WE DO NOT SUPPORT ANY STORE THAT SELLS BIRDS or OTHER ANIMALS! 

Please click here for a list of stores to avoid.

"Bird Paradise" is certainly not the only store profiting from the sale of exotic animals.  However, it is the self-proclaimed "LARGEST EXOTIC BIRD STORE ON THE EAST COAST."  Therefore, it is likely responsible for the sale of many of captive birds in this area.   As such, it is among the most appropriate venues to educate current and potential patrons on the facts of the lives of captive and wild birds.

Bird Paradise appears to have some issues with cleanliness and its care of birds:

Click here for  a recent inspection report from the New Jersey Department of Health  -

note that Bird Paradise has EIGHT violations in just ONE inspection, including two sanitation violations and two disease control violations

NOTE:  Bird Paradise employees or store owners have also intimidated, harassed, and physically assaulted peaceful demonstrators.  Among other things, store owner Kathy Lance smashed a camera into a demonstrator's face at the very first demonstration on April 12, 2008.   After the police were called, she fled the scene.  Read more here.

Another owner took desperate measures and actually contacted at least one employer of the demonstrators.  Read more here.

And read excerpts of a bizarre email here - one might suspect the author (a Bird Paradise store owner) is mentally deranged.  The same might be wondered about the author of these posts - yes, another Bird Paradise store owner.

 Bird Paradise owners appear to have a history of bizarre emails - Check out this exchange with between Bird Paradise co-owner Kathie Hahn and the N.J. Dept of FIsh and Wildlife (documents posted on public forum - Manhattan Bird Club):

Some news stories about Bird Paradise:

Pet store withdraws suit against protesters

By LAURI SHEIBLEY
Burlington County Times

April 12, 2008

BURLINGTON CITY — An agreement has been reached to allow animal rights groups to protest outside Bird Paradise, a large bird store along Route 130.

Owners of the store had filed a lawsuit against the animal rights activists about a week ago in an attempt to stop the protest. But they withdrew the lawsuit Thursday and Superior Court Judge Ronald E. Bookbinder dismissed the suit.

The protest is scheduled to go on as planned this afternoon.

The New Jersey-based Reach Out for Animal Rights organized the protest. The group does not believe that birds should be bred and kept in captivity.

The protest was posted on the Web sites of two other animal rights groups, Mobilization for Animals and the New York Bird Club.

Kathie Hahn, a co-owner of Bird Paradise, said she decided to seek an injunction against the three groups after learning about the protest.

“We wanted to make sure that ... the groups got all the appropriate permits and permissions,” she said.

Hahn said members of Reach Out for Animal Rights trespassed on Bird Paradise property and parked their cars in the store parking lot during an attempted protest at her store a few months ago. She said the activists have a right to express their opinion, but they should not be allowed on the store's private property. She also said it is dangerous for protestors to gather along busy Route 130.

Rachel Ogden, organizer of Reach Out for Animal Rights, said she obtained permission from the Burlington City police for the protest at Bird Paradise. She said the store had no basis for its lawsuit.

“They sprang this lawsuit on us, thinking we would just back away,” Ogden said.

The American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey represented the animal rights group. Ed Barocas, the union's legal director, said Bird Paradise had “no right to object to a protest that is approved by the city and the state.”

Lawyers for both sides sat down Thursday. Hahn said Bird Paradise agreed to drop the lawsuit if the protestors agreed to stay off private property and acquire the proper permits.

The group plans to protest from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. today along Route 130 in front of Bird Paradise. Ogden said the group will conduct its protest on land owned by the state Department of Transportation, which has granted them permission to do so.

Hahn said she believes her store is being targeted because it is large and well-known. She said the store takes good care of its birds, and recently raised $12,000 to combat a deadly avian virus.

But Ogden said birds are not domesticated animals and should not be kept in captivity.

“Bird Paradise, maybe at one time it was about the birds, but now it is really about the money,” she said. “If you loved birds, you wouldn't be selling them. Profiting from the exploitation of animals is not something to be proud of.”

Bird store fails to block animal rights protesters

The Associated Press

Philadelphia Daily News

Alive & Well: $2,000 bird in trash bin,
March 29, 2006

Gloria Campisi

YOU COULD CALL Peaches, a cockatoo, the miracle bird.

Certainly the fates seemed to conspire on Peaches' behalf yesterday.

It all started when Nancy Hellmuth, an MRI technologist in Northeast Philadelphia, stepped out the back door of her office to smoke.

Hellmuth heard squawking coming from a trash container outside University Dynamic MRI, on Grant Avenue near Blue Grass Road.

Hellmuth peeked inside and thought she saw a chicken sitting there on top of the trash, "because all I saw was all these feathers."

She quickly closed the lid, but then opened it all the way and discovered Peaches, a stolen $2,000 baby cockatoo, inside.

A birdnapper apparently tossed Peaches there after news spread of her theft Sunday from Bird Paradise in Burlington, N.J. As a result, the bird got too hot to handle.

As Hellmuth stood guard over Peaches, a waste-truck driver drove up to empty the container.

Luckily for Peaches, the truck driver was late yesterday.

"He usually comes at 6 a.m.," Hellmuth said. But it was already 8:30.

Hellmuth said she jumped in front of the trash bin, "screaming, 'Please, don't dump this Dumpster.'

"He says, 'I have to dump it.'

"I said, 'No, you can't - there's a bird in there.' "

The truck driver, who was wearing gloves that would protect him if he was nipped, picked up Peaches and carried her inside.

Hellmuth wrapped the cold, frightened bird in her lab coat, and Kristine Collins, Bird Paradise manager, hurried over from Jersey with a thermos full of formula for the hungry creature.

Collins said late yesterday that Peaches was on her perch at the store, resting, after a checkup by a veterinarian.

"She's very tired, very stressed out, a little dehydrated," Collins said. "But she has strength. She was able to sit up on a perch on her own."

Collins said Peaches, who is 3 ½ months old and came from a breeder, was discovered missing about 1 p.m. Sunday when her purchasers, the Papa family of Wilmington, came to visit. She's still being hand-fed and isn't ready to go home with them yet, Collins said.

"She's got a wonderful personality, very loving," Collins said. "A bird this gentle by nature and this loving, she wouldn't be fighting or arguing" with a thief.

Peaches wasn't her usual quiet self when Hellmuth and co-worker Dianne DiAngelo discovered her in the trash.

"It must have heard us talking, and then it started screaming," Hellmuth said.

Peaches calmed down, once Collins arrived.

Hellmuth said Collins held Peaches "like a baby. She wrapped her all up in a towel and was hugging her and kissing her."

Peaches was "just thrilled" to see Collins, Hellmuth said. "She stopped squawking and crying" and ate a little bit of formula. "She was starving."

Neither Hellmuth nor the truck driver had seen reports of Peaches' theft on TV and didn't know to whom she belonged.

But Carolyn Sims, receptionist at the MRI center, and the truck driver's dispatcher had heard the news and helped direct the search for Peaches' owner.

The pet store provided a $300 reward, which Hellmuth's co-workers agreed should go to Hellmuth for the care of her dog, which is hospitalized with diabetes.

Hellmuth said she doesn't normally go behind her office to smoke.

"I have no idea why I walked out back. I think I was meant to find the poor little bird."