Rochester, MN Out for Blood with New Plan Against the Crows Downtown

Rochester, Minnesota has had a crow problem for decades, since the 1980s. If you're in or near downtown in the winter around dawn or dusk, you'll see crows EVERYWHERE. They don't bother anyone but they're a menace and leave poop everywhere they go.

The city of Rochester has tried for years to deter the crows from deciding to hang out in the downtown area to no avail.

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How Rochester, MN Has Tried to Get Rid of the Crows

All sorts of tactics have been tried. There have been nets put up over trees downtown to prevent them from roosting (although that may also have been preventative for other birds as well).

They also, still to this day, try lasers, starter guns, pots and pans, and the Star Tribune says that the city has even tried "a shovel found at Mayo Clinic that made awful noises."

It sort of works but the crows always end up finding a new place downtown to roost. KTTC writes that the city wants to disperse the crow population instead of having them so concentrated to "reduce the nuisance and health risks associated with large seasonal crow populations."

Up to 20,000 crows make Rochester their home in the winter so yeah, it's a LARGE population, that's for sure.

New Plan to Get Rid of Crows in Downtown Rochester, MN

On Monday night, the Rochester City Council voted to approve a new plan to try and disperse the crow population downtown. The new plan totally caught me off guard because it sounds like such an extreme measure but I don't work in wildlife so I suppose it's best to leave it to the experts.

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The new plan enlists the help of USDA sharpshooters to use "airsoft rifles, which shoot plastic pellets, in parts of downtown Rochester." Paul Widman, Rochester’s Parks and Recreation Director, told the Star Tribune, “'It’s to create a sense of danger so that they don’t want to be in the area.'”

There were plenty of city council members who weren't so sure about the idea, though. "Mark Bransford said he had reservations about murdering them, while Dennis wondered if there were other ways to move the crows out of downtown."

But nevertheless, the plan passed 6-1.

When the USDA Sharpshooters will be in Rochester, MN

The sharpshooters will be in downtown Rochester culling crows from December 1st through the 5th between 3 PM and 11 PM. They'll be in marked vehicles, too.

The city says not to worry because the pellets "likely won’t be able to knock out a window or harm people, in case something goes awry." However, these are trained experts and they'll be shooting a specific target likely in a tree, so there should be no risk to anyone downtown.