<Yesterday, the USDA acknowledged a few mistakes of its own in spreading the word
As in, it didn’t? I just saw 2 reports about this on FOX. I can’t imagine walking out of your house and seeing hundreds of dead birds all over and having no idea what’s going on. And then the govt tells you it’s alright to pick them up? Yuck. You killed them, feds, you come pick them up.
Prospective clients ping! ;-)
“Obama” in Kenyan for Bird Killer.
Livestock could care less about starlings. Starlings are seed eaters. Most of us have seen thousands of them eating when farmers are seeding in the spring.
They should make them come and pick up the dead birds. Morons.
Today it's birds. Tomorrow it's us.
There. That should keep the ambulance chasers busy.
English starlings are a real problem where we live.
Hey, Feds.........can you do something about the grackles, too, please? K, thnx.
I wish my Dad was alive to read this story. He really hated starlings.
Can anyone explain why 10-12 yr old boys don’t still get B-B guns for their birthday?
In Texas, starlings, grackles, crows and ravens have been considered “pests”, no harm, no foul on getting rid of them if they “...are depredating, have depredated or are ABOUT to depredate”. Grackles really create health hazzards around eateries when they decide to invade the surrounding trees. However, vultures are protected (!).
And NO, it’s NOT “loss” of habitat pressure causing them to gather in certain areas, that’s what they do, even in small towns surrounded by rural farm/ranch land where there’s plenty of land in which to disperse.
Starlings are the worst pest I have ever encountered. When they fly and roost on your property they crap on everything. Everything must be covered, anything under a carport is fair game to them.
They roost in the trees, on the tools, on the lumber racks, under the shade and the ground is covered in poop.
I was using my table saw one day and left it uncovered that night. The next day it took several hours of washing to clean the crap off of it, and the barbaque, and the work table, and the floor, the shelvs for tools.
The response to starlings is to KILL THEM ALL! Any method, any means.
Take ‘em out; they are cavity dwellers. They take nesting places from American Kestrels, as an example.
Take all of them out by any means available.
Starlings are a real nuisance. My dad and I used to pop them with the 22 out of a big locust trees near the house. We’d compete all year. After you get them cleared out, the desirable birds move in. After a while, they’re back again, so you end up culling them in cycles.