FEATHERING THE TRIGGER

In a misguided effort to ostensibly "sanitize the environment," 171 Canada geese were rounded up and exterminated June 25 in the Fairfield Harbour vicinity, a private New Bern, N.C. community. The U.S. Department of Agriculture sanctioned the slaughter, issuing a permit allowing a maximum of 175 geese to be gassed.

Although residents complained about the geese, which would have soon migrated up north anyway, this blog firmly believes that killing the creatures is an inhumane and shortsighted solution to a "problem" consisting of tenants unwilling to live peacefully alongside the animals whose habitats were established in the Fairfield Harbour site hundreds if not thousands of years ago. Canada geese are clean, harmless and regal, and they mate for life, which is more than can be said for most Americans---and this blog would venture---most residents of Fairfield Harbour. There is a species clash, yes, but the authorities have faulted--and exterminated-- the wrong species.