The UK Ministry of Agriculture says that pigeons roosting on a nuclear facility in the north of England have significant levels of radioactivity.
The feral pigeons, at the nuclear reprocessing plant at Sellafield in Cumbria, contain high levels of caesium-137, the report claims. The radioactivity was detected in the meat of dead birds.
The results quoted in the report confirm initial tests made by the operator of the plant, BNFL. Greenpeace has called the birds ‘flying radioactive waste’. However the ministry suggested that it would be possible to eat 20 of the pigeons before exceeding the recommended annual dose of radiation.