Every town has its quirks, and Oakland, California residents enjoy the "rain-forest-like cacophony" of black-crowned night herons that roost in the downtown area's ficus trees.
At least, residents enjoyed the ruckus until Saturday, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. The local U.S. Postal Service office, fed up with the birds' defecating onto mail trucks parked below the ficus trees, hired a local tree-trimming service to shear back the city-owned trees. Crews arrived and began sawing off branches on several trees, sending nests — and the baby chicks inside — through a wood chipper. Onlookers called police, who arrived and told the tree trimming crews to halt their work.
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