Enthusiasts, Foes Spar Over Legal Cockfighting -- Animal-Rights Advocates Call Sport Inhumane

MULDROW, Okla. - As the first pair of gamecocks briefly strut around the pit, the crowd begins to buzz.

Aficionados in the bleachers take a moment to size up the birds, and soon the wagering begins.

"Twenty on the other side!" shouts a man in a straw hat, putting his money on a russet-colored bird with dark green tail feathers.

"Lay $80, lay $80," several people yell. It means they will offer to risk $100 against the taker's $80. The catch: The initiator gets to pick which bird he backs.

Arrangements are made in a minute or two, about as long as it takes handlers to get the birds into position. The din quiets as the feathered fighters are set 8 feet apart on the pit's raked dirt floor.

A brief glance and the birds launch themselves at each other, attacking in a single-minded explosion of whirring wings, slashing feet and a kaleidoscopic swirl of feathers. The furious dance is over within two minutes. A trickle of blood drains from the losing rooster's carcass as a handler carries it from the pit.

Money changes hands quietly now. The crowd, which has watched the fight with the same attention to style and detail as might spectators at a dog show, gets ready for the next pitting between birds with steel gaffs or blades strapped to their spurs. Within hours some bettors will be waving rolls of bank notes.

This is the 3rd Annual World Championship cockfighting tournament at Mid-America Game Club.

The five-day "derby" drew more than 100 gamecock breeders from across the country who each paid a $6,000 entry fee to pit their birds and compete for bragging rights and hundreds of thousands of dollars in prize money.

And it is legal.

Cruel sport or cultural heritage?

For now, the law permits organized cockfighting in Oklahoma, Louisiana and New Mexico. However, supporters and opponents in Oklahoma are eyeing each other as they prepare to brawl over whether the state should allow the practice.

As with the roosters, neither side is willing to give an inch.

"People know which side they're on. There's not a lot of gray area," said Wayne Pacelle, senior vice president of the Humane Society of the United States.

Opponents vilify cockfighting as cruel and inhumane, death for entertainment's sake. A petition drive to get cockfighting on the statewide 2000 ballot and persuade voters to outlaw the practice began Sept. 13.

Enthusiasts say cockfighting is a sport and, more than that, part of their heritage, often passed down from one generation to another. Outsiders, they complain, are trying to dictate how they run their lives.

"I would never, ever try to force my beliefs on someone else. I don't think someone else should be able to force their beliefs on me," said Mike Jones, a gamecock breeder who used to run a cockfighting pit near Sallisaw.

Last year, efforts by animal-rights groups led to bans on cockfighting in Missouri and Arizona, but so far similar legislation has repeatedly failed in the three states where it remains legal.

Organizers of the petition drive have until Dec. 11 to gather 69,888 verified signatures of registered voters. They are shooting for 100,000.

Cynthia Armstrong, president of the Oklahoma Humane Federation, an umbrella organization representing about 30 groups, thinks the measure will make the ballot and be approved.

"Animal fighting in and of itself is tasteless," she said. "It certainly should not be something that we as Oklahomans are known for."

Many of those involved in cockfighting say they are drawn more by the birds than by the fights.

"It's the admiration for the characteristics of the birds themselves," said Jim Tyler, who owns a dental laboratory. "That gameness, that absolute willingness."

Cockfights, fanciers say, are the only way to prove such qualities.

That's why pits like Mid-America Game Club exist. Located north of Muldrow, a gas stop on Interstate 40 near the Arkansas line, it is much more than the uninitiated might expect.

The metal structure in a clearing off a dirt road is larger than many high school gyms. During the World Championship derby, vehicles parked outside had license tags from California to the Carolinas and most states in between.

Activity revolves around the pit

Customers pay their $21 admission fee in the lobby, plus $10 to join the club and the Oklahoma Game Breeder Association, both required memberships. The lobby leads to the restaurant, and there's also a bar and a gift shop.

All are equipped with closed-circuit television monitors so patrons don't miss the fights.

But all activity here revolves around the pit, a 20-by-20-foot dirt square encased in a cage and surrounded by red, white and blue bleachers with seats for 610 people. A haze of cigarette smoke lingers just below the ceiling.

On this day in late May, the stands are nearly filled. Older children play in small packs, mostly oblivious to the fights, while parents keep younger kids within eyesight.

Once the matches begin, they roll along briskly. In a day, 100 or more fights will be held. If a bout lasts longer than about four minutes, it is moved to one of three smaller pits, called drag pits, in the concourse below the stands. Several times the announcer chastises handlers who aren't ready when their match is called.

"We've got to fight all these roosters today," he says over the public-address system. "We don't need any dawdling."

Waiting, some handlers fidget and others stand calmly, roosters tucked under their arms. One holds his gamecock up so it can see the battle under way, stroking the alert bird as he whispers encouragement with his beard almost touching its yellow-plumed head.

Each match begins with handlers "billing" the birds, or holding them face to face. The birds' hackles, the long neck feathers, stand straight out in challenge. The referee checks weapons strapped to each bird's leg to equalize any disparity in the length of the spur and make for a quicker and cleaner kill.

Gaffs or blades

In some fights the gamecocks are equipped with gaffs, long needlelike weapons, and in others a steel blade is strapped to the left leg.

Gaff fights tend to last longer, sometimes more than half an hour, and almost always go to the drag. The loser occasionally survives, its natural inclination to fight to the death overcome by fatigue.

In knife fights, using blades from three-quarters of an inch to 3 inches long, a fatal blow is usually struck within minutes.

If the roosters become entangled, the handlers separate them and again place them on the ground, this time 22 inches apart, according to established rules.

If a winner suffers cuts, there's a fellow on hand to stitch up the wounds for $20 or so, the cockfighting version of the cut man at a professional boxing match.

In one fight, a handler in his 20s sporting a wispy mustache pits an all-black gamecock against a bright red rooster with lemon-yellow hackles and black tail feathers.

This is a knife fight, and it ends with a decisive stroke eliciting a spontaneous "Ummmph" from those close enough to see each blow distinctly.

The young man picks up his dead bird and offers the winner a handshake before leaving the arena.

"Maybe he should have gone home," says a Georgia breeder in the stands, noting it was the beginner's fifth loss in a row.