Time for a bit of a reboot on this blog. The story of the dead geese is everywhere, the Times, Brooklyn paper, on NPR (Thank you Leonard Lopate), the Ditmas Park Blog. I feel like I have missed the boat a bit, since we were away for a week. Also (true confession) my leg has still been bothering me, so I don't always go to the park, but rely on Ber and JJ and their reports. Anyway, I'm getting plenty of 2nd and 3rd hand information about this horrible event. As a former lawyer, I really do think that hearsay is inherently unreliable. However, Here's a roundup of some of what I'm hearing.
The geese were rounded up at 4 AM on Thursday - under cover of darkness - then put on trucks and gassed with carbon dioxide, supposedly a humane kill method which does leave the meat edible. The Parks department immediately started lying about the lack of geese. "they flew away." Impossible since 1) they were molting and 2) the goslings can't fly yet - no wings, just fuzz. The goose with the arrow in its neck, which the parks Dept. was trying to save a short while ago, was included.
The claim is that geese were removed to protect the planes, to create a 7 mile no-fly zone around JFK. Prospect is more than 7 miles from JFK - more like 12-13 miles. Supposedly, the people who did the gassing were originally planning to kill the geese at Jamaica Bay (right next to the airport). The Gateway people wouldn't let them, so they came to Prospect Park, since they had all the equipment anyway. Again, THIS IS RUMOR AND HEARSAY, NOT PROVEN FACT.
Commentators in all the papers, blogs, radio, are having their say, often very strongly and on both sides. The geese must die - people are more important. The geese must live - anything else is murder. And everything else in between.
The real problem: the Parks Dept. cannot be trusted to tell the truth. Their decision-making is secretive and surreal. The geese had a definite fan base and will be missed. Yes, there were too many of them for the space, but surely there was a better solution, if only the Parks Dept. had bothered to look for it. That's really all I think I want to say on this.
The Good News: I finally went to a doctor (an orthopedist) about my leg. As my daughter tells me, the first step is to admit you have a problem. The second step is to put yourself in the hands of a higher power. the higher power in this case is a rehabilitation person. Since my leg has been hurting, I've been using my "good leg" more. Now I need to rebuild the "bad leg," then it will stop hurting. So I shouldn't worry ab out "overdoing" it and injuring myself more. Nice to know. So I'll be in the park more, and I think I'll stick to what I actually see when I'm there. No more gossip,l rumor, innuendo, hearsay. Opinions, yes. the fun of blogging.
What I saw in the park this morning:
We only went as far as the Peninsula. We saw 6 geese. Four in one group, looking like they are starting a tiny flock, and two others. There may be more in other parts of the lake. We saw two adult swans in the lake. Tomorrow we'll make it over the the Boathouse and check on the rest of the Swan family. The paths are looking fairly clean - many trash cans set out now. All the cans that FIDO bought that were being kept in the skating building are now finally out. However, the paths into the phragmites are overgrown and truly disgusting - people are using them as toilets - and I don't mean just the smell of pee. There is one disgusting photo. You are warned not to enlarge it if it will disturb you. The fishing line receptacles are all full. Will they be emptied? Inquiring minds want to know. And the ducks look quite happy to have the lake back.
As you note, there are conflicting reports about the round-up and kill as there apparently is NO documentation as to what actually went down. Some articles state 400 geese were gassed and others say 250. Does anyone actually know? Did anyone actually count? Most reports say the geese were trucked off to some "undisclosed" building where the gassing occurred. (On this claim, one wonders what building in Brooklyn is serving as an avian gas chamber?) But, what you describe is more commonly done (trucks). The fact that this was done at 4AM with so much secrecy and lack of any kind of documentation, totally debunks the claims of "removal" and "euthanasia." This was a massacre and no, the bodies were not fed to the poor (nor should they be), but rather dumped in some (again) "undisclosed" landfill.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. As I've said before, the real problem is the secrecy. When authorities act in secret, people assume the worst. And everyone has their own worst. Some openness is far better than these pitiful and poorly done attempts to cover things up.
ReplyDeleteThe truth is actually worse than we first thought. The geese were not gassed in the trucks (would have been hard to pull that off with early morning joggers in the park.) They were instead trucked to Kennedy Airport which apparently has digs for gassing geese. Also, gassing with CO 2 is NOT "humane!" As waterfowl, geese can hold their breaths far longer than humans. According to Carol Bannerman of the USDA, "The geese take anywhere from five minutes up to an HOUR to die." (Emphasis supplied.) Bannerman has never personally witnessed a goose gassing but simply reports "what workers" have told her. The deaths of these birds is hideous and extremely cruel. We banned gassing of cats and dogs in NYC decades ago due to the cruelty and barbarity. (Young animals sometimes survive the gas.) Geese can hold their breaths much longer than cats and dogs. No wonder the gassings are conducted at Kennedy Airport (away from public view and media scrutiny) and the bodies dumped in landfills. No vets overseeing the gassings. One has to wonder if the geese are even checked for mortality before being stuffed into garbage bags?
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