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.

Sunday, 16 October 2016

Saving two adult eagles per year to save the population of this endangered species




Date: September 29, 2016
Source: Universidad de Barcelona

Dying due to electrocution at the power lines is the most common death for Bonelli's eagle (Aquila fasciata), a threatened species in Europe. This is the case of a ringed bird in 2008 -- the baby bird 0M -- in Montserrat Mountain (Barcelona, Spain), that died due to electrocution in 2014 in a place with high density of power lines in a place in Penedès where the baby lived. Electrocution was the same death cause for another ringed eagle -- baby bird CD -- in Vallès mountains in 2013 and found dead in 2015 at the bottom of an electric tower in Empordà (Girona, Spain).

These are only two examples of the 92 Bonelli's eagles that died due to electrocution in Catalonia from 1990 to 2014, a problem that has big effects on birds around the world. In other parts of the peninsula, this affects other species with great ecological value, such as the Spanish imperial eagle (Aquila adalberti), and another of the most threatened species around the world. In the United States, one of the most affected species is the American bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus), considered to be the national symbol of a country where there are around 12 and 64 million bird deaths due to power lines (around 11 million electrocutions).


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