As regular CFZ-watchers will know, for some time Corinna has been doing a column for Animals & Men and a regular segment on On The Track... particularly about out-of-place birds and rare vagrants. There seem to be more and more bird stories from all over the world hitting the news these days so, to make room for them all - and to give them all equal and worthy coverage - she has set up this new blog to cover all things feathery and Fortean.

Monday, 1 October 2012

Battelle fined for destroying bird nests, eggs

Battelle has agreed to pay a fine of $96,800 after hundreds of bank swallow nests and thousands of eggs were destroyed during construction of a new laboratory in Richland.

The money will go to the nonprofit National Fish and Wildlife Foundation for purchasing or restoring shrub-steppe habitat in the Mid-Columbia, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Washington.

Destroying the nests and eggs during the construction of the new Physical Sciences Facility for Pacific Northwest National Laboratory was a violation of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. Battelle operates the national lab in Richland for the Department of Energy.

The problem occurred after topsoil from the construction site was piled up in 2007 for later use in landscaping. In 2009, a subcontractor on the project removed some of the topsoil from the pile, creating a vertical space ideal for the nesting burrows dug by bank swallows.

On June 21, 2010, four college interns noticed the bank swallow nesting colony in the pile of topsoil. One of the interns emailed an electronic link to a senior research scientist, but the email did not say where the nesting colony was or indicate there was any threat, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Read more here: http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2012/09/29/2117682/battelle-fined-for-destroying.html#storylink=cpy




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