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FeedHawks for the Killing
Federal wildlife officers are cracking down on people who kill raptors. But criminals rarely get more than a slap on the wrist because the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, an effective and versatile tool for 90 years, has lost its edge and needs sharpening.Fowl Play
By Ted Williams
Raptors are being slaughtered by the thousands all across our nation by people who, for one reason or another, don’t like them. This is, of course, criminal activity—specifically a Class B misdemeanor under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 (MBTA).
The maximum fine, rarely levied, for dispatching a raptor that isn’t a bald or golden eagle or listed under the Endangered Species Act is a mere $15,000. And though such a crime technically can land you in the slammer for six months, jail sentences are invariably suspended. The MBTA does have felony provisions if the United States can prove intent to sell, but the only intent of almost all raptor killers is to ditch the carcasses without being seen.
Another Class B misdemeanor—according to our legal system, just as egregious as knocking off a peregrine falcon—is using a rendering of Smokey the Bear sans permission from the U.S. Forest Service. Every state and federal wildlife-law-enforcement official you engage on the subject will tell you this: The courts routinely deal with rapes, murders, smuggling, drug trafficking, and the like. No way are they going to take Class B misdemeanors seriously.
So unless the law is amended to allow U.S. attorneys to seek felony charges where appropriate, raptors are going to keep dying at rates unimaginable to most of the public.
********
If you doubt this, consider Operation High Roller, at this writing still being conducted across the country by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s law-enforcement division. For once the “high rollers” aren’t rich trophy hunters. In fact, they’re not even people; they’re birds.
“Roller pigeons,” popularized in Birmingham, England, are bred for a genetic, seizure-like disorder that, in flight, causes them to simultaneously and uncontrollably throw up their wings, cock back their heads, and flip backward, somersaulting repeatedly for hundreds of feet, not always recovering before union with terra firma converts them to carrion. Regulated by the National Birmingham Roller Club (NBRC), the oldest and largest organization promoting the hobby, local clubs throughout the United States compete to see whose birds tumble best.
The hobby has attracted such high-profile participants as boxer Mike Tyson, whose sex therapist is quoted by USA Today as explaining that Iron Mike has a special connection with his rollers because he “doesn’t take the normal tumbles like the average person [but] gets real high, then crashes.”
Despite such emotional benefits, roller flyers face a major frustration: When their pigeons start doing their thing, birds of prey see them for exactly what they are—genetic invalids ripe for plucking. As Tony Chavarria, owner and publisher of the Birmingham Roller Pigeon Discussion Board (roller-pigeon.com), perceptively notes, “Many fanciers have been forced to leave the hobby/sport due to incessant attacks by these birds of prey which seem to focus on these roller pigeons as a primary food source (especially in the cities).”
Solution: Make the world safer for rollers by continuously killing raptors as they gravitate to roller lofts from all compass points, like stars to black holes.
Operation High Roller has been rendering this practice increasingly difficult and costly. Handling the case in California is Special Agent Ed Newcomer. Like all the special agents I’ve worked with over the years, Newcomer is highly educated, highly motivated, and horribly overextended. Before signing on with the service five years ago he had worked as a private attorney, assistant attorney general for Colorado, and assistant attorney general for Washington. He’s one of only 191 federal wildlife officers responsible for all states and territories, the lowest number since the mid-1980s. Such is the priority our society places on wildlife crime.
So “the thin green line,” as wildlife advocates call this small but ultra-elite force, employs resourceful strategies to make its presence known. In particular it depends on the media to high-profile the tiny percentage of criminal cases it can bring to the Justice Department. Good press discourages wildlife crime, though always temporarily.
In 2003 Newcomer investigated a complaint from a man who had found a dead Cooper’s hawk and a wounded redtail in his yard in North Hills (just north of Los Angeles). When Newcomer arrived on the scene he learned that one of the neighbors was a “bird lover,” too. How so? Well, because he “raised racing pigeons.” Newcomer had a suspect, and he collected enough evidence to get the pigeon racer convicted on two MBTA violations.
It occurred to Newcomer that this behavior was probably widespread, but racing-pigeon clubs are tough to work undercover because there’s little interaction between members; the birds are just released at some distant location and their return times punched in. Rollers, on the other hand, orbit the member’s property, and competitions progress from house to house, with much socializing at each.
Newcomer’s workload prevented him from infiltrating the roller community until 2006, but when he did he went full throttle, surfing the Web, contacting club members, seeking advice, attending roller shows. Everyone wanted to be his mentor (and sell him birds at prices a beginner was unlikely to recognize as inflated).
“Within five minutes I heard people talking about killing hawks,” he told me. “One of the first things every person I spoke with said was how much he hated hawks and falcons and all the ways he killed them. In half an hour I realized this was going to be a huge case. There are about 250 roller club members in Los Angeles alone. It’s a worldwide hobby. I realized that if everyone I talked to is killing hawks, then the majority of roller pigeon club members in the U.S. are killing hawks.”
In the next 14 months Newcomer infiltrated three clubs in the Los Angeles area and made contact with about 60 members, all of whom also belonged to the NBRC. In all that time he encountered only one member who said he didn’t kill raptors. The lowest claim was 10 kills a year; the highest, 52—this by the NBRC’s national president, Juan Navarro of Los Angeles.
“If we conservatively say that 50 percent of the 250 roller members in L.A. are killing 10 hawks a year, you’re talking 1,250 hawks in L.A. alone,” declares Newcomer. “That’s a huge impact as they migrate along the Pacific Flyway.”
Independently, Special Agent Dirk Hoy had started working roller clubs in Oregon, and the two coordinated their investigations. Quickly they learned that mass raptor executions by roller flyers weren’t confined to their states but were going down everywhere they looked—Washington, Texas, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Montana, and New York, for example. “One guy was bragging to me that a partner of his had killed 30 hawks in 45 days,” says Hoy. “When you start doing the math on that, the numbers are just enormous.”
So far five club members have been charged in Oregon, seven in California, and two in Texas. At this writing only two have not pled guilty. Other investigations are ongoing.
Some of the fines will go to raptor restitution. For example, of those collected so far in California, $29,500 will be deposited in an account set up by the Los Angeles Audubon Society to protect, restore, and rehabilitate raptors. “We’ll distribute the money in consultation with the Fish and Wildlife Service,” says the group’s director, Garry George, who is still steaming about the violations and methods of execution. “These criminals killed peregrines, redtails, Cooper’s hawks, even kestrels. Kestrels don’t eat pigeons, but they didn’t know that.”
Another way the thin green line compensates for its size is by winning convictions on nearly 100 percent of its cases, a record maintained by, among other strategies, keeping tight-lipped about evidence. For example, until the law-enforcement division charged roller flyers, it didn’t tell anyone there had been undercover work or that agents had audio and video evidence that plainly showed that the defendants had been killing raptors. Agents the defendants hadn’t seen (or, in at least one case, didn’t recognize because the formerly bearded agent was clean shaven and wearing federal raid gear) merely asked if they had killed any raptors. In virtually every case the defendants said they had not. So during plea bargaining, U.S. attorneys informed them that if they fought the MBTA Class B misdemeanor charges, the prosecution would add the felony charge of lying to federal officers.
While the MBTA has weak penalties, agents file collateral charges when they discover unrelated crimes. For instance, Newcomer has referred several roller club members to district attorneys for such state felonies as negligent discharge of a firearm and animal cruelty.
One of the defendants facing animal-cruelty charges is the NBRC’s president, Juan Navarro. In the same document, it says that Rayvon Hall of Rialto, California, told Newcomer that after he catches hawks at the rate of about one per week (in traps baited with live pigeons and, at the time, openly sold at roller shows), he “pummels them with a stick” and that it is a “great thing . . . you’ll see, you get a lot of frustration out.”
“We just didn’t have the manpower or time to go after everybody,” says Newcomer. “And at some point you’ve got to ask, ‘Gee, how long am I going to let hawks get killed?’ So I decided to target the club president and the people who were most brazen about this. It was sickening to have to hang out with these guys and listen to them.”
I saw what Newcomer meant from the court documents and the Internet roller chatter I’d collected (now mostly deleted online). For example, according to the search-warrant affidavit, Darik McGhee of San Bernardino, California, proudly informed Newcomer that he had filled a five-gallon bucket with talons from hawks he’d killed.
According to the same document, Rayvon Hall presented Newcomer with severed Cooper’s hawk talons and explained that he made chlorine gas with bleach and ammonia and used it to kill trapped hawks by spraying it in their mouths and eyes.
But the preferred method of execution, on which Newcomer, Hoy, and their fellow agents were carefully instructed by their eager tutors, was to discreetly and silently pump air-rifle rounds into the trapped hawks’ heads and chests.
In April 2003 Bob Sallinger, conservation director for the Audubon Society of Portland, rescued four peregrine falcon eggs from a bridge under construction, rappelling down to the nest. The society hatched the eggs and raised the chicks. Clark Public Utilities donated a crew and supplies to build a release tower on Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge, and a volunteer, Ken Barron, lived on the refuge with the young falcons for six weeks as they acclimated to the wild. The four fledglings—much in evidence in and around the refuge—won the hearts of the public and the press. But one day they disappeared, never to be seen again.
According to Ivan Hanchett of Hillsboro, Oregon, a fellow roller pigeon defender shot them. Herewith, from the Birmingham Roller Pigeon Discussion Board, Hanchett’s take on the incident, posted shortly before he was convicted for hawk killing and meriting the additional charge of cruelty to language: “Well low and behold just across the street from the wildlife refuge lives a roller flyer and when the young became airbourne they found alot of led in the air space across the street where the rollers were flying LOL!! I laughed and laughed when I heard this story because of all the pain staking measures they took to get these birds to adolescence and than to have somone take them out simply was bliss!!” (Special Agent Hoy reports that when he was working undercover, Hanchett bragged to him that he shot many hawks but instructed him on quieter, more creative methods: “angling” for them with live feeder mice rigged with fish hooks, and catching them in live traps, then suffocating them in plastic bags.)
Other commentary cut and pasted from the Birmingham Roller Pigeon Discussion Board:
Centralvalleylofts: “Just put some draino liquid on some of your weaker birds and let them take them and bye bye baby. Make sure you rub it on the back of their necks.”
Steve uk: “Shaun u need a larson trap [for raptors].”
Shaun: “Steve, I very recently acquired one and it ain’t working! Any hints?”
Steve uk: “It will work just keep tryin, the hen will start takin greater risks soon as she will be desperate to put weight on before laying.”
Shaun: “Put weight on? The fat, ugly, brown bastard is still probably digesting a dozen of my rollers! Can’t I just let off a homemade bomb at the bottom of my garden.”
J. Star: “I sit and wait for him behind a big bush and within a half hour he in on top of the Avery thinking he is going to catch a bird and soon he is picked off. . . .You will not see him again until another one comes to take his territory, then you repeat the process.”
Spider: “I use a 12 ga shotgun with led #5 shot. . . . Sometimes I get 2-3 friends with 12 gages and we have a ball seeing who can get led in these loft destroyers. . . . Good luck and good hunting.”
Rollerman 132: “What we need to do is hire a lawyer, and bring a class auction law suit against the department of U.S Fish and wild life for contributing to the destruction of personal property. . . . My birds are worth at lest a hundred each, I want compensation for each bird those hawks eat.”
The NBRC has responded to Operation High Roller with an official press release alleging that Cooper’s hawks have proliferated to the point of pestilence, and castigating the Fish and Wildlife Service for 1) stubbornly refusing to “relocate” them to areas where they won’t eat roller pigeons, and 2) making “inappropriate and grossly exaggerated comments . . . which sought to tar thousands of roller fanciers by reason of the unfortunate allegations against less than a dozen individuals.”
But it’s clear that raptor killing in the roller-flyer community isn’t just the work of a few bad apples. Most of the barrel is fermented mash. After all, of the roughly 60 NBRC members Newcomer worked while undercover, 59 said they killed hawks. It’s part of the culture.
Still, as NBRC members tirelessly point out, there are ethical roller flyers. After searching for a month I was able to find one (at least a former one)—Will Brown of Stanardsville, Virginia. He offers this: “One of the reasons I stopped flying rollers is that they’re hawk food. They mimic sick or injured birds, the kind hawks are supposed to eat. I’m not going to fight nature. So I switched to different pigeons—thief powders. They don’t flop around in the sky and attract hawks. . . . I was pleased to hear about this sting. Roller flyers are quite belligerent. If you mention that hawks are part of nature and maybe we should work with nature, you’re quickly ostracized. . . . I still lose a few birds, and I accept it as part of what happens when you let birds fly in the real world. The real world has raptors.”
********
Unfortunately, there is nothing aberrant about roller flyers. Similar jihads are being waged by other groups that find themselves inconvenienced by migratory birds.
In fact, MBTA flouting is an American tradition. Back in 1991, on a stakeout with Special Agent Roger Gephart in California’s San Joaquin Valley, I watched a fish farmer shoot great egrets. Several days later I interviewed another fish farmer, Marvin Carpenter, at his Merced, California, goldfish farm. He claimed to have been ruined by birds and feds. “All fish farmers shoot birds,” he explained, without much exaggeration from what I’ve been able to learn. “Fish farmers are producers, and the government is knocking us out. The environmentalists have [the government] right by the nose.”
Carpenter was especially bitter about the way special agents showed up uninvited and started digging up his property with a backhoe, thereby unearthing some 700 migratory bird carcasses. The total kill was estimated at 20,000. “If it flies it dies,” was the battle cry at Carpenter’s Goldfish Farm. All large birds, even non-fish eaters such as avocets, gallinules, willets, stilts, and hawks, were splashed as soon as they violated company air space. Cyanide-coated goldfish accounted for as many as 200 herons per day. Three hundred beaver traps constantly splintered the legs of wading birds. Carpenter got a 13-month jail sentence and a $34,000 fine, but this was mostly for the felony conviction of lying to federal agents.
Because the MBTA carries such weak penalties, nothing much has changed since Carpenter was making the world safer for goldfish, except that for a while fish farmers shot fewer birds (see “Killer Fish Farms,” Audubon, March-April 1992). Now roller flyers will be careful to obey the MBTA, or at least not get caught violating it, for maybe another year. “These things are always cyclic,” says Special Agent Hoy. “They’ll get comfortable again; some will start violating again; and we’ll be there.” Even so, the violators won’t have a whole lot to worry about unless the law is amended to provide for felony charges at the discretion of the U.S. attorney.
********
When Bob Sallinger started work at the Audubon Society of Portland’s rehabilitation center in 1992, he was astonished at how many raptors were coming in with gunshot wounds. The carnage hasn’t diminished. He still gets a steady stream of shot-up owls, ospreys, harriers, buteos, accipiters, falcons, and eagles.
One of the first birds Sallinger treated was a peregrine that had been shot off a telephone pole in Portland, when the species was listed as endangered and just re-establishing itself in the state. “We were frustrated by the low priority these crimes were given,” he remarks. “So in 1996 we created a migratory bird protection fund. We wanted to draw attention to the fact that lots of birds, mostly raptors, were being shot.”
When the thin green line took down the roller flyers, the Audubon Society of Portland initiated an aggressive campaign for stiff penalties. It lobbied the prosecutors, engaged the press, whipped up the membership, and got the mayor of Portland and the president of the Metro Region to write blistering letters prominently displayed on the Internet and quoted in newspapers. All this helped inspire prosecutors to seek the almost unheard-of fine of $10,000.
In Oregon one defense attorney told the judge that $10,000 was too much and that $7,500 would be fair for his client—Ivan Hanchett, the creative hawk killer who had “laughed and laughed” when he heard about the executions of the four peregrine fledglings. U.S. District Judge Ancer Hagerty didn’t agree; he dropped Hanchett’s fine to $4,000. One of the other two Oregon roller flyers convicted at this writing—Peter Kaufman of Portland—was also assessed $4,000. Mitch Reed of Mount Angel paid $5,000.
These and defendants from other states who pled out were placed on probation and some were required to do community service. But there was no jail time. So with the possible exception of the NBRC’s Navarro, who was convicted on 16 MBTA counts and fined $25,000, the raptor killers were bothered only by a business-as-usual expense that wasn’t much more painful than purchasing a shotgun, a pellet gun, ammo, and a few live traps.
After the arrests, Sallinger contacted the office of U.S. Representative Peter DeFazio (D-OR) but failed to stir up much interest. Then, when the press reported and editorialized about the ridiculous sentences, DeFazio’s office called him. The congressman would be introducing a bill to amend the MBTA so that federal prosecutors would have the option of seeking felony convictions for intentional violations. The Migratory Bird Treaty Act Penalty and Enforcement Act, as DeFazio’s legislation is called, is now before the House of Representatives with seven cosponsors.
DeFazio sent me this e-mail: “I was shocked that members of the pigeon clubs openly bragged in meetings and on publicly accessible websites about killing magnificent raptors, and that they killed these birds with brutal methods that included guns, poisons, suffocation in plastic bags, baiting with pigeons covered in fishing hooks, and luring hawks into glass panels. Upon hearing this, I decided that it was time for federal legislation to stop those who abuse migratory birds.”
The Audubon Society of Portland is outraged at the court’s leniency, but it is hardly surprised. In the summer of 2007 Sallinger received a complaint from a woman who had literally been hanging from the arm of a Madres, Oregon, resident (not a roller flyer) as she pleaded with him not to shoot a great-horned owl perched in a tree. She kept telling him that owls are protected by state and federal law, that they’re beautiful, important parts of nature. He extricated himself, explained that he didn’t want owls around his house, and calmly blew it away. When a state trooper appeared, the perpetrator—evincing no hint of remorse—gave him the severed talons, fetched the carcass from the bushes, and allowed that he’d done this before.
The fine was $750, exactly half of the reward Sallinger paid the woman from his organization’s migratory bird protection fund.
- 30 -
WHAT YOU CAN DO
Urge your legislators to support and cosponsor DeFazio’s Migratory Bird Treaty Act Penalty and Enforcement Act—H.R. 4093. And tell them to insist that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service receive funds to fully staff its law-enforcement division. For more information on Operation High Roller, visit Audubon Portland and the Fish and Wildlife Service. To receive e-mail updates from Audubon’s policy office on this and other issues, go to Audubon.org, and click on “Issues & Action” and then “Take Action Now.”
-- Audubon, May 2008: http://audubonmagazine.org/incite/incite0805.html
Posted at 08:21 PM | Permalink
Reader Comments:
seizure-like disorders, my ass. Nobody knows for real why they roll
You sound like a roller flyer. I hope not one who kills raptors, but then you’d be in the vast minority according to the stats collected by the undercover agents. Excuse me, but the flight disorders are indeed seizure-like. And the fact that no-one knows why rollers display this behavioral aberration is precisely why I used the word “seizure-like.” So after reading the entire piece, all 3,600 words, this is the only response you can come up with?
Best,
Ted
The first poster derived his comment from your 3600 word blog, based possibly on first hand knowledge of the subject, or possibly second hand. Who knows, he's anonymous. You, on the other hand, derived an 80 word response to his 11 word post. I performed pretty well in my math courses through college, but it doesn't take a mathematician to figure out that you, Ted, are the one reading between the lines (or line in this case) in your response.
I am a roller breeder and flyer. I have been so for over 20 years. And before you apply the same logic to those two sentences and conclude that I'm part of the vast majority, in your estimation, who hurt hawks: No, I have never harmed hawks or falcons. I have never harmed doves, starlings, grackles, or any other native or non-native wild bird for that matter either. On the contrary, I thoroughly enjoy observing all wild birds, especially raptors on my loft during the winter months, when my birds are tucked safely away. I am also a photographer and enjoy taking candid, natural pictures of them. I have always admired them and would be insane to believe they would not eat my birds. But rollers aren't any more susceptible to hawks than any other breed of pigeon. Not any more than any other breed of chicken, duck, dove, or any of the other many breeds of backyard birds.
But that aside, the real reason for my response is that I have had a hard time coming to terms with your initial premise with regard to rollers and what they are about. It seems that before the events of last year and Mr. Newcomer's heroic (I use that term loosely) crusade, roller pigeons were revered by many respected people. Now you've gone to great lengths to describe them as genetic rejects and further associate the hobby with a convicted felon like Tyson. Tyson has repeatedly proclaimed that flying flights were his breed of choice. And further, no one in the hobby, to my knowledge, espouses Tyson as any kind of ambassador or spokesperson. You solely came to that conclusion.
Not only do you use these associations to denigrate the value of these birds but you further go on to outright make things up. You seem to believe that you have to convince the readership of the Audubon that this hobby is akin to cock-fighting when it couldn't be further from that extreme. All of the roller guys I know are warm, kind hearted and hard working. Many, including myself, are Audubon members and regular contributors. They are not the ruthless killers that the media is trying hard to portray, with the ever so generous help of Mr. Newcomer.
No, we don't breed our birds to roll "hundreds of feet" until they hit the ground. Where on earth did you dig that up? That's the furthest from any ideal that anyone raising rollers would want to breed. There is the occasional bird that misjudges the roof line of a house, or the top of a tree, but by and far those birds have long ago taken themselves out of the gene pool. And by long ago I'm talking human-generations ago.
In my 20 years in the hobby, at most a couple of birds bumped on the roof from no more than 5 feet of rolling. They learned from their mistake and never again repeated it, continuing on to fly long and fruitful lives well into their mid teens. The fact is that the ideal we strive for is control. Frequency and style are hallmarks of great birds, and without fundamental control, there cannot be either. Further, the ideal that everyone in the hobby strives for is a 20' roller. 20 Feet! Again, it doesn't take a mathematician to recognize the wide disparity from what you have written, to what has been the accepted norm in the hobby. But I understand that you were framing the story.
Last and not least, you go on to claim that the NBRC is the regulating body of the sport. The NBRC is a club. It's an association of people who share a common interest in raising rollers. It is NOT a regulating body. You don't have to belong to the NBRC to be a roller breeder. You don't need their blessing to keep rollers and further, that you are not a member does not mean you have any less of a quality flock than an active member. Yet another convenient loose interpretation of facts on your part.
I don't belong to the NBRC and don't feel compelled to have to comply with anything that body writes. It doesn't mean they don't have a purpose. If anything, the NBRC has served to disseminate information on the hobby, including proper feeding, breeding and flying, LONG before the internet existed. They laid down the template for many local clubs, but they are not responsible for them.
But what really bothers me about your article, and the fact that the Audubon published it, is that in the same magazine edition wherein your article appears, where you bash the existence and value of roller pigeons, the Audubon proudly and exuberantly encourages children to pickup Project Pigeon Watch. Do you have any idea how many kids from the inner city have righted their lives due to raising rollers? No, most likely that was omitted from your plate of information. Hundreds, if not thousands of kids who would otherwise have led a life of crime or nefarious inclinations have found an purpose and meaning in those birds that you so liberally proclaim to have a disorder. But it goes to show you how truly confused the Audubon is. They'll take ad revenues from anyone, even if that ad would conflict with the content and dare I say, agenda, of their magazine when poorly worded, poorly researched, and conveniently contrived articles like yours make it to their pages.
You'll likely omit this comment, and that's fine. It's not convenient. As long as you get to read it first and know that this roller breeder will no longer renew his Audubon subscription.
The reason for your word-counting exercise is lost on me. And why would you imagine that I “will likely omit this comment”?
Congratulations on your college math performance, but you should have paid more attention in English class. You misread both my article and post. I never reported that roller flyers “breed birds to roll hundreds of feet until they hit the ground.” Re-read please. I did not “claim that the National Birmingham Roller Club is the regulating body of the sport.” I accurately reported that local competitions are regulated by NBRC. I did not and do not “conclude” that anyone was “part of the vast majority.” I merely cited the stat reported by the undercover investigation of the Fish and Wildlife Service--of the 60 rollers the agents worked only one did not kill raptors.
Congratulations also for being one of the few roller flyers who do not “harm hawks.” I’m not sure what you mean by “genetic rejects.” But rollers tumble uncontrollably through the air, sometimes not recovering until contact with the ground renders them carrion. By any standard that’s a gross genetic defect, and one that triggers a predatory response in raptors. How long do you think rollers would be able to pass on these genes in the wild?
Why would you object to me quoting Mike Tyson on roller flying when his felonious activity wasn’t connected with raptor killing? The felonious activity by roller flyers I wrote about, on the other hand, was directly related to their hobby. It included discharging firearms in city limits, animal cruelty and lying to federal agents. And, while I can quite understand why “no one in the hobby espouses Tyson as any kind of ambassador or spokesperson,” why have they espoused such people as Juan Navarro of Los Angeles by making him president of the National Birmingham Roller Club when he killed at least 52 raptors a year?
Finally, how on earth have you divined that I in any way object to the hobby or roller flying itself? And exactly what did I “make up”?
Best,
Ted
"But it’s clear that raptor killing in the roller-flyer community isn’t just the work of a few bad apples. Most of the barrel is fermented mash. After all, of the roughly 60 NBRC members Newcomer worked while undercover, 59 said they killed hawks. It’s part of the culture." These are your words. If this isn't a direct implication that the vast majority are harming raptors in your own words, then maybe you are right and I need to brush up on my English.
Secondly, the NBRC does not regulate local flies. Local clubs can put up representatives of their group in any form and shape they'd like, with or without competition for the NBRC's sponsored competitions. The NBRC does not care how you judge your local flies and it has no power to enforce any mandates or bylaws nationally. So yes, you did inaccurately report this. They are as much a regulating body with regard to rollers as the AKC is to dogs. The AKC definitely has no say in any regard with my Shepperd, what he eats, where he lives, how he's vaccinated or anything else for that matter.
Lastly, if your intent in bringing Tyson into the mix--a convicted rapist, ear-biter, and generally unpleasant individual--wasn't a thrust to align roller breeders with "felonious" activity in general, then it must have been to convey their popularity with role model individuals, RIGHT? You can't possibly explain away how this in any way didn't further taint the image of a roller fancier to start off your story. You not only associate Tyson with the hobby, but you use his sex therapist's comments! His crime was sex related.
Lazy, sloppy journalism. How dare you recommend that I go back to English class? If you "re-read please" my comments you'll see that I am not addressing those that were convicted of these crimes. I have no association with them and will not defend them. But I am attacking the basis and foundation of your journalistic attempt, which did attack me as a roller breeder.
No. The problem is your English. You charged me with claiming that you are part of the vast majority. I did not. I did accurately report that the vast majority of roller flyers (59 of 60 in the federal sample) kill raptors. NBRC regulations are used in local competitions. Maybe you know some competitions that use their own regulations. Swell. I’ll grant that Tyson is “unpleasant.” Would you define the roller flyers who smothered, poisoned, bludgeoned and shot protected raptors, then bragged about it as “pleasant”? How about the roller flyer who posted this on the Birmingham Roller Pigeon Discussion Board about his fellow roller flyer who had just shot four young peregrine falcons: “Well low [sic] and behold just across the street from the wildlife refuge lives a roller flyer and when the young became airbourne [sic] they found alot [sic] of led [sic] in the air space across the street where the rollers were flying LOL!! I laughed and laughed when I heard this story because of all the pain staking [sic] measures they took to get these birds to adolescence and than to have somone [sic] take them out simply was bliss!!” (Special Agent Hoy reports that when he was working undercover, this same roller flyer bragged to him that he shot many hawks but instructed him on quieter, more creative methods: “angling” for them with live feeder mice rigged with fish hooks, and catching them in live traps, then suffocating them in plastic bags.) And I’m “tainting the image” of roller flyers???? Who said anything about you “going back to English class.” Might be a good idea, but please re-read what I wrote. Finally, please explain how I have “attacked you as a roller breeder.”
Best,
Ted
Ted,
I would like to respond to your post. I am Kenny from Amarillo. Let`s get that out of the way right off the bat. I am a roller breeder and competitor. I am a former member of the NBRC. I resigned my membership in protest of the way the officials handled the fallout of Operation High Roller. The NBRC is divided into regions not local clubs. Local clubs are just that local clubs whose members happen to have membership in the NBRC. Local flys are not sanctioned by the NBRC in any way. Each event is held independently of the NBRC events.
“Roller pigeons,” popularized in Birmingham, England, are bred for a genetic, seizure-like disorder that, in flight, causes them to simultaneously and uncontrollably throw up their wings, cock back their heads, and flip backward, somersaulting repeatedly for hundreds of feet, not always recovering before union with terra firma converts them to carrion. Regulated by the National Birmingham Roller Club (NBRC), the oldest and largest organization promoting the hobby, local clubs throughout the United States compete to see whose birds tumble best.
Your information is not correct. It is NOT a disorder but a result of centuries of selective breeding. Tumblers were bred in the Middle East as early as the 1600`s. As previously stated we don`t raise our birds to roll “hundreds of feet”. A bird like that is worthless to a roller breeder. Our target area is 20-40 feet.
Our birds roll when they want to. The pigeons are bred from the same family and lines of great performers. This helps them to “break” or perform together. The more birds that break, the more points one can score in competition. It is anything but uncontrolled. Control is the watchword among breeders. An uncontrolled roll will result in what you have described and is counterproductive to the goals of a successful breeder. A prime Birmingham Roller will roll with blinding speed so fast the individual revolutions are indistinguishable. It will snap out of the roll to return to its kitmates. The bird you described is an undesirable bird to any fancier.
"The hobby has attracted such high-profile participants as boxer Mike Tyson, whose sex therapist is quoted by USA today as explaining that Iron Mike has a special connection with his rollers because he “doesn’t take the normal tumbles like the average person [but] gets real high, then crashes.”
What does Mike Tyson`s sex therapists have to do with some outlaw fanciers killing raptors? Let`s stick to the point and not sensationalize your obviously biased view of the sport.
"But it’s clear that raptor killing in the roller-flyer community isn’t just the work of a few bad apples. Most of the barrel is fermented mash. After all, of the roughly 60 NBRC members Newcomer worked while undercover, 59 said they killed hawks. It’s part of the culture.
“Within five minutes I heard people talking about killing hawks,” he told me. “One of the first things every person I spoke with said was how much he hated hawks and falcons and all the ways he killed them. In half an hour I realized this was going to be a huge case. There are about 250 roller club members in Los Angeles alone. It’s a worldwide hobby. I realized that if everyone I talked to is killing hawks, then the majority of roller pigeon club members in the U.S. are killing hawks.”
This translates to “I am going to be famous, and get a corner office in Washington after this.”
This is obviously Agent Newcomers opinion and not a fact. Newcomer believes every word he hears. Guys are known to embellish their stories especially when in the company of fellow fanciers. When is legislation going to be passed about telling “fish stories”? He felt, in my opinion that everyone there was guilty, his job…catch `em.
"Still, as NBRC members tirelessly point out, there are ethical roller flyers. After searching for a month I was able to find one (at least a former one)—Will Brown of Stanardsville, Virginia. He offers this: “One of the reasons I stopped flying rollers is that they’re hawk food. They mimic sick or injured birds, the kind hawks are supposed to eat. I’m not going to fight nature. So I switched to different pigeons—thief powders. They don’t flop around in the sky and attract hawks. . . . I was pleased to hear about this sting. Roller flyers are quite belligerent. If you mention that hawks are part of nature and maybe we should work with nature, you’re quickly ostracized. . . . I still lose a few birds, and I accept it as part of what happens when you let birds fly in the real world. The real world has raptors.”
You didn’t look very hard Ted. I had to come and find you. I have over 1700 posts on www.rollerpigeon.com. I have stated several times I don’t kill raptors. Sensationalism at its best.
In closing I would like to say the killing of raptors is wrong and not condoned by the majority of clubs and fanciers. I would like to ask a question of the Audubon Society.
Where are all of the songbirds?
Could it be they are being eaten by the raptors?
Where are the environmental studies that should have accompanied the release of a wild animal in the cities?
Who is there to police the almighty Audubon Society? Seems they have a prejudice in favor of the raptors. Darwin warned against man interfering with the balance of nature.
The raptors have recovered from DDT and have become the bane of the other avian species.Countrywide the Coopers hawk alone eats over seven million birds a year. Yes that’s MILLIONS. Go figger.
With the additional pressure of the Avian Flu a couple of years ago the focus should be shifted to preserving the songbirds.
Yours truly,
Kenny
The roll or performance that a tumbler or a roller pigeon does is considered a trait and not a defect. If it where a defect you could not breed for it and have it repeat itself. Because the roll is a recessive genetic process it would be called a trait. I believe you like calling it a defect to grow a distrust(or a disgust) of the hobby from those that have never been associated with the hobby.. Many pigeon breeders havwe not harmed any birds of prey; we are not the minority. Many of us have learned to fly around the birds of prey and they are others who are learning to do the same.
There is a study by Cornell University that is telling us that there will be more extenctions of song birds and some of it is being done by the proliferation of birds of prey population. We are so quick to blame the removal of habitat which does have an impact, but there are other forces that are playing a roll as well. The birds of prey are not without blame.
We have to stop the neurturing of sick and injured birds of prey; that too should be illegal. There are also operations that are hatching; training; and releasing birds of prey and that needs to be curtailed or halted. We are creating a a wildlife disaster that is doing nothing positive for birds of prey; the song birds; or other wildlife.
Nick Siders
I would personally like to challenge you Ted to go out and watch a kit of rollers and the try to tell your readers that rollers roll uncontrolably. I have had rollers for nearly 30 years and of the 100 or so I breed every year I might have one that as a juvinile has a hard time controlling the roll but given time they usually learn to control it. Anyway do yourself and your readers a favor and witness it befor you write it because you are 100% wrong on that point.
You roller guys really slay me. “Not a disorder”? “Not a defect”? How long do you think a bird that was genetically programmed to interrupt steady flight with dozens of somersaults (occasionally not recovering before wiping out on terra firma) would last in the wild? About as long as a tailless pogie that spun circles over a bluefish school! And your notion that songbirds are in trouble because of the predators they co-evolved with is as brainless as the notion that wolves are “wiping out” elk or that stripers decimated river herring. May I remind you that 59 of 60 roller fliers worked by the undercover agents admitted to killing hawks. Your theory that they were really lying and therefore ethical ain’t gonna cut it. The agents worked roller flyers in many other states and found that hawk killing is part of the roller culture. May I also remind you that, in addition to the 59 admissions, the agents observed many roller flyers killing hawks and gathered evidence (such as hawk parts) that proved that many others also killed hawks. I did look hard for an ethical roller flyer, found one, interviewed him and let him speak at length in the piece. So your point is…? There are places where most roller flyers don’t kill hawks--where there aren’t hawks. Maybe that makes them “ethical.”
Best,
Ted
Although your accounts and quotes of the investigation may be accurate the remainder of your article, and to some degree even the responses, are not based on fact, proper research or investigation and is a poor attempt to stereo type a group of people.
"Seizure-Like" It is apparent that you spent no time reseraching the act of rolling or tumbling. It is also apparent that you have never associated yourself with a person who suffers from seizures. Nor did you take the time to even confirm the definition of seizure as related to a medical condition. Had you taken the time to research these issues you would have learned that
1) During the 1960's, when the common explanation for the roll or tumble was perceived to be an act of a seizure, a group of veternarians conducting a study on the brimingham roller, utilized phenobarbital (at that time, the nations leading medication for the prevention of tonic-clonic, most commonly known as Grand Mal, seizures) in and effort to prevent the act of rolling. The final results of the study, the phenobarbital had no apparent or noticeable affect on the birmingham roller. Furthermore, it was also noted that there was no apparent loss of consciousness or change in consciousness of the roller nor did it appear to loose control of their body. Had you at least researched the definition of seizure, assuming you wanted to reoprt accurately and framed your article, you wuold have chosen the more common terminology of "backward somersault" and enhanced that with "in rapid succession" or anything to that affect.
2) In being associated, in one way or another, to individuals throughout my life that suffer from epileptic seizures of varying degree, to include tonic-clonic seizures, I have yet to see anyone of those individuals do backwards somersaults.
The roll has been identified as a genetic trait, one which can be controlled and reproduced in the offspring. Whether or not you consider this to be a defect is beside the point. You frame your statement as if we breeders of any of the roller or tumbler families are monsters because we knowingly pair these birds together to reporduce what you consider to be a defect. Yet we live in a society that does nothing to limit the reporduction of many humans that without question should not be permitted to reproduce.
Furthermore, had you properly taken the time to research the Birmingham Roller, you would have also learned and reported, that not only is the roll genetically linked, but in order to capitalize on the birds maximum potential, one must provide proper housing care and nutrient as well as regulate the flying times. If any of these are out of balance, you will get minimal to no performance from the roller.
Having had that information you would not have ignorantly (literally) have made the statement, "You roller guys really slay me. “Not a disorder”? “Not a defect”? How long do you think a bird that was genetically programmed to interrupt steady flight with dozens of somersaults (occasionally not recovering before wiping out on terra firma) would last in the wild? About as long as a tailless pogie that spun circles over a bluefish school!". The answer is yes, it can and will survive with the same odds of any pigeon within its geographical location, due to the fact it is no longer properly managed to enhance the roll. Although the natural ability to roll exist it does not necessarily mean that the roll will be induced each time it flys. Again, if you would have done some research you would have learned that if not properly managed the bird will not do anymore than the common pigeon on the street. If you have ever spent the time observing a common pigeon in flight, you will see that even they possess some ability to roll. They display this ability when they are flying by stopping the movement of their wings, and raising their wings above their body. To slowly and gradually descend. Once you observe this act and watch the development of a young roller you will see the evolution of the roll from the common pigeon in what is known as a tail drop in the roller hobby.
I will disagree with some of the responses. Not all breeders perfer the 20' roll. If your desire is to fly competition, then yes you likely prefer the 20 - 40' roller. I myself prefer the deeper "old School" roller that I grew up with that is 50 to on occassion 100' rollers. Will they come in contact with Terra Firma, its possible from time to time they will. Will it kill them, not likely. I lost more pigeons in this short period of 2008 to hawks than terra firma. The count today is 7 to 1. But because a bird comes in contact with terra firma does that mean we are cruel in-humane for breeding these birds? Although not specifically stated you insinuate that it is. Agin I will refer to the human race, do we not have humans coming in contact with terra firma every day? In fact do they not find even more cruel and in human ways to end their life or god forbid the life of another person? According todays scientific studies, it is now believed that humans are predisposed to commit certain acts of violence or any level of abuse whether it be verbal, physical or chemical due to genetic inheritance. Again, we do not regulate who can and cannot reproduce within society do we? So if in your eyes and the eyes of your readers, we are considered to be cruel and inhumane, I state to you, we come about it naturally, it is the accepted practice of our society.
Mr. Newcomers assessment of the number of hawks killed is an inaccuaret statement and one you should take the tiem to research as well. Find out how many roller breeders there are across the nation. Then also inlcude the other varieties of pigeons and assume, as Mr. Newcomer has done, a certain percentage of those that are reducing the population of hawks and falcons. Then inlcude in there as well the other members of society that are raising poulty. Throw in the fish farmer stats if you like. In the roller breeders alone, certaily these numbers would lend itself to at least one variety of hawk or falcon being extinct? If not then you would have to agree that if it were not for this illegal control of the population, certain varities would be heavily overpopulated and therefore suffering cruel deaths through starvation and inflictions of a variety of diseases.
This article is a classic example of traditional journalism as we know it in society today. Report the story, learn the facts later. Don't worry about whats right or wrong, capture the spotlight, get the readers attention, sell your story.
Your welcome to bolster yourself by attacking grammer, sentences spelling whatever you like. If that is what it takes for you to feel better about yourself and misrepresenting a group of people. Mr. Newcomers investigation does not represent all of us and your article certainly does not represent the roller. If you are trying to do society a favor, be a good investigative journalist, if there is even such a thing anymore, and do some research. Your list of roller breeders you called certainly could not have been very extensive if you only found one person who has not killed a hawk, and you certainly did not bother to sunstantiate your facts with anyone who has raised pigeons for any length of time at all. Mr. Newcomers 1 year investigation, altough much lengthier than anytime you put into this article, does not make him an expert in the hobby of raising rollers.
The only inaccuracy here is your reading comprehension. You argue that the birds do not experience seizures. I never said they did. I accurately described their genetically programmed behavior as “seizure-like.” Why can’t you understand the simple difference between a seizure and something that looks like a seizure? And don’t tell me that people and animals that experience seizures don’t fall and tumble. I’ve seen it. You also are abysmally ignorant of predator response in nature. The genetically bred trait of rolling is, despite your fantasy, an utterly unnatural defect and disorder bred into the birds by humans. When the birds roll they appear (indeed are) disabled, triggering the predator response in raptors. Racing pigeons do not trigger this response and, therefore, are not preyed upon as much. How would you possibly be an a position to know that the Fish and Wildlife Service’s “assessment of the number of hawks killed is inaccurate”? And who said the investigation represented “all of you”?
Best,
Ted
Fantastic article, Ted. I knew it was bad, but I had no idea it was this bad.
Idiots and guns don't mix, do they?
Thanks Mike. Good to hear from you.
Anon: “Under one of the local falcon's roosts was found over 100 pigeon bands. 75 percent of those were Racing Homer bands.” What’s your point? Assuming we can trust this stat which sounds like it came from a friend of a friend who heard it in a bar, who said falcon’s don’t eat racing pigeons? In my many years of reporting on wildlife crime I’ve learned a truism: People who proclaim that the special agents who’ve busted their pals have a personal “agenda,” are “power hungry,” “overzealous,” etc., etc. are dirty themselves. Someone I doubt you’re an exception. If you have something somewhat relevant or even mildly interesting to add to this exchange, let’s hear it. Otherwise, expect to be disappeared into cyberspace.
Best
Ted
Your “proven stats” appear to be pulled from your fertile imagination. Other roller flyers say you’ve got it wrong. How do you explain the following comment by Will Brown of Stanardsville, Virginia. I sought him out, interviewed him at length, and quoted him in the piece. Did you bother to read his statement? Or do you maintain that he has an “agenda,” too? Here are his words as it appeared in my piece: “One of the reasons I stopped flying rollers is that they’re hawk food. They mimic sick or injured birds, the kind hawks are supposed to eat. I’m not going to fight nature. So I switched to different pigeons—thief powders. They don’t flop around in the sky and attract hawks. . . . I was pleased to hear about this sting. Roller flyers are quite belligerent. If you mention that hawks are part of nature and maybe we should work with nature, you’re quickly ostracized. . . . I still lose a few birds, and I accept it as part of what happens when you let birds fly in the real world. The real world has raptors.”
He sure got it right about roller flyers being “quite belligerent”--esp. when they’re caught violating federal laws.
Finally, if all these racing-pigeon fanciers keep losing all these birds to wild falcons and hawks, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out a solution: Find another hobby or keep ‘em indoors.
Best,
Ted
Dear Anon:
Your last two comments have been delivered to cyberspace because you didn’t heed my patient warning. Again: My netiquette guidelines for this blog are the most lenient I know of: 1. A comment has to be intelligible; 2. A comment has to be minimally relevant and minimally interesting; 3. A comment has to be somewhat civil. Because you have kept plowing the same turf with your banal mantra that raptors are wiping out songbirds, providing no evidence save hearsay from your grandma, you flunked No. 2 twice.
Best,
Ted
Ted, why do you keep deleting that anon guy's post? I read it when it is posted and it doesn't seem to read bad. In fact it sounds quite interesting and there is probably some truth to it.
Because the anon guy who is you (I see the IP addresses) is, as you have noted from my last post, a violator of my extremely lenient netiquette guidelines. Again, if your have something halfway intelligent or even mildly interesting to contribute to the dialogue, let’s hear it. Otherwise you’ll continue to be disappeared into cyberspace. It takes me just one stroke on the keyboard so don’t expect to outlast me.
Best,
Ted