'There Is A Proper Method And This Was Not It'
The store had problems with birds that would get inside the store and then build their nests. A Fred Meyer spokeswoman told KOMO 4 News the company hired an exterminator to control the birds that were nesting in the store.
But say they never dreamed it would happen this way.
The exterminators installed what they call a glue board to catch the birds. When the birds fly into the board, they get stuck. And their struggle is a public one; their desperate thrashing witnessed by customers.
It was also captured on home video.
One customer secretly shot videotape of one bird's struggle Saturday morning. The small bird makes futile attempts at freedom. But there is no chance to escape.
The birds' wings are stuck to the glue board, and the helpless animals are pinned to the heavy adhesive in the rafters.
"One of the animals actually had his head stuck to the adhesive," said Stephanie Bell with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. "It was indescribable, it was so terrible. It was very clear to me that these animals were suffering."
Matthew Penzer with PETA adds, "The more the animals tried to escape, the more entangled they became the more contorted their bodies became, the more they struggled and they were just left there."
In the instance caught on tape, the birds had been there for nearly 24 hours. Some died as they languished overnight.
A Fred Meyer spokeswoman said they never dreamed it would happen this way.
"The fact is that this should have never happened to those animals," said Fred Meyer spokeswoman Mary Loftin. "This is not the right way to treat those creatures.
"There is a proper method and this was not it."
The Tacoma-based exterminator, Sprague Pest Solutions, told KOMO 4 News the glue boards are common industry practice. The birds are trapped, retrieved, and euthanized.
"We don't feel we did anything wrong," a spokesman for the exterminators said. "But we're responding to customer and store concerns and removing the traps."
Sprague has now installed more humane box traps -- and will release any captured birds into the wild.
"It's over for those birds," PETA's Penzer said. "But we hope to make sure this type of situation doesn't happen to any other birds."
A Fred Meyer spokeswoman says the corporate office has now instructed every store manager nationwide, to never accept the use of these kinds of traps for any animal. They say they don't want this to ever happen again.
King County Animal Control officers are also investigating what happened. They came to the store to look at the birds and how they were trapped.