What do I do?

[Meggypeg]

I am a college student in Abilene, TX. Apparantly a group of about 6 pigeons decided that my dorm room balcony made a good hang out place. I don't mind them, since we can't use the balconies anyway for safety reasons, and they are pretty. The problem is that they are now laying eggs. I don't really want baby pigeons on my balcony since they would make a lot of noise, and as a student with finals coming up, I need sleep. (My bed is next to the window) The pigeons have not built nests, there are just 5 eggs hanging out on the balcony floor. The pigeons are also not sitting on them or anything. Does this mean the eggs are not viable? Do pigeons lay eggs without intending to hatch them? If the eggs are viable then I will leave them alone and invest in earplugs. I wouldn't want to actually hurt or disturb a pigeon family. But if they are not viable, is it ok to remove them? If I remove them is there any way to nicely discourage the pigeons from laying more? Like I said, I like the pigeons I have out there, I am just not interested in their reproducing right next to my pillow.

Also, the pigeons have been pecking at the window a lot...could they be pecking at their own reflections? Are they trying to maybe eat the paint on the outside window frame? Just curious.

[Birdmom4ever]

Pigeons aren't great nest builders, but as I understand it from your post, there is no nest at all? Usually they at least throw a few sticks together. It seems odd to me that there are five eggs, too. A normal pigeon clutch is two eggs; sometimes they just lay one, but usually two. Possibly these are young birds that don't quite know yet what they are doing. If the eggs were just laid (within the last day or so) you can safely throw them out because they have not yet started to develop. If the pigeons aren't sitting on them, they won't have begun to develop anyway.

The next step would be to find a way to discourage the pigeons from hanging out on your balcony. Balconies do seem to be popular nest sites--we get quite a few posts about it! Can you put up a barrier of some kind? Perhaps shade cloth or some type of unobtrusive netting?

As to pecking the window, they are most likely pecking their reflections. Unless perhaps they are domestic pigeons asking to come inside. ;)