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  • RESEARCH HIGHLIGHT

Plagued by problem birds? Call RobotFalcon!

A robotic bird of prey scares off nuisance flocks in a flash — and they don’t seem to get wise to the deception.
A view from the RobotFalcon’s underside during flight on a sunny day

The RobotFalcon device has two propellors and a paint job mimicking the peregrine falcon’s plumage. Credit: R. F. Storms et al./J. R. Soc. Interface (CC BY 4.0)

Birds that hit aeroplane windscreens or are sucked into jet engines can cause accidents and costly damage, so airfields work to keep birds — particularly flocking birds — away. Trained falcons are more effective than scarecrows, but are expensive to keep and need to rest between patrols.

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Nature 611, 12 (2022)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-03386-0

References

  1. Storms, R. F. et al. J. R. Soc. Interface https://doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2022.0497 (2022).

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