Respect Authority

The assault has started. 

Hundreds of dead birds fell onto homes and cars in parts of a Somerset County, N.J. town this weekend, ostensibly part of a Department of Agriculture program to reduce the European starling population. Frankin Township resident Andrea Kipec told reporters she’d counted more than 150 birds on her property, a haul local authorities told her she is responsible for cleaning up. 

Health department officials say the dead birds - whose cause of death remains a secret (poison, obvi) - pose no hazard to people or pets, outside of their presence being a tad unsightly for the area. And residents remain confused about the bird-culling operation, about which USDA officials informed some local authorities and not others, and certainly not people whose homes would actually be littered with bird carcasses. 

Given the two-pronged avian attack on US Airways flight 1549 earlier this month, and a subsequent outcry against birds as malicious sky assailants, it should come as no surprise that local officials are taking measures to murder thousands of potential plane destroyers. The Port Authority is calling for the use of bird-radar at all New York area airports and City Council member Hiram Monserrate is waiting with bated breath for the OK on wanton bird assassination. David Weprin, another member of the City Council (which apparently has no real problems to deal with these days), is calling for various other measures to cull the goose population, including oiling unhatched eggs and pouring gravel over fields.

Oh yeah, and shooting. Because bullets flying around airports are certainly better than airborn Canada geese.