Pocketing an egg seemed natural to Booth Haley ’05 when he discovered it on a recent canoe trip. Paddling along the flooded Connecticut River on April 7 he and a friend, Andrew Holbein ’06, hopped out to climb a derelict railroad bridge and found a full nest there.
What he did not realize was that his intended lunch was the egg of a peregrine falcon, a rare species that receives protection under Connecticut state law. A conservation officer performing a routine check on the nest spotted Haley from the shore.
“I thought it was a pigeon egg,”Haley said. “I had no idea.”
Haley and Holbein now face one count each of criminal trespass in the third degree, a misdemeanor charge that could mean up to three months in prison if they are convicted. Charges at the state level are possible but have not yet been announced.
“I wonder if they didn’t bring [state] charges yet because they’re not sure exactly what charges they can bring,” Haley said. There seems to be some confusion about whether or not the peregrine falcon is still protected as an endangered species, according to Haley.
Their first court appearance on Tuesday was postponed for two weeks thanks to a continuance obtained by their lawyer, Wesleyan graduate Joe Lynch ’47.
“He [Lynch] said he’s been helping out Wesleyan students for thirty years,” Holbein said. “He’s a very paternal guy, very nice, and he said he would do the case for free.” Lynch declined to comment on the case.
“I think it’s fun to find wild food, to really know where your food is coming from,” Haley said. “In the modern world we get our food in rectangular boxes wrapped in plastic as if it magically appears from the factory, but food comes from animals. Food comes from the earth. So if you’re out there gathering your own eggs, it’s a great feeling.”
“I suggested that it seemed like a stupid idea,” Holbein said, maintaining that he attempted to discourage Haley from removing the egg. Not persuaded, Haley took the egg and headed back down to the canoe.
“We paddled back to Harbor Park, where the crew dock is. When we got there, there were two cop cars and an Environmental Protection car waiting,” Haley said. “They were very aggressive immediately, and treated us like criminals, which I guess they thought we were.” The pair was handcuffed, fingerprinted, and taken to Middletown Police headquarters.
At the station, the conservation officer interviewed them at length.
“He’s been watching over these eggs for three years, so he was really upset because he thought we were poaching the eggs,” Holbein said.
Meanwhile, the story has received much local and regional press coverage, appearing in the Hartford Courant and the Middletown press, on Channel 3 and Channel 8 news, and on Connecticut Public Radio. The Middletown Press headline, “Egg Theft Scrambled,” was one of several bird or egg puns to appear in print, including a reference in the Courant to the “eagle-eyed” conservation agent who nabbed them.
“Some of my old high school friends in Seattle found out about it through word of mouth and one guy designed a website, www.freebooth.org,” Haley said. “They’re selling Free Booth T-shirts and they have links to all the articles about it so far.” The T-shirts feature a picture of Haley’s head emerging from a broken egg and the slogan, “no harm, no fowl.”
“I think I should get one free,” Holbein said. “And we’re definitely going to give one to the lawyer.”
“Due to environmental ignorance, Booth now faces criminal charges for basically just being an idiot,” the site says. It also includes a testimonial from Haley’s mother, who confesses that it was one of her son’s chores as a child to collect the eggs from their chicken coop.
“I will say in my beloved, albeit foolish, son’s defense that he was conditioned from childhood to collect eggs,” she said.
“Booth is like Mary Poppins,” Holbein said. “You never know what’s gonna happen when you’re with Booth.” For his part, Haley doubts that this incident will keep him from adventuring.
“I’ll always keep exploring,” he said. “But if I see a bird egg in the future I might be more careful trying to figure out what kind of bird it belongs to.”
The egg has since been reintroduced to the nest and is developing normally. The Middletown nest belongs to one of six pairs of falcons currently thriving in Connecticut.
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