Shortly before the Pennsylvania House of Representatives was scheduled to vote on an amendment last December that would ban pigeon shoots, the Pennsylvania Flyers Association sent out a bulletin it marked as "urgent."
"We must act now to preserve our sport," the Flyers screeched. In a separate letter, the Flyers told its members they "should be very proud that your association has been able to keep the sport alive in PA [sic] for the last 27 years." For added support, the notice referred to an NRA release, which called pigeon shooting a "Pennsylvania Sporting Tradition."
Shooting live pigeons in a confined area isn't a sport. Most hunters, as well as the Pennsylvania Game Commission, say that pigeon shoots aren't "fair chase hunting." The International Olympic Committee banned pigeon shoots after the 1900 Olympics because of its cruelty to animals, and continues to refuse to classify it as a "sport." At that Olympics, the only time someone could earn a medal for cruelty, 300 birds were killed.
While 11,000 athletes from 205 countries continue to excel at the Olympics in London, 75 pretend hunters and faux sportsmen are at the Wing Pointe club near Hamburg, Pa., this weekend where they are shooting more than 10 times the number of pigeons killed at the 1900 Olympics.
Scared and undernourished, the birds are placed into small traps and then released 30 yards in front of people with shotguns. Most birds are hit as they are launched. Even standing only feet from their kill, the shooters aren't as good as they think they are. About 70 percent of all birds are wounded, according to Heidi Prescott, senior vice-president of the Humane Society of the United States.
If the birds are wounded on the killing fields, trapper boys and girls, most in their early teens, some of them younger, grab the birds, wring their necks, snip their heads off with shears, stomp on their bodies, or throw them live into barrels to suffocate. At Wing Pointe, birds are just thrown into a heap, with wounded birds left to die from suffocation. There is no food or commercial value of a pigeon killed at one of the shoots.
The lure of pigeon shoots in addition to what the participants must think is a wanton sense of fulfillment is gambling, illegal under Pennsylvania law but not enforced by the Pennsylvania State Police. At Wing Pointe, each shooter pays a $290 entry fee. According to the rules, each shooter "must play $200.00 anywhere." Pigeon shooters and the public can gamble more than that, with the club taking a percentage of the "official" bets. A high stakes, invitation-only poker game adds to the opportunity to lose more than a month's house mortgage.
Wing Pointe earns even more from its pro shop and from shooters and their guests who stay at its luxury suites it claims is "the perfect retreat after you have spent the day enjoying our Sports Shooting playground."
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