Thursday, February 04, 2010

Good rule of thumb: Don't do anything stupid* around me.

*Especially when you are in a work truck, making it extremely easy for me to tell on you. Because I WILL.


Hello everyone! I'm back, and with a story to share.
I saw a flock of ring-billed gulls in the Kmart parking lot, so I thought I would grab some lunch and go over and sit with the gulls while I ate.
While I was sharing my french fries with the flock, two different people came by and dumped huge amounts of bread and whatnot for the gulls. (Now I know why they congregate there) This was done in a furtive fashion, as if they didn't want anyone to know that they were doing it.

One of the gulls caught my eye as being different than the others. One foot dangled uselessly from his leg.
broken foot

The general floppiness and the color of it told me that this was probably a dead foot and this poor dude wouldn't make it. I actually, briefly wondered if I could catch him and take him to a rehabber.


foot close up

I came to my senses. This was a flighted bird, and I had no net.



This particular bird made me laugh out loud.
parking lot camo gull
He was ruling the parking lot with his head-throwing and bullying. I was enjoying all of the vocalizations...the typical 'gull' cries, weird gruff moaning, some very eerie chuckling...And check the camo...gulls are well suited for parking lots, at least in their first few years, aren't they?

I set the camera to "Video" to capture all the cool sounds.
(Some people hate gulls....like I hate house sparrows. To each his own. Personally, I love gulls)


As the camera ran, a truck came barreling into the shot, scattering the gulls. I followed with my eyes instead of the camera...a township truck had intentionally tried to hit the flock of gulls.
I just sat there with my mouth hanging open.
I snapped out of it and used my binoculars to read the number on the truck and to get a physical description of the driver (he had parked and gone into Kmart).
So here I was, with not only his truck number and what he looked like, I HAD VIDEO EVIDENCE of what he did.
Hmmm...what's a girl to do?
I emailed his boss at the township headquarters.
It felt good. Oh yes it did.

Look for yourself:


But let's take the birds out of the equation. He is still driving diagonally across an active parking lot at about 40 mph.
I am awaiting a response. And I will be certain to share that response with you.

12 comments:

KGMom said...

Never was the expression "you go, girl" more apt.
You go, girl.
Hope said employee gets at least a reprimand.

Susan Ellis said...

Hmmm..2 years ago one of my summer parks attendants (student) was reported to me because a woman at the park/beach had pointed out a wounded gull to him. And he subsequently promised that the injured gull would be taken to an animal shelter. What he actually did though, was bag the bird, and proceed to bash it against a dumpster until dead-unaware that she was watching, horrified...or that his boss (that would be me) was an avid birder! So come the termination interview, I asked him to explain what had been going through his mind...and he replied, "it was just a dumb shit hawk! what's the problem?" The problem, I responded is that did he know the kind of "dumb shit hawk it was?"..a Laughing Gull, Ring billed, Bonaparte's, Herring? maye a really rare Ross's? What if it had been an extremely rare Ivory?...well he just stared at me as if I had wings on my head...and when he smirked I told him his services were no longer required. Felt really good!

John B. said...

If that gull is an adult, chances are that it can survive on one leg. But I guess that depends on when it got the injury.

Good for you for reporting the gull harassment.

Dave Dorsey said...

You ROCK!

Lynne at Hasty Brook said...

Proud of you Susan!

Dan Huber said...

great to hear. hope he gets full fine. bad enough some jerk wants to kill a bird but he could have killed a kid/person going that fast

Chris Petrak said...

Good for you! Hope it does some good, but they probably think the gulls are a nuisance. They do a lot to clean up our mess, and sometimes people deliberately aid them. Anyway, I'm with you - love watching them even if they are common & noisy.

Mary said...

You, me, and parking lots. What a team. Kicking Ass!

dguzman said...

Kick ass, Susan! I love gulls too, especially that one wearing the herringbone suit!

Dawn Fine said...

Glad u got that on tape! glad to see u are back too!

Jbecca6 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
mon@rch said...

I would have reported the guy also! BRAVO job Susan!