20Produced by Fairen Rachow, Sanjana Burugapalli, Joey Lin

When Rats Fly: Why Did We Abandon the Pigeon? is an eye-opening historical and scientific podcast that challenges everything you think you know about America’s cities' most misunderstood residents. Hosted by Fairen, Joey, and Sanjana, the show tracks the dramatic, thousands-of-years-long trajectory of human-pigeon relations. Through engaging storytelling, expert interviews, and a healthy dose of wit and personality, the three hosts reveal that pigeons weren’t always viewed as "rats with wings." In fact, they were once revered as symbols of fertility, treated as luxury status symbols, and fiercely celebrated as decorated wartime messengers. The podcast dives deep into the mind-blowing biology of these birds—exploring how they navigate using a sophisticated "multisensory toolkit" composed of magnetic fields, polarized light, infrasound, and olfactory maps. Joined by expert and behavioral neuroscientist Dr. Aaron Blaisdell, the team examines the complex psychological capabilities of pigeons, alongside historic oddities like B.F. Skinner’s secret World War II project to create pigeon-guided missiles. Ultimately, When Rats Fly serves as a poignant cultural critique, unpacking how 20th-century urban design, aesthetic biases, and a misguided desire to separate cities from nature completely flipped the narrative on these fiercely intelligent creatures. It is a must-listen for anyone curious about animal cognition, forgotten history, or the hidden complexities of the urban ecosystem–and the perfect place for all pigeon enthusiasts!

Suggested Further Reading

Jerolmack, C. (2014). How Pigeons Became Rats: The Cultural-Spatial Logic of Problem Animals. Social ProblemsRetrieved April 28, 2026, from https://dx.doi.org/10.1525/sp.2008.55.1.72

Hung, C.-M., Shaner, P.-J. L., Zink, R. M., Liu, W.-C., Chu, T.-C., Huang, W.-S., & Li, S.-H. (2014). Drastic population fluctuations explain the rapid extinction of the passenger pigeon. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 111(29), 10636–10641. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1401526111

Pests and Prejudice is a podcast series created by UCLA undergraduates in the spring of 2026. Each episode is a story of a messy relationship, one in which people seduced pests, and then decided to break up with them... and it usually goes about as well as you would expect...