How the peacock story went down

This is the tale or tail(?) of the peacocks in the Grove:

One neighbor on Micanopy, Murray Epstein, MD, felt it was his job to rid the North Grove of the Peacocks. Not only his street, but the whole North Grove according to emails that went back and forth over the past year. I live in the North Grove, so I do resent that.

Along with Dr. Epstein, Bryan P. Abboud, Charles Valenti, Kenneth Tobin, Joshua Medvin and Eduardo Garcia-Allen, all Micanopy residents, signed one letter asking for results from the Village Council.

Dr. Epstein also hounded Commissioner Marc Sarnoff and his Chief of Staff Ron Nelson non-stop and I truly feel that both Sarnoff and Nelson were on the birds' side, but when you have a squeaky wheel, after awhile, you need to do something. It was either get rid of the peacocks or the doctor, I wish it had been the latter.

Village Council head at the time, Michelle Niemeyer, was also in on the emails and conversations. The subject came before the village council. There was even a peacock count, to see how many there actually were. I never did see a final figure on that.

Dr. Epstein and the others felt that their street was shouldering all the expense and problems of the peacocks. Apparently this was all open to the public, but I usually don't miss much and apparently I missed this and many others had as well.

The final blow was when an email came from Assistant City Manager Roger Hernstadt on Monday, December 15, 2008 that said:

The administration’s position is as follows:

The peafowl may be humanely captured and legally transport to a rural “adoption” farm by a licensed trapper at the property owners discretion and expense.

A trapper named Jeff Wood was hired, he requested written permission to remove the birds, since apparently he did not want the final responsibility. They found the Redland farm, they notified the Discovery Channel and apparently the Herald and the deed was done over the past few months.

Dr. Epstein requested that one male and one female remain in the Grove. Generous guy he is.

So that's the tale of the peacocks. I have asked Dr. Epstein for some sort of statement explaining his side, although we can all agree that Micanopy was being overrun by the birds.

It would have been so much nicer to maybe spead them out into other areas of the Grove, rather than send them to Siberia the Redland. It looks like much more than just the reported 15 were removed, the North Grove and the South Grove seem to be empty now.

A vast majority of the neighbors enjoy them and appreciate them. It's a shame that a few big shots, like a doctor and another who works for an aerospace company and others, were able to rid the Grove of their mascot.

Previous stories here and here.