Early in the evening on December 29, several residents of the Greens apartment complex in Doral came upon what appeared to be a Muscovy duck massacre on the banks of the property's manmade lake. There they found five of the waterfowl in the throes of agonizing deaths. "There was another corpse rotting in the water," recalls a horrified Viviane Farina, a Greens resident for the past three years. "Its flesh was half-eaten from the fish and turtles in the lake. The next morning we found two more bodies. I believe they were poisoned.
Jonathan Postal
Some residents of a Doral apartment complex say Muscovy ducks suffered agonizing deaths after being poisoned
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"Whoever did this is going to pay," Farina says, adding that she has a suspect in mind. On December 27 and 29, Farina and other residents observed workers from Critter Control of Miami feed bread to and then trap 22 of the ducks. She claims the workers said Critter Control had been hired by Shoma Homes, one of Miami-Dade County's largest residential developers, to remove the ducks. Shoma owns the apartment complex. "They also told us they were relocating the birds to a farm in Homestead, which was not true," Farina says. "Now they want to tell me it was coincidental that we found these dead ducks on the same day they were feeding them."
Critter Control of Miami franchise owner Charles Thomas vehemently denies that his company poisoned the birds. "They found the ill ducks long after we were gone," Thomas counters. He admits using bread to lure the birds and says the captured animals were taken to Homestead and asphyxiated with gas.
The Muscovy, native to Central and South America, has flourished in Florida for more than a century, yet the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission has designated the duck a nuisance animal. The ungainly birds -- commonly identified by bright-red crests of lumpy flesh around the eyes and beaks -- breed in large numbers, leave droppings all over the place, and corrupt the gene pool of native species such as mallard and wood ducks, says commission regional spokesman Willie Puz. Critter Control would face criminal charges of animal cruelty if it is determined the company poisoned the ducks.
Nuisance designation aside, the ducks play a vital role in Florida's ecological system, asserts Victor Muvdi, president of the Muscovy Protection Group of Kings Creek, a nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting the ducks from extermination. "They are beneficial to the environment because they eat mosquitoes, as well as black widow and brown spiders and other pests," Mudvi says. "They are beautiful, gregarious creatures." Muvdi is a property owner at the Village of King's Creek Condominium in Kendall, where three years ago Critter Control was hired by the condo association to remove more than 100 Muscovys. "They gassed them," Muvdi reports. "Critter Control doesn't care about these gentle birds."
Kevin Clark, Critter Control's chief executive officer, says the company does use on-site chemicals to immobilize animals the trappers round up, "But that does not mean chemicals were used on this particular job site. These people are making reckless allegations without any definitive proof."
Farina may soon know exactly what killed the ducks. She sent a duck carcass, as well as two dead turtles she believes ate duck flesh, to a veterinarian for an autopsy. Clark says he welcomes the inquiry: "When she sends me the results, tell her to send me an apology too."
