Chicago tops list of most dangerous cities for migrating birds

Date:  April 1, 2019

Source:  Cornell University

An estimated 600 million birds die from building collisions every year in the U.S., and research from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology offers one explanation for it.

A team led by Kyle Horton, a Rose postdoctoral fellow at the lab, ranked metropolitan areas where, due to a combination of light pollution and geography, birds are at the greatest risk of becoming attracted to and disoriented by lights and crashing into buildings.

Among their findings: While migration routes vary depending on the season, the same three large cities in the central U.S. -- Chicago, Houston and Dallas -- top both the spring and autumn lists of most dangerous for migrating birds.

"Those three cities are uniquely positioned in the heart of North America's most trafficked aerial corridors. This, in combination with being some of the largest cities in the U.S., makes them a serious threat to the passage of migrants, regardless of season," Horton said.

Research associate Andrew Farnsworth is senior author of "Bright Lights in the Big Cities: Migratory Birds' Exposure to Artificial Light," published April 1 in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. The work combines satellite data showing light pollution levels with weather radar data measuring bird migration density.

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The invisible killer threatening millions of migrating birds

By Aidan LewisBBC News, Washington

Every year, hundreds of millions of birds are killed or injured when they fly into windows. Volunteers who document the collisions are now calling for architects and landlords to make their buildings more bird friendly to reduce the number of deaths.

Sometimes birds see plants or empty spaces beyond the windows - sometimes they just see the reflection of the sky or trees, but not the glass itself.

Most tend to cruise at 20-30mph (32-48kph) - if they hit a window at that speed the impact is usually fatal as their beak is jammed back into the brain.

Although collisions can happen anywhere, they are most common in cities where big glass buildings proliferate.

Local birds seem to learn where they can fly safely but migratory songbirds such as warblers, thrushes and sparrows have a particular problem identifying glass.

They usually fly by night when they are less visible to predators and use the stars to navigate - but they appear to get confused by the illumination of towns and cities below.

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Deadly toxin killing loons and other water birds at beginning of St. Lawrence River

Friday, December 6, 2013 - 3:08 pm

A natural toxin is killing migrating water birds near where Lake Ontario empties into the St. Lawrence River, according to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

Type E botulism struck the eastern basin of Lake Ontario this fall resulting in sizeable mortality in migrating waterbirds, said a DEC report.

Reports from the public and field investigations by DEC crews indicate that at least 200-300 common loons have washed ashore along Jefferson and northern Oswego County shorelines.

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Autumn’s first migrating protected birds shot at – BirdLife

Some of this autumn’s first migrating birds have already been shot at and killed by illegal hunters in four different locations around Malta over the past two days, BirdLife Malta said in a statement this afternoon.

BLM said that “yesterday, a member of the public reported seeing an early migrating Marsh Harrier, one of the first seen this season, being shot three times by a man at Zonqor Point in Marsascala. The man was then seen collecting the shot bird and walking off with it.”

“Then, this morning, a flock of herons was seen, again in Marsascala, and again a member of public reported that shots were fired at the birds as they passed. Later in the day another report of herons being shot at was received, this time from Qawra Point, just next to a popular bathing spot,” BLM said.

BirdLife Malta said that this afternoon it received a Night Heron that had “evidently been hit by shotgun pellets that left a hole in its left wing. The injured heron was immediately taken to a vet, but the wound was so severe that it had to be put down.”

BLM pointed out that “these incidents come just days after the Government announced a four hour roll back of the curfew on hunting during afternoons during the peak migration period in September.”

Nicholas Barbara, Conservation Manager of BirdLife Malta said, “No sooner do migrating birds appear over Malta than they are shot at, proving that more controls to prevent illegal shooting of birds are required, not less.”

http://gozonews.com/40362/autumns-first-migrating-protected-birds-shot-at-birdlife/

Arizona Water Pumping Decision Threatens Millions of Birds, Group Charges

EDIA RELEASE

Contact: Robert Johns, 202-234-7181 ext.210, Email click here

(Washington, D.C., May 3, 2013) American Bird Conservancy (ABC), one of the nation’s leading bird conservation groups, has called on Arizona Governor Janice Brewer to overturn the decision by the Arizona Department of Water Resources that approved a groundwater pumping plan that runs the risk of drying a southern Arizona river, the San Pedro, part of which was formally designated in 1995 as the nation’s first Globally Important Bird Area and remains today a critical stopover point for millions of migrating birds.

The May 3, 2013 letter from ABC Vice President for Conservation Advocacy Darin Schroeder asked Gov. Brewer to “...exercise your gubernatorial authority and reverse this ill-considered approval by your administration’s Department of Water Resources to effectively drain the San Pedro River in order to support the unsustainable growth of Sierra Vista.”

The letter conveyed that ABC had thoroughly reviewed the Pueblo Del Sol Water Company’s groundwater pumping plan and “concluded it poses a serious and substantial threat to millions of migratory birds, many of which are protected under the federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act. We are particularly concerned that the groundwater pumping would negatively impact the designated Critical Habitat for the Southwestern Willow Flycatcher, which is protected under the Endangered Species Act.”

The San Pedro is one of the last major undammed rivers in the American Southwest, Schroeder said, and exhibits a remarkably intact riparian ecosystem. An approximately 40-mile reach of the upper San Pedro River between the international boundary and St. David is encompassed by the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area (SPRNCA), one of only two RNCAs in the United States. The BLM has also opposed the water-pumping plan.

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Beaufort County pushing for birds to soar to new heights

Birds of a feather are starting to flock together in Beaufort County.

The birds I'm talking about are people -- bird people.

Bird people have set the standard here. In the old days, they came from all over to shoot quail. Today they come to observe a wide variety of birds. And in between, many of the new residents who turned rural Beaufort County into a busy place set the standard by appreciating and protecting the wildlife through land conservation, education and field trips.

Now more than ever, the bird people are flapping in the same direction.

Pete Richards of the Fripp Island Audubon Club tells me there is growing cooperation among his club and the Hilton Head Audubon Club and the Sun City Bird Club.


Read more: http://www.islandpacket.com/2012/09/25/2224054/beaufort-county-pushing-for-birds.html