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When good birds do bad things, can suit be far behind?
When good birds do bad things, can suit be far behind?
By Bill McClellan
Of the Post-Dispatch
04/18/2005
THIS HAS BEEN a bad month for bird lovers. First came the news of the attack in Alton. Actually, the attack occurred "on or about April 15, 2003," but authorities apparently hushed it up. News like this can't be kept suppressed forever, though, and last week, trial lawyers, as always fighting for you and me, broke the silence with a lawsuit.
The suit alleges that Rhonda Nichols was at the outside gardening area of a Lowe's Home Center when a wild bird flew into the back of her head. Reporter Paul Hampel tracked down Nichols' attorney, Zane T. Cagle, who contended the bird was about the size of a robin. "This was no sparrow," Cagle said.
Apparently, it was a particularly malicious robin. The suit alleges that the bird caused injuries to Nichols' head, brain, neck, muscles, bones, nerves, discs and ligaments, leading to the loss of neurological functions and cognitive skills. Nichols and her attorney are seeking damages in excess of $50,000. From the store, incidentally. Not from the bird.
Many of us in the birding community have been fearful for some time of something like this happening. Although many robins seem to be able to live in close proximity to people, one should never forget that these are wild creatures, and what appears to be a harmless "Robin Red Breast" is, in fact, the same bird that will casually eat a worm. While that worm is still alive!
I am not going to prejudge the suit, but Cagle had the good sense to file it in Madison County. I doubt that those judges and jurors are going to be taken in by any of that "first robin of spring" nonsense. That first robin of spring that you see just might be the last thing you'll ever see.
On a more predictable front, the area also saw another goose attack. This is nesting season and the geese are aggressive. In the latest attack, a child received a gash on his scalp. The attack occurred in Lake Saint Louis.
The goose problem is not confined to Lake Saint Louis. While many people have been preoccupied with the deer problem in certain West County suburbs - don't even tell Cagle about the deer problem! - geese seem to have taken over entire communities. It's part of the yin and yang of global warming. We've traded snow and ice for geese. While our winters have become milder, the geese no longer consider us part of the great fly-over. No need to go farther south.
Nobody seems to know what to do about the geese. Last year, the city of St. Louis took care of its goose problem in Forest Park by netting the geese and shipping them to a slaughterhouse. Who thought of that? The School Board? Naturally, the pro-geese people were furious. The pro-geese people are with GeesePeace, and that organization's favored tactic is to locate the nests and put vegetable oil on the eggs. This cuts off oxygen flow into the egg and prevents the yolk from developing into an embryo.
The latest municipality to adopt this strategy is Earth City. A businessman of my acquaintance received a notice this month from the Earth City board of trustees informing him that GeesePeace volunteers would be seeking access to his property in order to oil any goose eggs they might find. This businessman, who claims to be a member of an alternative PETA, not People for Ethical Treatment of Animals, but People Eating Tasty Animals, wrote back that he is a member of GeesePiece and would be interested in a breast. He then made a more serious suggestion.
He wrote that the Foster Wheeler Energy Corp. has recently signed a contract to design and supply a boiler for what will be the first U.S. power plant to use "poultry litter" as fuel. The businessman sent me a prospectus. I called Maureen Bingert, who is the media contact for Foster Wheeler. She said there are two such power plants already operating in the United Kingdom.
So the businessman wrote the board of trustees.
"We could build a power plant burning goose dung, and all of us in Earth City could get free electricity! Why would you want to eliminate a renewable source of energy?"
Perhaps this bad month could yet be turned around.
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