Interview w/ Gary Menin Sr. of Raptors Are The Solution Massachusetts

We recently spoke with Gary Menin Sr. the head of the Massachusetts chapter of Raptors Are The Solution (R.A.T.S.). Gary discusses his fascination with birds of prey, why they are so vital to our eco-system, and how rodenticides have impacted their populations. Additionally, Gary discusses some key initiatives and how people can get involved! 

AT:
Why don't you start off by telling us a bit about yourself, Raptors Are The Solution and your current role there?

GM:
I'm a retired environmental compliance manager for General Electric, and I also, when I did retire, I taught physics for a couple of years. I've always had an interest in nature, ecology, bird watching, and birds of prey specifically, because I found them so inspiring, you know. They're dramatic, powerful, elegant, they're intense. But it wasn't until recently, when I was over at my daughter's house because I was babysitting my grandchildren, and I found some rat poison in her home at the entryway. And I knew it wasn't good. Didn't like that idea. It was especially kind of problematic for me and for them, because both my daughter and son-in-law are very heavily into organic things. Everything we buy has to be organic. And I said, "This is a dichotomy," my daughter's name is Jennifer, and I said, "You shouldn't be using this." I was first concerned about their dog, and my grandchildren, of course, that they might get into it accidentally.

GM:
And then, I started doing some research. And I came across an article by Ted Williams, who's an environmental writer, not the baseball player, who was writing for National Audubon. And he was writing about an article where he was working with a Dr. Maureen Murray of Tufts Wildlife Clinic in Grafton, Massachusetts. And she was reviewing autopsy photos of raptors that have succumbed to anticoagulant rodenticide poisoning. And it was just a heart-wrenching essay. And it really got me bothered.

GM:
So I started writing editorials, letters to the editor, to local papers, and I was fortunate that these papers saw it worthy enough to print them as full-page editorials. Then I started getting calls from people that knew me, knew how to reach me, and told me that they found the article quite compelling and that they would stop using such poisons immediately. That they were, in fact, using them, they didn't know of this issue, and now that they found out, they wouldn't use them anymore.

GM:
So I felt very satisfied by that, that I was making a difference almost immediately, that if I could get any given residential family that I could get to stop using rat poisons, I felt that somewhere, someplace here in New England, a raptor family would be saved. As a result of, again, continuing with these editorials, I got an email from the Raptors Are The Solution people in California, and directed to their founder, Lisa Owens Viani, who has been working on this problem for about the last eight years. Asked if I would be a volunteer for Massachusetts, to form a Massachusetts chapter, if you will. So I'm right now, kind of an army of one, if you will, being that chapter representative. And that's how I got involved with it.

AT:
Well, it's certainly a powerful army, Gary. We're happy to hear your message. I was wondering if you could explain to me some of the imperative roles that birds of prey play in our ecosystem, that maybe some people aren't really aware of?

GM:
Of course. First of all, these birds of prey are apex predators. They're at the top of the food chain. Other than maybe other predators, other birds of prey and human beings, they basically have no other predators. They have a lot of life risks, of course. Any given Great Horned Owl that has two owlets in the spring or late winter, they have a 50% chance of surviving for a year. So they've got a lot of stresses on them, notwithstanding the stresses of rat poison.

GM:
But the thing that people aren't aware of, is that if you remove these apex predators, and particularly here in Massachusetts and throughout New England area and the Northeast, you may be aware that we have a serious, rampant problem with Lyme Disease. And the main vector for Lyme Disease, of course the tick itself, is carried by not the White-tailed Deer, but by mice. So if you eliminate these apex predators, the Barred Owls, the Great Horned Owls, the Red-tailed Hawks, these birds which eat a diet of mice almost exclusively every day, are helping us combat the Lyme Disease epidemic. And if you remove them, it's only going to get worse. I don't think people are really aware of that. So they're very important in that regard most directly. And of course, eliminating ... As the name implies, Raptors Are The Solution, ultimately, we'd like to be a society where we could live in harmony with these raptors, and then they would largely take care of our rodent problems for us by themselves. But that's not the case, and people looking for immediate solutions, and too often, they revert to poisons. Which is ultimately, very counterproductive.

Photo courtesy of Pamela Dimeler & Raptors Are The Solution