(Photo: Danny, the lone Canada goose at Central Park. Is Danny the victim of "valuable public resource" to USDA Wildlife Services or victim of failure to question?)
The USDA documents acquired through FOIR and posted on (27) GooseWatch NYC (as well as this blog) are revealing in more ways than one.
Most significant are some of the quotes from NY State Director of (USDA) Wildlife Services, Martin Lowney.
In one of his request letters for goose roundup permits, Mr. Lowney writes:
"Resident Canada geese are a valuable public resource with numerous values. There are multiple benefits for the removal of resident Canada geese from Rulers Bar Hassock." (Emphasis supplied.)
Maybe it is me and my old and slow brain, but the above does not make sense -- unless the implication is that geese are only "valuable" as a cash "resource" for USDA roundups and "removals."
In another part of one of his permit request letters, Mr. Lowney states, "Also, I must recognize that some patrons will be saddened by the removal of the geese from Ruler's Bar Hassock."
But, then Lowney says nothing more about this either in the rest of the paragraph or the letter.
One gets the unmistakable impression that although USDA "recognizes" public dismay for goose killings, such "sadness" or dismay is easily dismissed and literally written off by Wildlife Services.
But, most significant in Lowney's request letters to the leaderships of Gateway National Recreation Area and National Park Service is this:
"I am requesting Special Use permit from National Park Service to capture and euthanize resident Canada geese from Rulers Bar Hassock."
"Euthanize?"
We know from the documents that the geese were sent to an upstate "processing plant" more than 6 hours from New York City. (Apparently one without a published phone number.)
If presumably slaughtered, there is no way this fits the definition of "euthanize" no matter how loosely the term is stretched, twisted.and applied.
But, even if the geese were gassed, the fact they traveled 6 hours under crowded and heated conditions of summer would not meet any definition for "euthanasia," including the oft quoted (and distorted) "UVMA guidelines."
Lowney is guilty of (at best) misleading the recipients of his letters and at worst, lying to them.
Perhaps the assumption was that no one would dare to question the claims made in the letters and/or no one cared how or where the geese died.
Unfortunately, that assumption seems correct according to everything up to this point.
Apparently, the leaderships of Gateway National Recreation Area and National Parks Service did not question anything, nor did the media.
As we know now, the permits were granted, 701 geese were rounded up and killed from Jamaica Bay Wildlife "Refuge" and virtually all the major media failed to report the goose massacre from a national wildlife refuge, most notably (and mysteriously), The New York Times.
Fast forward to today when I am personally looking at hundreds of ducks in Central Park and only one lone Canada goose who it is suspected will not survive much longer.
So what are the real prices of failing to question anything and just "going along to get along?"
How about deliberate and exceedingly cruel eradication of certain (to use Lowney's term) "valuable public resources?" -- PCA
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