Local residents complain of peacocks scratching their cars, dirtying pavements, and waking them up at night with loud mating calls, with many calling for the birds to be removed.
The birds perch on rooftops and fences across Punta Marina, a village on the Adriatic Sea coast in the Emilia Romagna region, east of Bologna.
Their booming numbers have split the town in two -- one side thinks they should be left alone; the other wants them taken to more suitable pastures.
The once-revered creatures appear throughout nearby Ravenna's prized mosaics as a symbol of immortality -- but 81-year-old Marco Manzoli, a retired bus driver, said they were essentially delinquents who poo a lot.
"The population has boomed over 30 years and it's too big now: they disrupt sleep, disrupt traffic and dirty the ground with ice-cream-like excrement, which we then step in," Manzoli said.
