(Photos: New [domestic?] duck at Harlem Meer. Brad, the domestic, Rouen duck)
While fantastic news that, due to public pressure, the North Little Rock City Council postponed the planned Dec 20 -22nd goose shootings at Burns Park, the geese are certainly not out of the woods.
With so much public and media attention focused on the controversy over the past two weeks, it is quite probable that city leaders simply decided that by postponing the massacre until after Christmas, public focus would die down. (In other words, a decision of political expediency and PR.)
What's important now is for advocates to present viable non-lethal alternatives that we know WILL work. Those include habitat modification, Border Collie chasing and in the spring, egg addling if necessary. What seems most important in this location however, is addressing the "complaints" about goose droppings. And for that, the Naturesweep machine seems the effective solution. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92ELjHmx2SA&feature=related
I posted this information to the FB pages and hope that others take note. It is simply premature to celebrate any real victories until we know for a fact that goose shootings in this very public park are not going to occur at all.
Presently, the geese merely have a stay of execution. But, that is certainly a better place to be than where we were 24 hours ago.
The passion and dedication of the animal advocates of North Little Rock, AR have been something to behold and admire. -- We all need to take a page from it.
In more local goose news, I have not seen Buster and his troupe of 6 vagabond geese for the past two nights at Harlem Meer.
Its obvious that the charges of those "feeding geese" being responsible for geese wearing out their welcome and staying too long in a location are just that -- charges that have no basis in actual fact.
Of course, I have personally known for ages that this accusation is completely bogus. That was obvious in the summer of 2010 with the Turtle Pond goose family. Scores of people and children fed the family of 8 geese daily. But, as soon as the goslings could fly and the parents grew their flight feathers, the family took off.
No amount of "human handouts" could keep them in the gosling-rearing location, once the calendar changed and the goose family was able to fly.
It is appalling that those who feed geese or ducks in a park are constantly being blamed and scapegoated for the fact that some birds "stay" longer than what some people tolerate.
Perhaps the most egregious example of this allegation reaching insane and downright cruel proportions is this article out of Lynn, Massachusetts last week:
It is obvious from the photograph that the birds Ms. Butcher had been feeding are domestic, Pekin ducks, who are usually flightless. (Most likely, they were dumped in the park.) That the city would arrest this 80-year-old woman and threaten jail time for performing what really is a charitable act is mind boggling. This seems to give credence to the charge that many park and city officials seem to have little idea on how to responsibly deal with animal and human problems in a park. (The people who should be reprimanded in situations like these are those who dump animals in parks, not the one's who take pity on the abandoned creatures.)
The bottom line is that if waterfowl can fly, they do not stay in a location because some human feeds them. And if the waterfowl cannot fly (such as domestic ducks) then efforts should be made to find safe sanctuary for them -- not penalize their human feeders.
Speaking of domestic ducks, I am suspecting, though am not certain, that there are possibly two other domestic ducks at Harlem Meer besides Brad.
Over the past month or so, I have discovered two brownish ducks (Perhaps Kacki Campbells or some type of hybrids?) who are larger than the mallards and move differently. (Sort of herky jerky, awkward movements.) The mallards constantly and mercilessly pick on the two outcasts I have named, "Piggly and Wiggly" and I suspect from them constantly being ostracized, they are "different" in some significant way.
At first, I only noted the one duck and felt sorry for him/her. But, over the past few weeks, I have noticed the second one. The two outcasts are now usually together. (At least they found each other.) If true that they are domestic -- and flightless ducks, then Brad will have at least two other ducks to hopefully aid him in keeping open water at the Meer over the winter.
(As previously mentioned, Harlem Meer usually freezes almost entirely over once winter sets in. Most of the mallards leave at that time to seek open water.)
Meanwhile, the Canada geese are a vanishing species in Central Park.
It is incredible that we are in the middle of December and so far, only a pitiful few migratory geese have been observed in Central Park.
This is extremely troubling indeed.
But, for now, I simply seek to see Buster and his little group of refugee geese and hope that as accused, they come seeking human handouts once again. -- PCA
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