Audubon says never more to poisonings

By Greg Brown, Great Bend Tribune Staff Writer
Great Bend Tribune - March 28, 2001

Even though the actual controlling of blackbirds had ceases for the time being in the Great Bend area, a battle may be brewing in Washington, D.C. "We are finished baiting for this season," said Tom Halstead, United States Department of Agriculture district supervisor of wildlife services.

"The birds are starting to migrate out of the area. It is hard to tell how successful the program was when you start at the end of the season. The real test will come when we start the program at the beginning of a season."

If the Audubon Society in Washington has anything to say about it, that test will never happen. The group has already stopped a similar poisoning program in South Dakota.

"The USDA wanted to kill 2 million birds per year for three years to protect their sunflower fields," said Perry Plumart, Director of Government Relations for the Audubon Society.

"Ironically, a large portion of the crop they were protecting was being grown for bird seed so it was natural for the birds to be attracted to it. We were very concerned that they were poisoning the birds. They had no idea which birds would be eating the poisoned rice. We identified 69 species of birds near the poisoned rice and some of those were on the Audubon watch list and state threatened species lists."

The Audubon Society was successful in preventing that USDA program by convincing the United State Fish and Wildlife Service to hold the permit. Anytime a migratory species is affected it requires both state and federal permits, Plumart explained.

"We believe that large-scale poisonings are not really a solution to the problem," Plumart said. "The only way poisoning would solve the problem is if they killed all of the blackbirds. If they don’t kill them all, then the birds will just keep coming back. It outrages people to know that our government is using our taxpayer dollars to poison these birds that are literally dying in their backyards."

The Audubon Society learned of the poisonings in the Great Bend area after the latest media exposure and now plans to do something about any future programs. "We just realized that they were poisoning blackbirds around Great Bend," Plumart said. " We didn’t know about it in time to do anything this spring, but we will try to stop any future poisonings."

The poisoning program did not cause a great deal of concern for Great Bend resident, however. "We had a few calls," Halstead said. "I think people were mainly worried about what to do with the birds and what kind or dangers were involved with the toxicant."

If a similar program is permitted in the future, Halstead plans to distribute additional information on the toxicant to ease the fears of area residents. The compound, DRC-1339, that was used in the area is species specific to blackbirds, cowbirds, grackles and starlings.

"It is a good possibility that we will be back next year," Halstead said. "It will depend on whether or not the feed lots get the necessary permits."