Continuing on, the story goes like this:

On Saturday 10/30/04 I was on my way to work at 8:15am (I was working at an Appliance Retailer at this time, I had given up optical for the time being) when I received a cell call from my husband telling me bad news.  Mike Massey from NJ Fish & Game had been pounding on the door so hard that my husband thought his knuckles were going through the door.  He didn’t want to answer the door with such a hostile person at the front of it, but he did.  Massey informed him that Fish & Game knew about the caging area and that there was a problem.

I told my husband that I was on my way to a meeting at work, and would leave briefly after the meeting to take care of any concerns.  At 8:45am I received a call from a friend stating that Fish & Game had a search warrant, and was on their way to the property.  I immediately left work and headed home to switch cars, and headed to the caging area.

When I arrived there were several game wardens on the property.  They had taken the screws out of the front door to enter the cage because they didn’t have a key for the lock I had on the door.  As I approached, I saw them chasing the birds through the caging area trying to capture them to transport.  I saw a black truck with the back open with cardboard boxes and heard sounds of birds banging to get out.  The boxes were small like liquor store boxes, and the large birds could not stand up in them.

I told them they were being too rough with the birds and did not have proper ways to transfer birds and that they would injure them.  They should let me get the birds for them.  I witnessed a conservation officer holding one of the Red Tail Hawks by its feet like a chicken.  The hawk was fighting and the man was trying to control it, and there was blood running down the hawk’s head.  As I moved towards the caging area three conservation officers blocked my way with their hands on their guns and told me if I go in there they will cuff me and arrest me.  I was mortified.  I told them that the birds knew who I was and trusted me and that I could get them without injury.  They refused to let me help.  I ran around the officers to the left of the cage, I knew if I went into the cage they would arrest me, and I couldn’t leave those precious birds. 

I cried for one of the birds I named Lancelot, (Lancelot was a Red Tail Hawk with a blind eye, non releasable, he was a lecture bird) but the officers had taken him out.  They would not allow me to see him.  I know he could hear me yelling for him.
The officer in the cage yelled at me stating I wasn’t a vet and had no training.  I stated I had trained under their trainer Joanne Balliet in Tabernacle NJ, and another rehabilitator that ran a center and who had over 25 years experience.  I am knowledgeable on all bird injuries and I know each bird individually.  I can tell their progress and accomplishments and know when they can be released.  (I was only rehabilitating non-regulated species at this time, the others were transferred at the earliest convenience).  He said he was an expert and handled plenty of birds and he knew what he was doing and I didn’t.  I continued to tell him to be gentle with the birds, he was brutally grabbing them, mishandling them and injuring them.

The man collecting the birds couldn’t understand what nerve damage was on a bird, which feathers would not stay intact and therefore the bird’s appearance was not perfect.  It would never be perfect.  This bird would need to be zoo placed.  He then proceeded to contain a vulture.  The bird was high up with its talons in the mesh screen on top of the smaller cage built inside to separate species.  The man I thought was a conservation officer tried to jump up and grab its tail to pull it down.  I screamed “Don’t you grab its tail to pull it down, you will break its back, never handle a bird like that.”  He looked at me nastily, and told his partner to get a net.  They netted the birds head and part of the shoulders (it was a large bird) and then they pushed him off of the side of the cage.  As the bird fell it flailed trying to stop itself from falling, then this man thrust his shoulder into the bird’s wing slamming it to a wooden post.  I was surprised the bird’s wing didn’t break. I continued to scream, “You’re going to break its wing stop being so brutal, you don’t know what you’re doing.” The entire time I was crying, it was the worst feeling being helpless.  I watched the birds trying to flee in terror, looking at me for help and I couldn’t.

My husband arrived in the middle of the vulture endeavor.  It was very upsetting for him to watch this happen to me.  He understood my dedication to the birds, and knew the helplessness I felt in being forced to watch them violently contain the birds.  The idea of what they were going to do to them once they had them was overwhelming.

I was asked for my ID and read my Miranda rights.  I asked where they were taking them, and they stated Don Bonica in Toms River.  He was a rehabilitator that was tied in with the state.  I told them I knew for a fact he took passerines (small birds like robins, blue jays, etc) and fed them to his raptors, and that he would kill all of the birds, and then make up some excuse of how they died or why he had to kill them.

One of the conservation officers assure me that none of the hawks would be killed, possibly only the smaller birds which he thought were not important.  I asked where Mr. Messy was, he was a lecture bird for educational purposes for children and adults.  The bird was a handicapped crow, the children loved seeing him, not only did it teach them about a species they could recognize on a daily basis, but it taught a lesson of being handicapped, and that was all part of life.  They accepted, and loved Mr. Messy.  They officer told me I couldn’t have a lecture bird (I had a special permit for education for him which the state refused to renew along with my State Permit).  The officer also told me that the handicapped bird had no right to live and would be put down.

I tried to phone my lawyer at the property, but did not get through, I could only leave a message.  He probably couldn’t understand me after all of that crying anyway.

After my Miranda Rights were read they told me I had to sign the paper on which he read me my rights.  I refused.  He again told me I had to sign it, I told him I didn’t have to sign anything and would not!  Then the officer told me to step over to him and explain to him the situation.  I said, “What situation?”  He said, “What this is all about, you need to tell me about it.”  I said, “I don’t have to tell you anything, I have done nothing wrong, and I’m not talking to you.”  He said condescending, “So are you exercising your right?” I said, “You’re damn straight.”  He said, “What do you have to say?”  I said, “Nothing!”.  He said, “So, you’re going to remain silent.”  I said, “Yup!”

The owner of the property showed up and spoke to one of the conservation officers and asked their rank and who they were.  He and my husband were asking questions on how Fish & Game would take care of the birds now.  Would they drive injured wild birds to rehabilitation centers since there was no one in our area?  He said no.  When asked what to do with the injured animals I was told to leave them out to die.  What a great lesson to teach our children.

The officer also expressed his opinion of how they refuse to help Seagulls.  He felt as though there were too many and they were not important.  Little does this nonintellectual conservation officer realize that all types of Gulls are important.  They are part of God’s cleanup crew, along with vultures and other scavengers.  What does he think our beaches would look like without them?  Every creature on this earth has its place and function ecologically on this planet.  Without these animals we wouldn’t be able to survive on this planet.  When they are all gone, we will be next.

We’re going to be wrapping up this story in my next post … hopefully you can see the importance of me getting this story out to people everywhere!

Check back in a couple days for the conclusion!

Technorati Tags: alliance, animals, ara, fish and game, history, New Jersey, NJ, non-profit, rehabilitators, St. Francis Avian, story, wildlife

Bookmark This!

Hide Sites

If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!

Comments are closed.