Zanesville-As the black vultures expanded in Ohio, they proved to be a nuisance in Zanesville. 

Laine Snyder, executive director of the Zennsville Museum of Art, has witnessed the problems they cause.

"In the past five years, we have encountered a terrible problem," she said. "I'm not talking about a few, it's a huge group, with as many as 40 people living on the roof of the museum at a time."

The roosting vultures destroyed the roof, and as they became more comfortable, they began to approach staff and visitors, wandering in the overhang above the museum entrance, making customers uneasy, some of them leaving instead of walking under the big bird , Snyder said.

In the end, Snyder said, the damage to the roof required $180,000 to be replaced. But first, the bird must leave.

The museum tried to scare them away with high-pressure water cannons and water pipes, but with little success.

"Before we finally get the license to repair them permanently, we have to go through the entire restoration process. We have to get the license to kill a bird and use the killed bird as a portrait," Snyder said.

Hanging statues of dead birds is a very effective way to keep them away from certain areas.

Snyder said that applying for a permit is a long process with many conditions attached. This permit allows the museum to kill up to six black condors. 

The city recently received a permit from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to kill up to 10 birds because they are protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. It comes with a long list of conditions, a total of 16 conditions, including "In order to minimize the lethality of migratory birds, you need to constantly combine non-lethal harassment methods with lethal control."

The mayor of Zanesville, Don Mason, said that people near the former McKinley Elementary School have been complaining about the increasing number of bald eagles since the spring. These birds cause property damage and seem to be attracted to things like rubber roofs and windshield wipers, often damaging them.

On Tuesday, a contractor hired by the city shot and killed three birds.

Mason said he hoped that the bird hanging on the statue would scare others away. He said that dummies are not as effective as real birds because they do not have the same smell.

So far, the museum has killed a bird.

"We want to maintain this state," Snyder said, saying that having to kill these birds is terrible, but these birds are persistent and intelligent. Snyder said they had learned what car the person responsible for clearing the bird was driving and flew away as it entered the parking lot.

Snyder said that these birds have been wandering around the museum for many years, not necessarily in the museum, but around. She said that they used to leave in October and come back in the spring, but recently they started to spend a whole year in the area.

There are two types of vultures in Ohio, the red-headed turkey vulture and the black-headed black vulture. According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, these two species of vultures mainly feed on carrion, although it is well known that black vultures kill small mammals such as skunks, as well as newborn livestock such as sheep and calves. Neither the city’s nor the art museum’s permits apply to turkey vultures.