So birds of a feather do flock together. Adolfo Valadez, medical director for Travis County Health and Human Services, is delivering a press conference right now over the winged rodents’ mysterious deaths – and they really are as filthy as we all imagined. “Birds are not the cleanest of animals. They eliminate in their food and water supply,” said Valadez. So when one grows ill, it can rapidly spread. That’s the gist. Move along people, nothing to see here. One comment does imbue the birds with a certain hard-partying, Behind the Music, beautiful-corpse ethos: “One too many stressors pushed them over the edge and the birds died.”
Just like Janis, man.
This article appears in January 19 • 2007.