Atwater Minnesota - cruelty to chickens - someone needs to change this.

[smudge]

Couldn't figure out best section, please move or delete if properly addressed elsewhere.

Apparently the news of the police beating a chicken to death with a shovel to the point of decapitating it has gone viral.

Long story short, keeping chickens is against the code, the family was given a warning, there are efforts to change the local code. Chicken was on the loose and the police couldn't catch it, so used a shovel. No indication that this was a violent hen. But the thing is, why not use animal control, or just remove the chicken?

It should be considered animal cruelty to dispatch an animal this way!

 

[Y N dottes]

heres an article on the subject

http://www.twincities.com/localnews...-chief-decapitates-boys-pet-chicken-complaint

 

[chickenladymn]

I live in Atwater Minnesota and had to remove my chickens.

 

[Blooie]

I've never understood why, when someone says someone should do something, they always mean someone ELSE should do something.

 

[Stumpy]

That was so unnecessary! I wonder how he would feel if someone killed his child's puppy with a shovel. So much for due process, warrant, etc.

 

[chickenladymn]

I'm not understanding what the last post was about. We have asked the city to change the ordinance to allow our chickens in town. We were unaware of the ordinance in place when we bought our chickens from a girl in 4h that was at the atwater festival days 2 years ago. We have never had a complaint or problem with our chickens.

 

[smudge]

Not sure if this is in response to my initial post or Blooie's.

I'm not understanding what the last post was about. We have asked the city to change the ordinance to allow our chickens in town. We were unaware of the ordinance in place when we bought our chickens from a girl in 4h that was at the atwater festival days 2 years ago. We have never had a complaint or problem with our chickens.

The problem, as I see it is twofold.

1) Getting rid of the current anti-poultry ordinance - which you and others in your community are trying to address. (Not sure where they got the idea that chickens = rats.) Others in this forum have experience with this.

2) Getting that police chief Bergen psychiatric help, at the very least. I can't see killing an animal because it's on the loose out of its run unless it is a clear and present danger to others - as in attacking people or rabid. He states that he would have used a gun, save for the children in the neighborhood playing - who in their right mind would even consider using a gun for a hen running away from them? He likens how he dispatched the hen to how he would take care of a rodent. Would he have bludgeoned to death the white rabbit that got loose in my neighborhood?! Beating to death a domesticated animal that is not a clear and present harm is BARBARIC. If he had caught it and processed it for meat, I would have labelled him insensitive but pragmatic. What Bergen did is not just insensitive but illogical and *unreasonable*. He should not be in law enforcement.

 

[chickenladymn]

To blooies

 

[chickenladymn]

We will be attending the city council meeting tomorrow. I'm hoping the city will voter in favor of chickens. What is ironic is Trevor rewrote the ordinance for the council meeting. We have been interviewed by the local news station and newspapers. I hope this brings awareness to the issue. But all we would like is for our hens to come home.

 

[Blooie]

I've never understood why, when someone says someone should do something, they always mean someone ELSE should do something.

This was a comment regarding the title of the thread.....and very poorly tongue in cheek, I must confess, and I apologize for it! We can ALL let the town of Atwater know that we don't approve of their "animal control" methods - in fact I have, even though I live in Wyoming. We might not be able to change the ordinances regarding keeping chickens because we don't live (and therefore don't vote) in Atwater, but that kind of unnecessary action should be protested by any animal lover - anywhere - who becomes aware of it. The authorities there need to know that no matter where we live, we are appalled by the way they handled this situation. I am a somebody who did something, even if it does no good.