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The Australian government will not euthanise a pigeon after an investigation found it the bird was highly likely to be Australian and does not present a biosecurity risk. The department is satisfied that the bird’s leg band is a fraudulent copy of a legitimate leg band, a spokesperson from the Department of Agriculture said. No further action will be taken by the department in relation to this matter.
The statement came late on Friday night after a US pigeon racing union claimed the racing band on the bird’s leg was a counterfeit and not American as previously thought.
Fake US leg band gets pigeon a reprieve in Australia | 100 5 The Eagle – Jonesboro, AR eagle1005.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from eagle1005.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
The Globe and Mail Yan Zhuang Published January 15, 2021
A racing pigeon sits on a rooftop Tuesday, Jan. 12, 2021, in Melbourne, Australia, The racing pigeon, first spotted in late Dec. 2020, appears to have made an extraordinary 13,000-kilometer (8,000-mile) Pacific Ocean crossing from the United States to Australia.
Kevin Celli-Bird/The Associated Press
The racing pigeon seemed to have travelled far, from Oregon, when it showed up weak and hungry in a backyard in a Melbourne suburb.
Someone decided to name it Joe, after U.S. president-elect Joe Biden.
But Australian officials, fearing the spread of germs from a foreign bird, would not bend the rules: The bird must die.
January 17, 2021
CANBERRA, AUSTRALIA (AP) A pigeon that Australia declared a biosecurity risk has received a reprieve after a United States (US) bird organisation declared its identifying leg band was fake.
The band suggested the bird found in a Melbourne backyard on December 26 was a racing pigeon that had left the US state of Oregon, 13,000 kilometres away, two months earlier.
On that basis, Australian authorities on Thursday said they considered the bird a disease risk and planned to kill it.
But Sport Development Manager for the Oklahoma-based American Racing Pigeon Union Deone Roberts said on Friday the band was fake.
The band number belongs to a blue bar pigeon in the US which is not the bird pictured in Australia, she said.