A student with a phobia of pigeons was ‘triggered’ when he returned to his flat to find one had moved in and built a nest – even laying two eggs on his sofa. Josiah Hunsu made the bizarre discovery after returning from a few weeks back home in London over summer to move his things out of his Nottingham flat in halls ahead of the end of his tenancy.
The first sign that something was amiss was a large beetle in his hallway, but the 19-year-old thought nothing of it and headed into his shared kitchen. However, to his horror, Josiah found the kitchen counter and floor were covered in bird poo and a ‘smug’ pigeon sitting on the sofa, having made a nest in his student kitchen with branches brought in through the open window.
Hilarious footage shows Josiah gobsmacked by his discovery as he exclaims ‘what the flip, that’s building a nest – oh my gosh’ – before promptly shutting the door so he could go to get help. The economics student said he then went down to the reception desk to ask for help and recruited a friend from another flat.
A later clips shows the receptionists heading into the kitchen and shooing the pigeon away by kicking the sofa, which reveals two eggs underneath it – provoking screams from everyone. Josiah claims the bird was ‘territorial’ over its eggs and it took repeated ‘shooing away’ before the pigeon fled back out of the window.
Josiah claims the bird was ‘territorial’ over its eggs and it took repeated ‘shooing away’ before the pigeon fled back out of the window.
He claims the incident ‘triggered’ him as he’d been left ‘scared’ of pigeons since one got into his room and pooed on his belongings. Josiah said: “I had previously moved out my stuff and I just came back to move the rest of my stuff and then I was just walking to the hall area and I just saw like a random insect like a beetle or something and then it was just weird to see a beetle inside.
“So I went inside my kitchen only to find that there’s lots of bird poo everywhere and I was kind of shocked as to why there was bird poo until I looked at the couch and I just saw a bird there and it had a nest and everything.
“But then basically I just closed the door quickly and then I ran downstairs to tell the people [the receptionists] that there was a pigeon inside. The receptionist said that she’d handled a pigeon before. So she just basically walked up to the pigeon and that’s when we realised it had laid eggs.
“I’m not sure how long but it must have been there for a good week because it had a nest. It was quite territorial over the eggs, that’s why it didn’t leave. I thought I could scare it off but it just didn’t leave. I just tried to shoo it away and stuff.”
Josiah said after the pigeon flew out of the window, the receptionists put the eggs inside of a box and took them outside. He said since living in the flat, he has had problems with pigeons coming in through the window, but that none had ever made themselves at home before.
Josiah said: “For me, I was getting triggered, I’ve got a pigeon phobia now because there was another time a pigeon came into my room. I went to the shops, came back and I just find a pigeon in my room and it pooed on the cupboard it was on. Ever since then I’ve been scared of pigeons.
“My room, that was just a rare occurrence, that doesn’t really happen too much but the kitchen, they always come into the kitchen. I was scared. I got scared because of the first time when the pigeon went into my room. I was panicked. I didn’t know what to do in that situation.”