Augusta-Richmond County, GA Animal Ordinances: Bird Protection (2026)

The bird sanctuary sits inside Chapter 1 (Animals) alongside the county's livestock and dog rules, but Sections 4-1-30 through 4-1-32 form their own protective scheme for wild birds. Sec. 4-1-30 declares the entire Urban Services District, defined in Sec. 4-1-16 as the area coterminous with the former City of Augusta's boundaries as they existed on December 31, 1995, a bird sanctuary. Sec. 4-1-31 makes it unlawful for any person to maim, kill or otherwise injure any wild or migratory bird anywhere inside that district. Sec.

4-1-32 adds a narrower ban aimed at nest robbers and trappers: no one may trap a mockingbird or any other wild bird, or rob a nest of its eggs or young, in any Augusta-Richmond County cemetery, around the basin, reservoir or pumping station of the waterworks, or anywhere else within the sanctuary boundary. The code carves out no exception for nuisance birds or property owners acting on their own land; the prohibition is territorial, not use-based. Enforcement runs through the same enforcement clause that governs the rest of Chapter 1: Sec.

§§ 15-10-62 and 15-10-63. Because Sections 4-1-30 through 4-1-32 carry no penalty clause of their own, a violation falls under the chapter-wide Sec. 4-1-61 enforcement provision, which routes back to the Code's general penalty section, Sec. 1-6-1.