Single pair of blackbirds builds ten nests along ladder in Cumbria

25th May

Up and down the country birds have been racing to find a mate and get on the property ladder ahead of the breeding season. And as a couple of RSPB members found in their back garden, one busy pair of blackbirds have taken it a step further with a real life game of ‘birds and ladders’.

As Bill and Jo Maddams were giving their garden in Penrith, Cumbria, a spring clean they noticed something unusual between the rungs of a ladder hanging on the wall. They say practice makes perfect but one pair of hard-working blackbirds took it to a new level by building 10 nests side by side giving themselves plenty of options.

Bill Maddams, who first spotted the nests, said: “By leaving out a supply of food and water in our garden we’re always joined by a variety of different birds such a robins, blue tits and goldfinches. However, as I looked out my window one morning it was a busy pair of blackbird that caught my eye. Over a number of days they were furiously building something and it wasn’t until we started our garden spring clean that the true extent of their efforts was revealed.”

Read on  and see photos

Blackbirds in the city: Bad health, longer life

Date:  March 22, 2018

Source:  University of Groningen

Summary:

Blackbirds live longer in cities than in forests. But their telomeres, the repetitive stretches of DNA at the ends of the chromosomes, show that these city birds have a much poorer health status than their rural cousins. These findings from a study in five European cities led by University of Groningen biologists were published in Biology Letters on 21 March.

Blackbirds are a common sight in many city gardens. The species has adapted well to this environment. 'But they also live in their original forest areas, which makes them ideal candidates for a study of the effect of city life on health', says University of Groningen postdoc Juan Diego Ibáñez-Álamo. He travelled to Granada, Seville, Madrid, Dijon and Turku to obtain blood samples from blackbirds in these cities and the adjacent rural areas.

Continued  

Usutu virus is back: Not only in blackbirds but also in humans

Date:  October 13, 2017

Source:  University of Veterinary Medicine -- Vienna

Summary:

Usutu virus, a flavivirus of African origin, was first detected in Austria in 2001, when it caused a severe bird die-off, mainly of blackbirds. The virus was active in the eastern part of Austria until 2005, killing many blackbirds, but also other songbirds. During 10 subsequent years no Usutu virus associated bird mortality was observed in Austria -- contrary to neighboring Hungary. Last year Usutu virus was identified again in two blackbirds -- and in 2017 already in sixteen songbirds. In another study Usutu virus was demonstrated in seven human blood donations from eastern Austria, suggesting that human infections seem to be more frequent than previously thought. 

Continued  

Has bird watcher finally captured rare albino blackbirds on camera?

17:40, 13 JUN 2016

UPDATED 17:40, 13 JUN 2016

BY PETE BAINBRIDGE , JOSH PEACHEY

Paul Gartley has spent a month trying to get footage of the birds

A bird watcher who spent a month trying to film an elusive species believes he has finally captured them on camera.

Paul Gartley says he repeatedly saw a group of albino blackbirds in the early morning as he walked his dog in Irlams o’ th’ Height, Salford , but wanted to gather some hard evidence.

Paul, 42, thinks he finally caught the birds on his mobile phone as he walked on Bolton Road playing fields.

He told M.E.N: “I only saw them very early, between 4am and 7am in the morning. They hang around with others and I read online that they only last about a month in the wild because they stick out to predators.

"They bounce off as soon as you get within 50 yards of them but two weeks ago I managed to get close in my car and watch them for a couple hours.”

Albinism is often genetically inherited, and is a recessive characteristic, leading to rare numbers and very few of them surviving in the wild.

Continued and video … 

Large bird kill reported near Picher

Nearly 100 dead birds were seen by several travelers east of Hwy 69 and 69a junction south of Picher Friday evening.

Posted: Monday, March 30, 2015 3:49 pm

Melinda Stottsmelinda.stotts@miaminewsrecord.com

COMMERCE — Several people in the area reported seeing a large amount of dead blackbirds, most estimates around 100, on the highway between Commerce and Quapaw near Picher over the weekend.

According to Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation Information and Education Supervisor Micah Holmes, the most likely cause of the birds' demise was natural causes or weather-related issues during their migration. Holmes said his department did not receive any reports of this specific bird kill incident, which occurred on Highway 69 and 69A south of Picher on Friday evening.

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Later supper for blackbirds in the city: Artificial light gives birds longer to forage for food

Date:

October 20, 2014

Source:

Helmholtz Centre For Environmental Research - UFZ

Summary:

Artificial light increases foraging time in blackbirds. Birds in city centers are active not just considerably earlier, but also for longer than their relatives in darker parts of the city. The study showed that artificial light has a considerable influence on the activity times of blackbirds in the city and therefore on their natural cycles.

Continued ....

City Slicker or Country Bumpkin: City-Life Changes Blackbird Personalities

June 19, 2013 — The origins of a young animal might have a significant impact on its behaviour later on in life. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Radolfzell, Germany, have been able to demonstrate in hand-reared blackbirds that urban-born individuals are less curious and more cautious about new objects than their country counterparts. This study sheds light on an interesting debate on whether personality differences between rural and urban birds are behavioural adjustments to urban environments, or if there is an underlying evolutionary basis to the existence of different personalities in urban habitats.

It's something pet owners have always known: animals have personalities too. More than 100 species have so far been identified by scientists where individuals consistently follow distinct behavioural strategies and behave in similar ways in a variety of situations. Scientists believe that such differences may also be important in adapting to new habitats.

Urbanization has considerably changed the living conditions of many wild animals. Animals living in urban areas need to cope with new anthropogenically-altered living conditions. A textbook example is the European blackbird (Turdus merula). Historically a forest-dweller, the blackbird is now one of the most common bird species found in our cities. In these new habitats, the blackbird has changed its behaviour in many ways: urban blackbirds migrate less in the winter, breed earlier, and live in higher densities than their forest conspecifics.

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Kentucky City Fights Migratory Bird Invasion With Air Cannons, Lasers

As cardinals flock to Rome, blackbirds and starlings are flocking to Hopkinsville, Kentucky. Yes, we couldn't help ourselves with that transition. And the hills are alive with the sounds of air cannons. The cannons were brought in to disperse hundreds of thousands of birds roosting in trees, filling the skies, blocking the sun.

CORNISH: The cannons were brought in to disperse hundreds of thousands of birds roosting in trees, filling the skies, blocking the sun.

BOBBY HAILE: Well, they usually come in about 4:30 or 5:00, and they just come in in droves. They don't just come at one time. They circle around and look for a landing place. And then here comes another maybe 1,000 birds, and the sky almost gets black. The sky is just full of them.

CORNISH: That's Hopkinsville resident Bobby Haile, a retired dentist. And while it's not uncommon for migratory flocks to make a pit stop in Haile's area, the sheer scope of this visit is causing some problems. With us to explain a bit more about this troublesome bird summit in Hopkinsville, Kentucky is Geoff LaBaron, an ornithologist with National Audubon Society. Welcome, Geoff.

GEOFF LABARON: Glad to be here.

Continue reading transcript and/or hear audio here:

http://www.npr.org/2013/03/04/173455759/kentucky-city-fights-migratory-bird-invasion-with-air-cannons-lasers

Bird invasion brings real-life horror to Kentucky city

NASHVILLE, tenn. — Millions of birds have descended on a Kentucky city, fouling the landscape, scaring pets and raising the risk for disease in a real-life version of Alfred Hitchcock's film, "The Birds."

The blackbirds and European starlings blacken the sky of Hopkinsville, Ky., and turn the landscape white with bird feces. The disease they carry, histoplasmosis, can cause lung infections and symptoms similar to pneumonia, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"There are enough that if the sun is just right, they'll cloud your vision of the sun," said Hopkinsville-Christian County historian William Turner. He said it's the worst invasion he's witnessed since the late 1970s.

David Chiles, president of the Little River Audubon Society, said migratory flocks are roosting in the city rather than flying farther south because of climate change.

The city has hired a pest-control company to get rid of the interlopers. Henry Jako, general manager of McGee Pest Control, said crews use air cannons and "bird-bangers" — similar to bottle-rocket fireworks aimed where the birds roost. 

Read more:Bird invasion brings real-life horror to Kentucky city - The Denver Posthttp://www.denverpost.com/nationworld/ci_22611752/bird-invasion-brings-real-life-horror-kentucky-city#ixzz2LG4m1Q7C

Artificial light speeds sexual maturity in blackbirds

A study has found that urban nocturnal light makes European blackbirds develop reproductive systems a month before their woodland counterparts.

Birds exposed to higher light levels developed functional testes on average 26 days earlier than control birds.

Photo: Christian Ziegler

Further results suggested that urbanisation may alter the physiological traits of songbirds.

Scientists say the findings highlight the consequences of artificial lighting on the ecology of urban animals.

The findings are published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

Davide Dominoni, from the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Germany and part of the research team told BBC Nature: "We knew that birds in urban areas sing earlier in the morning and breed earlier in season than conspecifics living in rural habitats."

"There was evidence that urban blackbirds showed not only advanced egg-laying date, but the whole reproductive physiology was turned on approximately three weeks before than in rural birds."

The scientists, from the Max Planck Institute and Konstanz University in Germany, measured the nocturnal light levels that eight "free-roaming" European blackbirds (Turdus merula) were exposed to in the field using miniature light loggers.

Read on:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/21430015

Mysterious Virus IDed in Bizarre Bird Deaths

By Tanya Lewis, LiveScience Staff Writer | LiveScience.com 

They were dropping like flies.

One by one, the blackbirds started dying, with no obvious cause. That year, 2001, the birds completely disappeared from the city of Vienna.

The bird population rebounded a few years later, but meanwhile, researchers at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna, started doing some detective work. The team initially suspected West Nile virus might have caused the blackbird die-off, but the tests weren't conclusive.

A closer look revealed the killer was a related pathogen called Usutu virus, but how it arrived in Vienna was a mystery. Now, the scientists have identified that the virus first appeared in Italy in 1996.

"This virus was not very well-known, because it had never been related to any disease," study leaderand pathologist Herbert Weissenböck told LiveScience. When it cropped up in 2001 in Vienna and other parts of Europe, "it was the causative agent of huge avian mortality," he said. 

Feathery surprise

Recently, Weissenböck and his colleagues at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna, learned of a similar mass dying of blackbirds that took place in Tuscany, Italy, five years earlier, in 1996. At the time, the cause was unknown, but scientists at the University of Camerino saved tissue samples from the dead birds in paraffin wax.

Weissenböck's team analyzed the samples and found the same strain of Usutu virus that had hit Vienna. "It was just a guess, because the major species in Italy had been blackbirds as well,"Weissenböck said.

The Vienna scientists sequenced the genetic material from the Tuscany samples and samples from infected Vienna birds, finding a match between the two viruses. A second test, using antibodies for the virus, confirmed the match.

Continued:  http://news.yahoo.com/mysterious-virus-ided-bizarre-bird-deaths-173637362.html

2 leucistic blackbirds in Herefordshire

Leucistic blackbirds in Hereford

January 2013. Wildlife Extra has reported on many leucistic and albino animals and birds in the last few years, but I have never seen one myself, until yesterday. As ever, I wasn't looking for them, or for anything else. I had just dropped by daughter at college and I stopped somewhere I have never been before to walk the dog for 10 minutes.

I caught a flash of something unusual as I walked passed some scrub. A very bright black and white bird, all the wrong size and shape for a blackbird. Naturally, as I was in an urban park I didn't have binoculars or a camera, so I retrieved the 'emergency' camera from the cars glove box, and went back in search.

To cut a long story............ There were two leucistic blackbirds within 30 yards of each other, presumably from the same brood. They were in the scrub, and I didn't have the greatest camera with me (the photos are decidedly average, and that is being harsh on average), but at least I can now join the leucistic club.

Perfect camouflage?
I will go back and try again, but it is now snowing, so for just a few days, they now have perfect camouflage. 

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/leucistic-blackbird-hereford.html

Clamorous City Blackbirds: Birds Can Sing Louder at Higher Frequencies to Make Themselves Heard Over Traffic Noise

Jan. 11, 2013 — Animals have developed a variety of strategies for dealing with increasing noise pollution in their habitats. It is known, for example, that many urban birds sing at a high pitch to differentiate their song from the low-frequency sound of road traffic. However, as scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology discovered, this is just a useful side effect. The real reason for this behaviour is that songs at a higher pitch are also automatically louder. The birds can make themselves heard far better in city noise by increasing the volume of their song than by raising its frequency.

Despite the numerous unfavourable environmental conditions they encounter there, many wild animals have colonised cities as a new habitat. In cities they must deal with greater numbers of humans and with more light and noise pollution than they encounter in rural settings. However, the urban habitat also offers certain advantages, for example a more abundant supply of food and new breeding options. Many animals have thus adapted surprisingly well to city life.

To attract mating partners and defend their territories, urban robins sing in the latter night when the traffic noise decreases after the evening rush. Many other bird species, including blackbirds, sing in urban environments at a higher pitch. So their song is easier to detect in the lower-frequency traffic noise.

Continued:  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/01/130111110916.htm