People who frequent Lake Gregory in the San Bernardino Mountains are seething and grieving after authorities say a man trampled on the beauty and tranquility there by throwing rocks and injuring a great egret, leading to its death.
The bird was so beloved that visitors gave it a name: Arthur.
“The egret stands out all the way across the lake. It’s really a showy kind of bird,” Nathan Godwin, general manager of the Lake Gregory Company, which manages the park near Crestline for the county, said in an interview Thursday.
A 36-year-old Claremont man was arrested on Tuesday, Nov. 12, on suspicion of animal cruelty and killing of a non-game bird, the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department said.
Deputies received a report of a man throwing rocks at ducks, and a witness filmed the attack. The man wounded an egret sitting on a dock with one of his throws, and a second person pulled the bird out of the water and broke its neck to end its suffering, the sheriff’s news release said.
Witness statements and the video led investigators to the Claremont man’s home, where he was arrested.
Godwin said he began receiving messages about the attack within minutes.
He said there are several egrets at the lake. They can grow to four feet tall with a wingspan of 50 inches. They were once endangered because they were frequently killed as their feathers were coveted to make hats. The Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 makes it a crime to kill an egret or destroy their nest.
“It’s a sense of outrage that a person would come here and kill a bird this way,” Godwin said. “It’s just a senseless act of violence in the mountains where everyone comes to enjoy the natural beauty. A lot of people were really upset at how it happened and shocked and surprised that this would even happen.”
Godwin said he doesn’t know of any other birds there that have been named by visitors. There is a mama mallard duck that migrates back to the lake every year and produces several ducklings.
“We know who she is,” Godwin said. “You kind of get used to seeing a bird and recognizing a bird. There is something special about that. That’s what people liked about Arthur.”
The Sheriff’s Department asks anyone with information on the investigation to call Deputy Ian Buchowiecki at 909-336-0600. Information may be left anonymously on the WeTip website at wetip.com or by calling 800-782-7463.