I've said this to three or four people in the past month

[conuly]

which is weird, because most years I hardly say it at all.

Anyway, maybe saying it here will keep me from having to say it for a while!

If you're in the USA then you should know that it's not lawful to possess the feathers, eggs, nests, or any other item from or connected to most native birds. Yes, even if the bird shed that feather naturally or the egg and nest is from two years ago and isn't being used. This is a matter of international treaty.

Probably nobody's going to chase you down over it unless you're doing the very thing the law is intended to prevent, that is, selling those items or, worse, killing birds - but you should probably not post public photos about it either, not even on relatively unknown sites like Dreamwidth. Just keep your private feather collection private.

Comments

[lilysea]

Gosh, I didn't know that

Do you know if there are exemptions for First Nations groups for whom feathers have cultural/spiritual/religious significance?

[conuly]

Yes, there are.

[lilysea]

Now I am wondering about the laws in Australia for when you find a naturally-shed feather on the ground, with no bird anywhere in sight.

[conuly]

Here you go!

[jhetley]

Wife's nature center had to get a special license to keep a Victorian monstrosity of stuffed songbirds cased in glass. It had been left to them in a will.

[conuly]

Is the, uh, monstrosity worth it?

[jhetley]

Aesthetically, no. But the woodworking and the individual glass bubbles show a high level of craftsmanship.

[redbird]

I was startled to discover, at least a decade ago, that this applied to most birds--I had previously only known about eagle feathers, and was surprised that it applied even to birds that aren't even close to being endangered.

[conuly]

Well, the eagle feathers have an additional complication of being used for religious purposes. There just aren't enough of them to go around if everybody can keep any one they find.

[hannah]

I volunteered at a bird rehab center until 2020 hit, and they had a box set aside for any recovered feathers to make sure nobody took them home. I can't remember if they included the pigeons or not - while they're an introduced species, it might've been simpler to say "all feathers" as a blanket policy.

[lilysea]

I've heard about bird rehab places re-attaching feathers

from bird A

to bird-that-is-missing-flight-feathers B

[hannah]

Imping, yes.

[conuly]

Game may be exempt in some states, but only if you're licensed to hunt the animal in question and the feathers are not for sale.

Crows are not exempt. Link

[conuly]

A blanket policy is a lot easier to enforce, that's for sure.

[cesy]

Wow, I wonder if that's also true in the UK? Kids collecting feathers off the ground from common birds is such a thing.

[tellshannon815]

Also UK here and wondering the same thing - the only thing I ever heard of here was the monarch being able to claim the mute swans.

[gatheringrivers]

Which brings to mind the perhaps not-so-dumb question - what are you supposed to DO with native bird's feathers if you find them?

[conuly]

Eagle feathers, google for what to do and then do it.

Everything else, leave them or toss them out or anyway don’t tell people you have a bird feather / nest / eggshell collection.

[minoanmiss]

I know this makes me a weirdo and I hate disappointing children but I approve of this law. It's written as broadly as it is because otherwise people would (as they used to) say the whole cubic meter of bird feathers in a box in their house just fell out of the sky (which it did, attached to the 25 endangered birds they shot).

[conuly]

Indeed. And really, if you honestly did just pick that feather up off the ground but you don’t make the government aware of it, they’ll never know. If they know, that’s definitely your screwup, possibly because you did one of the things the law is actually trying to prevent.

[musyc]

When I worked at Serpent Mound, I tacked a vulture feather to the message board and eventually some Fish and Wildlife guy wandered through and I let him know. There were loads of them around but that one had been dropped right at the doorstep. He shrugged and told me to keep it.

Trying to explain to some suburban mom why it was actually against the law for her kid to take home the handful of blue jay/crow/cardinal feathers he'd collected was ... rather difficult. I finally went with, nobody's going to take them from him so this is a Just So You Know educational moment.

[conuly]

Yeah, I really don't think that anybody cares if you just have a private collection you legitimately got from the ground, not unless they're trying to get you because they don't like you. I just think people ought to know the law so at least they aren't advertising their illegal feather collections.