New controversy over Malta's bird slaughter

Island MP Karmenu Vella nominated as European commissioner to head green policies, including wildlife protection

Robin McKie, science editor

The Observer, Saturday 27 September 2014 20.31 BST

Karmenu Vella has unusual credentials for a man selected to be the next European commissioner for the environment. The 64-year-old politician is a long-serving member of Malta's Labour government, which is accused of direct involvement in the widespread slaughter of birdlife on the island – including many endangered species.

Every spring and autumn, thousands of migratory birds – including quails, song thrushes and brood eagles – pass over Malta as they fly between northern Europe and Africa, only to be greeted by thousands of local hunters who gather in trucks bearing slogans like "If it flies it dies". They duly open fire on the birds.

"Turtle doves have suffered a catastrophic decline in western Europe, including Britain. Yet the Maltese government continues to allow them to be shot in their thousands every year," said Andre Farrar of the RSPB. "This slaughter has widespread implications and involves dozens of rare species, many of them regular visitors to the British Isles."

Campaigners say Malta's bird culls, which have intensified over the last two years, have been specifically encouraged by its Labour government. For example, new rules have extended shooting curfews, which previously limited the hours when hunters are permitted to fire at birds each day. Such moves have helped make Malta the ecological pariah of Europe.

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Threatened birds of prey 'vanish' - via Mike Playfair

By Claire Marshall

BBC environment correspondent

Two of the rarest birds of prey in England, which had been satellite tagged, have vanished in unexplained circumstances, conservationists say.

The young female hen harriers had left their nest sites in Lancashire only a few weeks ago.

Named Sky and Hope, they were among the first hen harrier chicks to fledge in England since 2012.

Last year, no chicks were born after the only two nesting pairs failed to breed.

As part of an ongoing conservation project, Sky and Hope had been fitted with lightweight solar-powered tags.

Scientists examining the satellite data became worried when their tags stopped transmitting. Sky's signal stopped suddenly on 10 September and Hope's signal died three days later.

Searches of the area have failed to find any trace of them.

The tracking devices are designed to operate for at least three years. The scientists say it's "improbable" that this is due to technical failure. The more likely cause is that the birds were killed by other animal predators, or humans.

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Dying brain cells cue new brain cells to grow in songbird

Date:

September 23, 2014

Source:

University of Washington

Summary:

Using a songbird as a model, scientists have described a brain pathway that replaces cells that have been lost naturally and not because of injury. If scientists can further tap into the process, it might lead to ways to encourage replacement of cells in human brains that have lost neurons naturally because of aging or Alzheimer's disease.

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Dinosaur family tree gives fresh insight into rapid rise of birds

Date:

September 25, 2014

Source:

Swarthmore College

Summary:

The study shows that the familiar anatomical features of birds – such as feathers, wings and wishbones – all first evolved piecemeal in their dinosaur ancestors over tens of millions of years. However, once a fully functioning bird body shape was complete, an evolutionary explosion began, causing a rapid increase in the rate at which birds evolved. This led eventually to the thousands of avian species that we know today.

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Tempers flare as Malta temporarily bans legal hunting season

Following the illegal shooting of a rare juvenile white stork, and the growing body of support for the campaign against illegal hunting, the Maltese government has decided to temporarily close the autumn legal hunting season until 10 October.

This move is to prevent illegal hunters using the legal hunting season as a cover to shoot endangered birds.

“The urge to target these protected species is something we continue seeing each and every time rare visitors, such as storks, grace these islands,” said Nicholas Barbara, BirdLife Malta’s Conservation Manager. 

The ringed stork was a migrant from a reintroduction project in Udine, Italy that was set up by the local community to help stork repopulate the area.

“This is a loss of great significance as we would have expected the bird to return to Fagagna in a few years to breed,” said Bruno Dentesani the project’s scientific ringer.

“This was its first migration, I’m very sad to hear of this news.”

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Natural selection causes early migration, shorter parental care for shorebirds

Date:

September 25, 2014

Source:

De Gruyter

Summary:

All bird migrations are fraught with danger – from the risk of not finding enough food, to facing stormy weather, and most importantly – trying not to be eaten along the way. Raptors such as peregrine falcons are the main predators of migratory birds, and huge flocks of congregating shorebirds can be easy pickings. In a new paper, researchers provide new evidence that shorebird species can adopt substantially different ways of dealing with this predation pressure.

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Migratory shorebirds could face extinction within a decade

Migrating shorebirds that travel to Australia from Siberia are under serious threat from development, which is destroying the vital feeding grounds they rely on during the epic journey.

Director of Deakin University’s Centre for Integrative Ecology Professor Marcel Klaassen, along with other researchers, is examining the migratory behaviour of shorebirds to see how they cope with changes in their environments. Their findings to date have been concerning, and reveal that there has been a dramatic drop in the number of migratory shorebirds arriving in Australia.

Alarmed by the statistics, Klaassen states, “The rate of decline among some of these bird species is such a dramatic drop in numbers as to be truly depressing. For instance, the rate of decline in numbers of one of these, the Curlew sandpiper, is a staggering 10 per cent per year which means they face extinction within a decade.’’

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