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Natalie Perea of the Gilcrease Bird Sanctuary steps inside the cage where about 95 pigeons, captured from city rooftops, await deportation to California. Photo by Christine H. Wetzel. Bill Gilcrease, whose Gilcrease Bird Sanctuary serves as a way-station for captured pigeons, holds an Emu. Photo by Christine H. Wetzel.

Thursday, November 23, 2000
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Pigeons Preserved

Activists cry foul; city opts for avian shuttle

That bird on your holiday table may be grounded, but the pigeons soiling City Hall are still flying high. Relatively, at least.

Five months after the Las Vegas City Council approved a $56,000 pigeon abatement program -- which included a plan to trap and kill some of the birds soiling city facilities -- the pesky creatures have been spared.

The Gilcrease Bird Sanctuary northwest of Las Vegas has taken in about 95 birds since city officials were pressured into granting the pigeons a stay of execution. The sanctuary plans to send the birds to California, where they'll be raised by hobbyists.

That the city's captured pigeons have found a home -- albeit in a cage, not a rooftop -- is testament to the influence of animal rights activists and to the willingness of a longtime local landowner to protect even the unsightliest of God's creatures.

"We'll accommodate as many as we possibly have room for," said Natalie Perea, a California native who helps run the sanctuary. "We're here to help out as much as we can. We're a nonprofit, but Vons (supermarkets) helps us out with bread and stuff, and that kind of cuts down on our expenses."

The birds began arriving this month after a lengthy stalemate within City Hall over how to get the pigeons out of sight without ruffling the feathers of their defenders. The original plan called for wringing the necks of the pigeons, freezing their carcasses, stuffing them in plastic bags, and, ultimately, feeding them to birds of prey.

Newspaper articles about that plan generated more than 200 e-mails to City Hall last summer and prompted mayoral aide Bill Cassidy to ask for an end to the killing. A sharply worded missive from the Humane Society of the United States arrived July 24, demanding a halt to the pigeoncide:

"We respectfully request that you immediately stop the trap and kill program and have the entire issue re-evaluated and addressed from a more comprehensive and inclusive planning perspective," the letter read.

Word of the impending slaughter reached activists in California and Colorado, who called Perea to ask whether the Gilcrease sanctuary could help. Although the sanctuary is home to dozens of bird species -- from peacocks and parrots to ducks and chickens -- it had no captive gray pigeons. Being an equal-opportunity bird preserve, Gilcrease agreed to help. Perea called the city and a plan was hatched.

"Based on what we've done to turkeys, we're really going to try to treat the pigeons better," said Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman, relieved to have the pigeon dilemma behind him. Added Cassidy: "Please don't be foul about this."

Robert Turner, a former state wildlife biologist contracted by the city to trap the birds, calls it a "win-win for everybody."

"The birds go to the sanctuary, then they take them to California, where they have people who raise pigeons."

The stalemate at City Hall put him months behind schedule -- and cost him money -- but he's catching up quickly. On city-owned rooftops, he has baited traps where the pigeons can enter, but can't leave. Later they're picked up and taken to the sanctuary, where they join their pigeon brethren in a 10-foot by 15-foot cage, waiting for the ride to California.

Should the birds escape, Turner said, the city's pigeon problem could quickly multiply. Their homing instincts would lead them back to City Hall, where they would not likely fall for the same bait-and-trap trick a second time.

"Then you're sitting there saying we got a pigeon problem," he said.

Turner doubts the birds will find their way back from California, especially because they're likely to be kept in cages.

In the meantime, it will be hard for the birds to beat their new lifestyle at the Gilcrease sanctuary. Started a quarter-century ago by Bill Gilcrease, now 81, the sanctuary is a haven for all manner of birds and other animals. Wide cages line a maze of corridors and house pheasants and parrots and blue- and green-bellied Budgeriars.

Other cages and pens house pot-bellied pigs, turtles and sheep, while a small pond is filled with ducks and swans -- many of them donated by local golf course operators seeking to rid their manicured grounds of bird poop.

Gilcrease has lived on the property most of his life, starting the sanctuary with two cages and watching it multiply over the years as people brought him injured or unwanted birds.

"I was interested in birds since I was 8 years old," he said Wednesday while tending to a 6-foot Emu. It started as a private project, but opened to the public a few years later as more birds arrived.

And yes, even turkeys are offered a safe haven at Gilcrease. But that didn't stop Perea from organizing a traditional Thanksgiving meal. As a reporter arrived Wednesday, she had just returned from the supermarket. She was buying a frozen turkey.