I'm totally not sympathetic to wildlife smugglers, but one has to cringe when noting the placement of the contraband and all those pointy little beaks...
Addendum of apparently related info from finchwench:
In 2010, French customs officers at the Rochambeau airport in Cayenne, French Guiana after noticing some suspicious bulges, conducted an intimate pat-down of a Dutch tourist and found some tiny parcels in some very personal space.She reports that "the story precipitated from a private e-mail, sent by a customs officer, that was forwarded to some online orchid forum and a Yahoo! group (both in French language), and that was a year ago. Now, there are various "news" reports about this, not only in English, in which details of the story are misreported (e.g. The Daily Mail, AOL)."
The guy with his shorts full of hummingbirds was reported to be a repeat offender; he was allegedly intercepted at the same airport with an accomplice and a cargo of 53 hummingbirds two years prior to this photographed encounter. I was unable to find record of the convict’s previous offence, but in the 2010 incident, he was fined €6000. The value of his catch was estimated to be between €10,400 and €13,200...
It seems to be officers of the French Customs in the last picture
ReplyDeleteAs a lifelong birder whose yard is filled with many dozens of tiny hummingbirds racing about the feeders all day long, this makes me sad.
ReplyDeleteWhat was to be the fate of those wee birds?
oh my god it's so funny and so sad at the same time!! What are they doing with these birds??
ReplyDeleteadditional info:
ReplyDeleteIn 2010, French customs officers at the Rochambeau airport in Cayenne, French Guiana after noticing some suspicious bulges, conducted an intimate pat-down of a Dutch tourist and found some tiny parcels in some very personal space.
The guy with his shorts full of hummingbirds was reported to be a repeat offender; he was allegedly intercepted at the same airport with an accomplice and a cargo of 53 hummingbirds two years prior to this photographed encounter. I was unable to find record of the convict’s previous offence, but in the 2010 incident, he was fined €6000. The value of his catch was estimated to be between €10,400 and €13,200...
found at the finchwench:
http://finchwench.wordpress.com/2011/09/19/hummerbummer/
A bird in hand is worth 53 in your bush.
ReplyDeletehaving birds in your pants must tickle you to death !
ReplyDeleteThis is absolutely ludicrous !
My heart sank when I saw this. So many beautiful and endangered creatures die while being smuggled. These tiny birds have enormous energy needs and are terribly fragile. I couldn't care less about the smuggler's junk. He deserves nothing but contempt (and possibly some jail time) for his actions. He certainly shouldn't get a moment's concern for any damage or discomfort he probably didn't experience.
ReplyDeleteAmen, Anonymous poster. Amen.
ReplyDeleteI hope all the people feeling sorry for the birds here are vegans. Farm animals go through far worse than these birds do every day, and there are millions of them. If you feel bad for these birds, take a serious look at your diet, or else stop complaining please.
ReplyDeleteI didn't even know that you could keep Hummingbirds in captivity.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.waynesthisandthat.com/hummercare.htmCare of Hummingbirds
From the look of the pictures it looks like the smuggler had those hummingbirds in his shorts and NOT much else, if you know what I mean. Nudge,nudge,wink,wink.
ReplyDeleteLook at the little peckers.
ReplyDeleteAll I can think to say is..... what a dick.
ReplyDeleteWhy is the officer on the left smiling???
ReplyDeleteThe Sean Connery eyebrow look is so much more appropriate in a situation like this.
ReplyDeleteMaybe got a buzz out of it.
ReplyDeleteI try not to be so conservative, but people like this should be killed...
ReplyDeleteINTRODUCING NON-INDIGENOUS SPECIES TO AN ECOSYSTEM CAN KILL OUT THE INDIGENOUS SPECIES...CASE AND POINT: CUT THROAT TROUT AND THE ARCTIC GRAYLING ARE BEING FORCED OUT OF EXISTENCE BY STUPID BROWN TROUT BROUGHT FROM GERMANY TO ENHANCE FISHING IN NORTH AMERICAN STREAMS...ANOTHER, THE STARLING...IT IS FORCING OUR CHICKADEES, FINCHES AND OTHERS OUT BECAUSE THEY CAN'T COMPETE FOR FOOD...THERE ARE MORE: lAMPREY EEL, IGUANAS, JAVALINAS, AFRICAN BROWN RATS, KUDZU...THIS IS DETRIMENTAL TO OUR ENVIRONMENT.
ReplyDeleteApparently the same man had got through with some penguins the week before!!
ReplyDeleteLorax, your "caps lock" key is stuck. It makes your message look like you're shouting, which is impolite.
ReplyDeletehave you heard.... BIRD BIRD BIRD BIRD BIRD BIRD ... BIRD IS THE WORD.
ReplyDeleteThe bird in the center of the top row appears to be dead. The smuggler should be charged with cruelty on top of all other appropriate crimes.
ReplyDelete@Above Anonymous: I noticed that, too. In each picture, its head it completely down unlike the others. Either died from the heat or maybe a broken neck. :-(
ReplyDeleteSo now we know why the caged bird sings... it knows that if it does not, someone might shove it in their pants and fly halfway around the world with it.
ReplyDeletePoor wee burdies.
re: Da Scritch said...
ReplyDeleteIt seems to be officers of the French Customs in the last picture
Perhaps that is because French Guiana is part of (wait for it) France.
neeners, in fairness to Da Scritch, the info from the addendum wasn't there when he wrote his comment.
ReplyDeleteIn terms of what happened to them... if the customs officers were french, they probably ate them ;)
ReplyDeletethese birds must be scarred for life!
ReplyDelete@Minnesotastan, thanks for referencing my post. As far as I can tell, the story precipitated from a private e-mail, sent by a customs officer, that was forwarded to some online orchid forum and a Yahoo! group (both in French language), and that was a year ago. Now, there are various "news" reports about this, not only in English, in which details of the story are misreported (e.g. The Daily Mail, AOL).
ReplyDeleteThanks, finchwench, for clearing that up. Since this story has gotten a lot of publicity as a result of the Boing Boing post, I've added your info to my report.
ReplyDeleteYou have a very interesting blog, btw...
Anyone who keeps any bird for a pet is pretty much and a-hole. They're meant to fly. I'm not a PETA douche by any stretch, but captive birds have always bothered me. It just seems beyond selfish to cage something that should be free, just so you can ignore it while it chirps in the corner of your room.
ReplyDelete@ritualdevice: Noble sentiment, but you don't know the first thing about avian psychology, hand-rearing, and imprinting, and it shows. Although I firmly believe birds should be adopted from the available pool and not pulled out of the wild--and the subject of this post is only one of many reasons why--I am not so naive as to believe birds will never be desired as pets. Therefore, as long as that desire exists, it is better that they are hand-raised and imprint on humans. Those currently kept as pets cannot survive in the wild. I currently have one bird that has some special needs, I gave a good life to another that was rescued from a bad situation, and when the time is right, I will adopt another rescue. So sorry, I am not an "a-hole." That term is reserved for people who spout about things they know nothing about.
ReplyDeleteLooks like there is a tongue on his underwear in one of the shots......maybe the barbs on the tongue of the dead one got stuck in the fabric and ripped out the tongue when his pants came down.
ReplyDeleteI would say unbelievable, except for the photos, along with the research I did in the last year for my newest Birder Murder mystery, which delves a bit into illegal bird smuggling (though I never found anything as remotely funny as this). You can't help but wonder what kind of idiots these people are, but I guess some folks really will do anything for a price.
ReplyDeleteIt would be fitting if the dude was Rochambeaued until he fell over......
ReplyDeleteI am feeling so hopeless after seeing these pictures... People might not have hearts....!
ReplyDeleteI hope he gets over this. Maybe someone could give him a Gerbal
ReplyDelete