MP Terry Lister: Feral Chickens Bill Failed To Fly
Speaking about the Bill passed on Friday, Independent MP Terry Lister said rather than just allow annual licences to shoot feral chickens, he would have liked to see amendments that would have made trapping of feral chickens legal, and also suggested a bounty for captured chickens.
“Additionally, there should be a plan to increase the number of people shooting these chickens,” said Mr Lister. “Presently there are five shooters. There are a healthy number of Police officers and Regiment soldiers who would be more than capable of shooting these chickens.”
Most Bermudians are all too aware of the feral chicken problem, and last year Government estimated that there were over 30,000 chickens roaming the island, and said the numbers continue to climb.
Government has undertaken a chicken culling programme, and the map below, provided by the Department of Conservation Serices earlier this year, shows the feral chickens culls as of January 2013.
Mr Lister said, “Last Friday the Members of the House of Parliament passed a Firearms Amendment Bill. The Bill had been tabled two weeks ago but despite this I believe many Members thought the Bill was dealing with the handling of Firearms in relation to “pests” rather than what the Bill actually was doing.
“The Bill allowed the Commissioner of Police to issue annual licences to shoot pests/ feral chickens instead of the current licencing programme whereby these licences can only be issued for 60 days.
“Clearly, this change makes sense as today feral chickens are a daily challenge for us and thus having to apply for up to six licences each year makes no sense.
“However, I was taken aback to realize that the sole purpose of this Bill was only to make this licencing change. Feral chickens are a serious problem for Bermuda. The Minister of the Environment informed the House that the estimated number of feral chickens is between 20,000 and 30,000.
“This is a huge number for an island with a resident population of around 65,000 people. And the chickens are thought to be throughout the island. Only few neighbourhoods are spared the presence of these chickens.
“The chickens are a nuisance to our farming community as it is not unknown for these chickens to descend upon a field of crops and to ravish the field. The loss can be complete and total.
“The farmers cannot get insurance for crop loss due to feral chickens. Today we need all the vegetable and other produce that we can grow. We cannot afford to have produce loss in this way.
“I would have been most happy if the Minister responsible for the Environment had brought amendments that would have made trapping of feral chickens legal. As well as shooting these animals with air guns, there is no reason why Government can’t encourage people to build traps to capture the chickens.
“To encourage people to get involved government should have a bounty for captured chickens and have the bounty offer well known in the island.
“Additionally, there should be a plan to increase the number of people shooting these chickens. Presently there are five shooters. There are a healthy number of Police officers and Regiment soldiers who would be more than capable of shooting these chickens.
Mr Lister said he would have been happier if the Minister told the House that he would be: 1] encouraging an increase in the number of licenced shooters, 2] licencing the trapping of chickens, and 3] enriching the current bounty program to have more people get involved.
“I am encouraging the Minister to come back to the House as soon as possible with a solid plan to address this serious problem. We cannot afford to lose more crops to this large number of feral chickens,” concluded Mr Lister.
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- Possible Feral Chicken Market Not Cost Effective | Bernews.com | December 6, 2013
anyone for KFC ???
So are we going to spend millions culling chickens to save ourselves thousands in lost vegetables?
Agreed. Feral chickens are a prerequisite step on our path to third world-ness
I personally thing this is a huge mistake killing these chickens.
The way the economy is going this might be our only source of food in a few years. The more the merrier…..
How about we invest in a machine that we can throw feral chickens in one end, and have a 3-piece fried chicken meal come out on the other side? Mmmm now that’s finger lickin’ boom
lool…wat u think kfc does?!
That’s a great idea! Somebody should get on that…but what about the biscuits and fries, I assume they’d be included with the meal? You’d have to put flour, potatoes, etc. in there, too…but then you’d have yourself a nice tasty meal in no time, LOL…
Use the regiment? Conscript me to shoot chickens? At least that’s more than I currently do up there…
hahahaha live targets eh?
A good shot from one of their guns & the chicken would not only be dead, it would be blown apart.
From a .22 cal? Small game is what it’s perfect for.
5.56 actually lol…so ya feathers flyin
There is such a machine, its on Queen Street and is currently being renovated
Eat them it beats 10 percent wednesdays
Since they will be wasted , could they be used to feed farmed fish (snappers love chicken) which addresses the main problem with farmed fish , it takes about 2 lbs of say , anchovies , to produce 1 lb of fish ? These pests could become a benefit , help ocean conservation and create jobs , as long as they aren’t wiped out they could qualify as a free renewable resource.
I just want some eggs.
ME TOO!
Bernews, surely you mean ‘Failed To Fry.’
I am tired of my family being woken at 3:45am EVERY DAY by the pesky roasters that are roasting in the trees near my house. They have a very accurate alarm system which is driving us bananas. I have built a very stonge sling shot the kind we made when we were kids and slowly but surely its getting quite.
Yum, yum. Chickens that you can get off the trees already cooked.
Roasters? I think you mean roosters LOL…although I’m sure you would love to roast them!!!
I think that’s what you call a Freudian slip…
Come Ord Road, we got enough there to open up our own Mr. Chicken.
Well brah get out there and start it up before i come out there and catch them and open up a C.F.C,Country Fried Chicken, or an O.R.C. Ord Road Chicken. W0W at least there would be 20 new job openings created…
50 cents for every dead chicken. $1.00 for every lion fish. Problem solved.
With that method you would have to kill 40 chickens an hour to make a $20 per hour wage. Impossible. As for the lion fish you need to pay for scuba gear, gas, a boat, etc. Simply wouldn’t work out.
Fishermen sell lionfish, cleaned and de-spined, for $10 a pound.
those so called “feral” chickens which are really just free range birds are more than likely healthier for you than your favourite “Perdue” chicken parts caged inhumanely and given every synthetic pharmaceutical they can think of.
Most of the chickens i see are of the Bantam species which produce a smaller egg…but if we had white leghorns or red or black sexlinks running around would we still want to cull or capitalize..? they need to be trapped, sort the cocks from the hens, and then YOU do the math from there.
Whether you like it or not Bermuda is still on a downward spiral and has not struck rock bottom yet. Survival is the EndGame.
There are foreigners here who catch and eat them all the time. They think Bermudians are crazy for wanting to cull and then dispose of them, and then go to the supermarket to buy chicken. There’s nothing wrong with these chickens-you’re right, they’re free range. They would be free of hormones, antibiotics and all that other crap that gets injected into the chicken you buy at the supermarket, crap that ends up in us.
Those ‘feral’ chickens are healthy to eat, I’m sure. Bermudians can’t be that hungry if we’re willing to totally ignore a good source of food.
You said ‘cocks’ (hee, hee-giggle, giggle).
WOULDN’T IT MAKE SENSE TO CAPTURE THESE ANIMALS AND CONTAIN THEM INSTEAD OF HAVING MORE PEOPLE WITH GUNS? OR SHOOTING? EVENTUALLY ALL THOSE CHICKENS COULD BE USED FOR EGGS AND FOOD. I DON’T SEE WHY THEY CAN’T DEEM A SMALL ISLAND FIT FOR THEM AND KEEP THEM THERE. IF PEOPLE STARTED CAPTURING THEM AND BRINGING THEM IN THEY COULD GET A RECEIPT FOR TURNING IN A CHICKEN. ONCE THE CHICKEN HAD RECEIVED ALL SHOTS AND WAS ONCE AGAIN HEALTHY THEY COULD COME BACK IN A YEAR OR SO AND PICK UP DINNER. ALSO PEOPLE WHO TURNED IN CHICKENS COULD GET DISCOUNTED EGGS. SEEMS LIKE THERE COULD BE A MORE POSITIVE WAY IN DEALING WITH THE “PESTS” THAT PEOPLE LOVE TO EAT SO MUCH!!!
EVERYBODY LOOK AT ME WHAT I HAVE TO SAY IS SO IMPORTANT
WHY ARE YOU SCREAMING
Let the chickens live!!!!
Really slow news day. Really slow. Me thinks Lister is trying hard not to vanish into political oblivion. Chickens??
lister is a joke, and needs to go. Bitter and sneaky. But at least he is presenting a
Ideas to a problem. I actually agree with others who think we can turn these chickens into assets instead of liabilities. And I’m not an accountant!
KILL all of them – ASAP
they are a nuisance -
I still wonder how they got in these area’s in the first place.
I used to know this Central American lady who used to feed them behind the Crawl hill Gas Station every morning.
until she was caught by the Gas Station staff and had her stop her foolishness.
l have seen a hell of a lot in the Blue Hole Hill Area.
OK OK OK I GOT THE SOLUTION…..get a camera and get a crew and let them go around Bermuda hunting and capturing feral chickens, call it “THE TRIANGLE CHICKEN BOUNTY HUNTERS” have a fat guy who runs slow,a kind hearten guy who loves animals,a woman with baby daddy issues, and a rouge teenager who is mischievous who has a dog, Have the chickens viewed as trouble makers…WITH PROFILES…example red rooster guilty of running up to cars looking for food during lunch hours……..role footage… action!! …and at the same time promote Bermuda for Tourisim ..problem solved
i would like 2 % royalties
I love it!!!
“Common sense saves dollars”. Why aren’t the feral chickens lured into cages and taken to the Prison Farm where they can be used to supply eggs as well as fresh chicken meat when they are no-longer laying eggs?
Years ago the Prison Farm did house chickens and pigs as well as they did supply the prisons with fresh fish caught daily,(weather permitting) and this was a tremendous saving all around plus gave inmates jobs to occupy their time spent in prison/s.
I do feel sorry for the chickens seeing as they’re such communal creatures. They’re trying to survive just like any other creature. I do understand the fact that they’re a nuisance, though.
Didn’t the Gov’t once say they were going to give them feed that would render them infertile so we don’t end up with any more chicks? Whatever happened to that or did I dream it?
Typed this up earlier but forgot to hit submit, in case anyone is wondering why this comment is just being posted…it was still sitting there when I returned to my computer!
Has anybody researched the impact on the insect population on the island if the (albeit man-made) food chain is altered dramatically in this way. This needs to be explored as a possible consequence to a cull.
Vegetable crop production may not in all actuality be improved. In fact, insect predators may be just as damaging to production resulting in the need to increase chemical pesticides and therefore adding cost to maintain output.
Chickens are quite probably keeping these pest numbers down significantly. I keep 4 chickens for domestic use and know they consume significant quantities of bugs to gather the protein necessary for their egg and feather production.
Surely a more productive idea would be to round them up and farm them for their food producing capabilities. “Harvest” their egg output for added food supply on the island. It seems odd to me that you would remove a food source to protect another food source. Why not farm both?
Some of the chickens, especially the roosters, have some very beautiful feather patterns and colours.
Should be art. Take them to the Bermuda National Gallery for exhibits.
chickens are the foundation of our civilization. we need chickens more than we need a government. govt scared them chickens win the election
Some Bermudians raise chickens to produce fresh eggs for their families.
Is there anything stopping someone stealing their chickens for the ‘cull’? How are we to distinguish between feral and raised/farm chickens?
This is another bad bill to deal with an environmental issue. Earlier we culled cats to then have the rat and chicken population increase. My cat (which is chipped0 was even caught and then we had to pay to get it back. What is next?