It’s the Mad Max dream of a bird’s nest: A menacing composite of metal, clay, twig and plastic. Spotted in a sugar maple tree in Antwerp, Belgium, the gnarly architecture brims with at least 1,500 ...

LONDON - Look up. The birds are taking charge. The hard metal spikes that humans install to prevent birds from perching have been found in nests across Europe. The birds are masterfully subverting ...

Despite a plethora of products designed to keep birds off buildings, our feathered friends are sending a clear message: Nice try. Eurasian magpies typically build their nests from thorny branches, but ...

Two summers ago, a patient looking out his Belgian-hospital window spied in a tree an odd, abandoned magpie nest of plastic and wire. He had, by coincidence, just read a newspaper article about a ...

Spikes placed on buildings to deter birds are being used by birds to build nests in several locations around Europe. “It sounds like a joke,” says Auke-Florian Hiemstra at the Naturalis Biodiversity ...

Strips of sharp metal pins are meant to keep birds away from buildings. Some birds are stealing them to build their nests. A nest made from metal pins and other materials collected by magpies, found ...

NPR's Scott Simon speaks with biologist Auke-Florian Hiemstra about his study of bird's nests that are made from anti-bird spikes. One human's trash just might be an avian's armoire. Urban birds have ...