It was a real turkey shoot.
A Canadian vigilante used a slingshot to take down a wild turkey that had been attacking elderly people and children in a small town in Quebec for the past several weeks, the Montreal Gazette reported.
With the blessing of the local mayor, the unnamed hunter killed the turkey with a bullseye Thursday and then took its back home to eat — freeing the town of its fowl terror and causing criticism from those who say the mayor did not have the authority to order the bird’s assassination.
“This morning at 9 a.m., a man with a sling — like in the time of David and Goliath, he’s very good with it — he hit the wild turkey with two metal stones in the head and he fell,” Mayor Yvon Deshaies, who ordered the hit. told the outlet.
“He didn’t suffer at all,” he said, adding that he was not happy that he issued a call to arms Wednesday to blow the stuffing out of the turkey.
“I would have liked the wildlife ministry to take care of it,” the mayor said Thursday.
But he felt he had no choice when all wildlife officials told him was that turkeys are not dangerous.
“When it’s attacking citizens, or children, a person in a wheelchair, it doesn’t matter — that’s not normal. I defend my citizens,” Deshaies told CBC. “I’m not going to wait for [the turkey] to scratch a child.”
It is illegal to hunt wild turkeys in Quebec before the hunting season begins at the end of April, but Deshaies said that provincial police were present during the killing to ensure people’s safety.
But some people cried fowl over the killing – threatening to sue him and demanding that he resign.
“They’re saying I’m Putin. They said I’m worse than Putin,” Deshaies told the Gazette, referring to the bloodthirsty Russian dictator.
The mayor also faces possible sanctions from Quebec’s wildlife ministry.
The problem reportedly began about three weeks ago, when wild turkeys descended on the town of about 5,000 people located about 60 miles northeast of Montreal.
One crazed bird attacked a woman in a wheelchair and pulled her shirt, according to the Gazette.
Earlier this week, a Facebook showed an elderly gentleman, Michel Turcotte, who was trying to enter his residence being blocked by a large wild turkey.
He clapped his hands and then threw snow at the bird, which then chased Turcotte around his SUV and then down the street.
“He tried to jump on my back,” Turcotte told TVA news. “He didn’t get me, but it was close. I was pretty scared.”
Asked if it was a good idea to ruffle the bird’s feathers by tossing snow at it, Turcotte admitted: “No, it was not.”
But the 34-year mayor said he had seen enough.
“The birds have claws like razor blades,” Deshaies told the Gazetts. “And they’re large. When they spread their wings, they’re five to six feet wide.”
During a TV interview, he also told residents to grab their baseball bats and go on the offensive.
“I will not wait until a child is disfigured,” Deshaies said, adding that he had also tried to hire a trapper but was told it was illegal.
“People were telling me they tried to run away, and this bird would come after them, again and again,” he said. “He wouldn’t give up. The wildlife people told me he wasn’t dangerous. I have the claws on my desk, sir. The claws are enormous.”
He speculated that the turkey was lost – or “a bit mentally unstable.”
On Thursday, cops stood by to provide security but did not intervene as the bird was killed by the slingshot shooter, who gave its claws to the mayor and took the bird home to cook it, according to the outlet.
“In our town, if an aggressive dog or cat bites someone, it is euthanized,” the mayor said. “For me it’s always the security of our citizens that comes first.
“This animal didn’t bite, but it was running after people. That’s not normal, so I said that’s enough. I acted as a good captain. I didn’t abandon the ship,” he told the Gazette.
