People are apparently cowering in their homes in a small village in England.  The cause of their fear?  A terrorist pheasant.  No, I am not making this up.  Perhaps we shouldn’t be closing Guantanamo Bay?

The vicious bird has launched several unprovoked attacks on villagers in recent weeks. Men, women, children, prams, bikes, dogs and cars are said to have have fallen foul of the bird in Newsham, near Richmond, North Yorkshire. There are tales of the plucky cock lying in wait for children to get off the school bus, before chasing them screaming to the village green.

In response to the repeated pheasant attacks Gordon Brown, desperate to do anything to improve his poll numbers, stated:

We shall defend our island from the pheasant, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight the pheasant on the beaches, we shall fight the pheasant on the landing grounds, we shall fight the pheasant in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight the pheasant in the hills; we shall never surrender to the pheasant*

Hopefully, the campaign against the pheasant will end soon enough and everything can return to normal.

*There is no evidence whatsoever that Gordon Brown said any such thing.

Written by Corey
Corey is a New Yorker who lived most of his life in upstate New York but has lived in Queens since 2008. He's only been birding since 2005 but has garnered a respectable life list by birding whenever he wasn't working as a union representative or spending time with his family. He lives in Forest Hills with Daisy and Desmond Shearwater. His bird photographs have appeared on the Today Show, in Birding, Living Bird Magazine, Bird Watcher's Digest, and many other fine publications. He is also the author of the American Birding Association Field Guide to the Birds of New York.