high ridges and peaks of the landfill facilities and crisscrossing the flats in a grid formation. Gulls need a path for landing and taking off, so the grid helped prevent them from landing. But,” he adds, “if the wire breaks, the preventive effect is lost.” Subject to weather and wind, wires break frequently, leaving the space unprotected.
“Our goal is to keep a clean environment for people coming to, and working at, the facility,” Chairman A. Austin Ferland continues. “We plant flowers in the summer and try to keep the area pleasant for our employees, our corporate commissioners and visitors. Gulls were raining on our parade,” he laments.
That’s when Bill Jasparro read about a new bird deterrent device made by Bird-X, Inc., a Chicago-based company long known for its success in the field of bird control. “While looking through trade publications about two years ago, I read about the research Bird-X had conducted in developing its high-tech, electronic bird repeller. So I thought, why not give it a try?”
Jasparro phoned Bird-X and spoke with Joshua Sirt, one of the company’s technical consultants. “Josh said to me: ‘I think I can solve your bird problem. Try the BroadBand PRO unit for three weeks. If we can’t help you reduce the gull population, we’ll take the unit back,’ he promised.”
Josh says that the sonic technology behind the BroadBand PRO is unusual. The unit not only emits distress cries that signal danger to gulls (and pigeons and starlings and others), but also produces predator cries like hawks and falcons, plus a random combination of threatening sounds, varying frequencies and volumes that add up to all-encompassing harassment. Birds are repelled by the ongoing commotion.
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