Kill Wild Animals? Exterminate the Thought!

By Kay Rutherford

Chicago Sun-Times

Monday, April 19, 1982

Garon Fyffe is so enthusiastic about his job that he's likely to deliver a little lecture on North American marsupials, yellow jacket wasps or the habits of hornets as he removes them from your property.

 You may think of it as removal-and-good-riddance, but to Fyffe, the thought of "extermination" is an abomination.

 He calls himself a "naturalist consultant" and he has been busy relocating uninvited animals and pests in Cook, Lake and busy relocating uninvited animals and pests in Cook, Lake and Will counties for five years.

 Fyffe, who has a state wildlife rehabilitation license, will "humanely" remove any kind of wildlife be it skunk, snake, squirrel or honey bee.

 To homeowners with raccoons bringing up baby in the chimney or a giant yellow jacket nest in the crawl space, he's often the only one who will come and collect them – much less find them new homes.

 Most exterminators won't go near a squirrel, village animal-control officers usually are police personnel with other duties and it's illegal to shoot animals in city and suburbs.

 Last year the Boyk family of Schaumburg had skunks living under the front steps and Fyffe "seemed to be the only one we called who cared," said Donna Boyk.

 Fyffe's firm, A-B-C Humane Wildlife Rescue and Relocation, Arlington Heights, was still circled in her phone book last week when a raccoon was found raising her young in the Boyk chimney. So Fyffe and his assistant, Jerry Cain, went out on their remove-and-relocate mission.

 Tranquilizers can be risky to animals so they were pleased to "live-trap" a raccoon in the backyard without using drugs. But he turned out to be a male, and the birdlike chirping of baby raccoons still could be heard in the chimney. The chances were that the female still was in there.

 From just above the Boyk's damper he fished out four still-blind babies, but "mama" wouldn't budge. It took a tranquilizing shot to finally extract her – and she was huge, maybe 35 pounds.

 A big part of Fyffe's philosophy is relocation and he had already scouted out proper places for the raccoons far from the attractive garbage pails of suburbia. The area was rife with hollow logs, fresh water and room to roam. Fyffe likes to keep his relocation spots secret to protect the animals from hunters, he said.

 He's also secretive about his method of removing bees, wasps and hornets but swears the insects are unharmed and that organic farmers even vie for his hornet nests because the insects eat aphids.

 How much does it all cost? Well, that depends on how tough the job is. As Fyffe said, tearing down walls and taking out pounds of honey or climbing soot-filled chimneys takes longer than live-trapping a cooperative critter.