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RAMSEY, Minn. (AP) _ Authorities have busted a suspected cockfighting operation in Anoka County and seized more than 100 birds.
The sheriff's office said a caller reported a cock fight in progress Saturday night. Officers who arrived could see, through an open barn door, people gathered around a ring with bloody and injured roosters nearby.
Police seized 102 roosters, hens and chicks as well as fighting paraphernalia, including an electric frying pan, "commonly used to irritate the cocks prior to a fight by dipping the talons in hot oil," according to the criminal complaint.
The birds are now with the Animal Humane Society of Golden Valley.
A 23-year-old man was arrested. He told police he was just watching the property for the owners, who were out of town.
Another cockfighting bust happened in Anoka County in late July. Thirty birds were seized in that case.
"This one is less sophisticated in terms of professional fighting (compared to the last bust)," Animal Humane Society investigator Keith Streff said Tuesday, "but shows a propensity for breeding and supplying the fighting industry."
Though officials said cockfighting was in progress Saturday, they don't believe that's the primary purpose of the site.
For one thing, deputes also confiscated was a white board with animal names, dates and weights written on it. The board included a note to "check Running Bear's incisors in spring."
Streff noted in a news conference Tuesday that bird don't have incisors, and the weights don't match birds.
"That board tells me there's more going on here than bird fighting," he said, although he also conceded that it could mean nothing at all.
Laura Nelson, director of the human society's Wildlife Rehabilitation and Release Program, said the birds used in cockfighting aren't naturally aggressive.
"Unfortunately, these birds have been trained to fight, provoked to kill," she said.
The birds might be suitable for adoption after they've been given time to recover, but there's no guarantee, she said.
For now, they are quarantined for 10 days. Humane society staff will work to keep the birds comfortable and monitor their health.
Anoka County sheriff's office spokesman Lt. Paul Sommer said none of the people involved in Saturday's animal fight were involved in the previous one in July.
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