BIRDS DAMAGING CLARK CO. SIGNS
Monday, April 21st, 2008 -- 12:09 PM
Southern Clark County stop signs are going to the birds?literally.The county received a grant in 2006 to put up 650 'stop' and 'stop ahead' signs.
But, crews have noticed a lot of damage to 40 of the new signs in the southern part of the county.
'The top three- to six-inches is peeled off. Completely peeled off,' reports Highway Commissioner Randy Anderson, 'But the sticky surface is still there. That's why we couldn't quite understand what was happening to them.'
The prevailing theory was some sort of chemical reaction was causing the damage, but crews set up cameras and caught the real culprit?Blue Jays.
'There were never any tabs, there was never any places where it was half-pulled off, it was always completely pulled off. Someone came up with the idea it could be crows, that's when we set up the camera,' Anderson says.
The signs feature a diamond prismatic sheeting that is much easier to see at night, but Anderson says the sheeting apparently is also attracting the jays.
Inexplicably, it's only affecting signs in southern Clark County. No other counties have reported problems, and new signs erected in northern Clark County haven't been damaged.
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