When Bimini Wright, a 38-year-old Brooklyn writer and performer, embarked on a routine subway ride back in September 2025, she did not expect to return home with a pigeon.
Wright first found the then-squab, which she has since named Smidgen, “stumbling around” a subway platform off the Q line during a Monday morning rush hour.
“I was about to step onto the train, and this little ball of feathers basically ran into my foot,” Wright told The Post.
“I was, like, ‘Wait, where do you think you’re going?’” she recalled. ”It was about to topple onto the subway tracks … It had absolutely zero survival skills.”
Initially naming the squab “Birdie Sanders,” Wright decided to take the bird back to her apartment and arranged a cardboard box for it to stay during her workday.
After calling the rescue and education organization NYC Wild Bird Fund — which advised putting the pigeon back where she’d found it — Wright attempted to return it to the same subway platform, placing it on a covered electrical box to keep it safe from harm’s way.
But when she returned the next day to check the bird’s status — and found it scrunched behind the box, “peeping and flapping” — Wright knew she’d found her new feathered companion.
“I’d missed having an animal for a long time, but I’d never pulled the trigger on getting one because it seemed irresponsible,” said Wright, citing her “very cool” roommate as a large factor in keeping the squawking squab. “But when a baby bird literally runs into your hands like you’re a gritty Disney princess, you kind of (feel) it was meant to be.”
And, apparently, the public is fascinated with stories like hers.
Wright joked to The Post that after all the burlesque videos she’s posted over the years, she’s best known for the content featuring Smidgen. In fact, her most popular pigeon TikTok rings in at 2.4 million views and features Smidgen’s “graduation” from “seed school,” a socialization technique that uses video or visual tapping to teach the birds how to eat whole grains and seeds.
Wright and Smidgen — whom Wright determined to be female after she laid her first egg on International Women’s Day — are not the only pigeon-woman duo to strut around the Big Apple, not to mention document their journeys.
Abby Jardine, a 28-year-old content creator/pigeon owner who spoke with The Post back in 2024, continues to post videos of her beloved Pidge, a potty-trained bird that she totes around Gotham in a cream-colored purse.
Wright and Jardine are among the growing number of pigeon-human pairs — bird parents of a feather, mainly featuring millennial and Gen-Z women — who are flocking in NYC, and beyond.
While there are no set stats on how many people keep the divisive birds as pets, many of the fowl fanatics can be located with a simple social media search; #pigeonlove has 593,000 posts on Instagram, while #pigeonlife is tagged to 221,000 posts on the platform.
“Pigeons are so ubiquitous in cities that most people don’t even think about them, let alone know that they can make great pets,” Jardine recently told The Post, who rescued Pidge in Williamsburg and posted pigeon content shortly thereafter in July of 2023.
“As creators post about pet pigeons, more and more people are finding out that having a pigeon is an option,” she continued. “I think it will snowball from there.”
Izzie Soto and Kedle
Izzie Soto — a 23-year-old Chicago-based content creator who posts under the username @flatwavelength — started sharing videos of her rehomed bird Kedle with her 549,400 TikTok and 189,000 Instagram followers in 2021.
Soto, who occasionally sports a crocheted pigeon hat in her vids, covers both the educational and entertaining aspects of keeping a pet pigeon — with captions that range from “Revealing what my pigeon’s nest actually looks like” to “Holding my pet pigeon like a Costco hotdog.”
Having previously cared for and centered her content around a bird — her now-deceased morning dove, Lemin — Soto told The Post that she became interested in owning a pigeon after seeing one in the local bird store where she used to buy the bird’s food.
“Once Lemin passed away, I took a break from (posting content) for a while — but eventually was, like, ‘OK, I’ll post Kedle, too,’” said Soto, adding that she’s always liked birds, planes and anything that has to do with being up high. “It’s nice to share an animal for other people to enjoy, because I get to enjoy her every day.”
Soto’s daily routine with Kedle, whose name comes from the decorative tea kettle she enjoyed perching on as a squab, involves many of the trappings of general bird care — i.e., cleaning up cage droppings — along with employing two air purifiers for the fowl’s delicate respiratory system.
Soto also describes Kedle as a “little diva” who loudly coos and flaps her wings, enjoys warm baths, wears “pigeon pants” (essentially a bird diaper), and behaves with the fair-weather friendliness of a cat — hopping between Soto’s head and shoulders whenever she’s in the mood for affection.
“I wouldn’t say I rely on her for any kind of comfort — I have my human friends and family for that,” Soto clarified. “But she’s nice company.”
Hanna Lemoine and Monet
Hanna Lemoine, a 33-year-old Louisiana-based painter, is the owner of a similarly clever, “very pampered” pigeon — a white-and-brown Classic Old Frill named Monet.
“I had no idea how smart pigeons were until I got her,” Lemoine told The Post, having grown up with more traditional household birds. “I was just observing her and was, like, ‘Oh, my God — that is a totally sentient being in my room. Every pigeon you see on the street is a totally intelligent, sentient being. It’s kind of crazy to think about.”
Lemoine, who bought Monet from an Ohio breeder in July 2025 for $180 after being “bit with the pigeon bug” on a trip to Ireland, said that it initially took time to bond with her avian pal, who struggled through an anxious, awkward teenage phase — or, as she describes it, “pigeon puberty.”
However, Lemoine — who still refers to the bird by she/her pronouns, despite suspecting it may be male due to its frequent dancing and puffing of its crop — eventually became thick as thieves with Monet, taking her along on errands and even traveling together to outdoor art festivals, where the bird perches happily on Lemoine’s shoulder as she paints.
“She’ll literally sit there, watch everybody, and not make a noise,” said Lemoine. “It’s amazing.”
Pigeons may not be everyone’s bird of choice, but she disagrees with those who call them “rats with wings,” quipping that rats make “great pets,” too.
“Some people like to say (Monet’s) not a gross pigeon like the wild ones, and I’m, like, she’s exactly like the wild ones — she just has pretty privilege,” Lemoine said. “She acts exactly the way a wild pigeon would if you raised them from a baby …They’re amazing creatures.”
Nikki Shumaker and Pidgy
Toronto-based Nikki Shumaker, a 38-year-old wellness professional, gives the pigeon she’s been caring for since March — whom she cycles between calling Pidgy, Bird and Henrietta — a lot of time, care and attention, even though she doesn’t fully consider the bird her own.
“Of course, I am a caretaker of it, but I don’t consider it fully a pet,” Shumaker told The Post of having initially saved the struggling squab from a potted plant covered in trash. “I feel like we have a relationship, and I’m really glad we found each other.”
She still gives the bird a life of luxury — having it set up with three makeshift nests around her room, complete with pee pads, and a variety of plants for perching and pooping.
In the morning, she also regularly takes Pidgy out to enjoy the sunrise, the bird under one arm, her chihuahua Squeaker under the other; lets the fowl bathe in her shower when it prefers (“It seems to know when it needs it”); and does Pilates with it (“It’ll fly from one leg to the other,” she noted).
Occasionally, she also uses her rose quartz gua sha facial tool on the bird, who “seemed more relaxed than ever” the first time she tried it.
“This bird has a great life — I feel like in the next life, I’ll come back as this bird,” Shumaker joked.
She admitted that not everyone in her life was supportive when she started caring for Pidgy — and that she was turned away by multiple veterinarians/animal clinics before finding one to give the all-clear on the bird.
However, the wellness pro feels that when it comes to pigeons, it’s important for people to “see beyond what they think.”
“So many times we have these misconceptions,” said Shumaker. “I think it’s so important to learn more — to be kind and compassionate … It’s important to be educated.”
Rory Langelier | vet student and pigeon rehabilitator
Rory Langelier, a seasoned pigeon rehabilitator and second-year veterinary school student at Canada’s Western College of Veterinary Medicine, wholeheartedly agrees with Lemoine’s praise for pigeon-kind, explaining that the derogatory “rats with wings” descriptor took root in 1960s New York.
Around that time, the late NYC Parks Commissioner Thomas Hoving first described the birds in that manner as blame for spreading cases of human meningitis, reported the West Side Rag in 2024.
“The (cases) ended up not being connected, but the damage to their reputation was done, and people started to see them as dirty pests,” Langelier told The Post. “The term ‘rats with wings’ was coined, and the rest is history.”
However, Langelier — who happens to own two of the birds herself — echoed Shumaker and cautioned that pigeon ownership is a “big decision” that should not be taken lightly.
“Good pet owners should do their due diligence before deciding to adopt,” said Laneglier, adding that pigeons “are a big commitment and deserve a good quality of life. Even though I would consider them an easier pet bird, they still need a lot of enrichment and time with their people.”
