The End of the Pigeon Shoot - Finally?

This morning's Intelligencer Journal editorial, "In Our View," came out and said it - voicing the position held for a very long time by the vast majority of central Pennsylvanians: End Pigeon Shoots.

From the national outcry when the "sport" was demonstrated in the 1900 summer Olympics to recent days when the local Hegins Pigeon Shoot and a similar shoot at the Philadelphia Gun Club have been interrupted by protests and visits by animal cruelty officers, the time has come for legislators to listen to their constituencies, and hopefully, their consciences - and make it illegal to tie a bird down and shoot at it or release birds from cages and fire upon them as they attempt to fly away.

Any live shoot of any trapped or otherwise confined bird is NOT hunting -- and for this reason, hunters have nothing to fear, as all other forms of licensed hunting are exempt from the bills. Here's the first paragraph of the House version:

"(c.1) Use of live animals or fowl for targets at trap shoot or block shoot prohibited.--
(1) A person commits a summary offense if that person willfully organizes, operates or conducts a trap shoot or block shoot in which live animals or fowl are used as targets."

Pretty straightforward. To read the whole bill, click here.

NOW... as for the bills. Callers, get the numbers straight -- when you call your State Senator, say you want him or her to support SB 843, and for the House, it's HB1411. Below are links to use to obtain your state legislators' contact info. And, as we always remind you, please don't email -- please CALL your legislators, as calls are always taken and logged. Emails are ignored, deleted, and those read are not always logged or passed along to the legislator. Calls and faxes make much more of an impact.

Find your PA House Rep: http://www.house.state.pa.us/

Find your PA State Senator: http://www.pasen.gov/

In both web pages, you'll enter your zip code into a box in the upper right corner to find out who represents you. Once the name/s appear, click them to be taken to the legislator/s page/s to obtain contact info.

Please call and let them know you want them to support these bills. Even if you know your legislator is already on board, make the call -- it helps them to know that their current stance is supported by the electorate (you, their voters), and they can then tell their fence-sitting (or wrong-side-entrenched) colleagues, "Hey -- I'm getting so many calls in favor of banning the pigeon shoot. I think it's time we all just put an end to this. Whaddya say?"

When calling, please remind them that you're a voter, and that you'll be remembering who voted to support these bills when you cast your vote in the next election. While we, the animal protection community, have no money for big-time campaign contributions, we can turn an election through voter education -- letting the voters know who we were able to count on to put an end to an atrocity that has been a source of shame for Pennsylvania for far too long.