Bacteriological survey of feces from feral pigeons in Japan

Some public areas in Japan such as parks and gardens can be highly contaminated with pigeon feces. We examined levels of four bacterial contaminations in fecal samples from feral pigeons in 7 prefectures. We isolated Salmonella Typhimurium and S. Cerro from 17 (3.9%) of 436 samples, as well as Mycobacterium spp. including M. avium-intracellulare complex from 29 (19.0%) of 153 samples. The polymerase chain reaction detected Chlamydia psittaci and C. pecorum in 106 (22.9%) of 463 samples, but E. coli O-157 was not isolated from any of the samples. Our results indicate that pigeon feces are a source of several zoonotic agents for birds, animals and humans.