Sir, – Crow-bangers should be outlawed given their high noise nuisance and their ineffectiveness to scare birds off tillage crops. These bangers can be heard for up to a mile away and cause a very reduced quality of life over the summer months for those in proximity to them. They do more to scare people off than the birds or other fauna they are supposed to be scaring away.
The birds learn to fly between the bangs of the bangers and also learn that where these bangers are, there is a crop on which they can feed! These bangers have been getting progressively louder over the decades and go off much more frequently with a number of bangs and not just one. They are more like military cannons than anything else and are by no means effective. What they are very effective at doing is disturbing the peace and should be banned outright so we can enjoy the summer months without listening to what sounds like a war going on in a field with very unsettling explosions. – Yours, etc,
MAURICE FITZGERALD,
Shanbally,
Co Cork.