[TowerTalk] Stupid Birds? NO

Wed Dec 13 06:54:28 EST 2006

This whole bird thing is totally ridiculous.

Birds fly in, under, over, around, and through trees, sit on power lines,
yagis, and every wire that has any elevation (and are a lot harder to see
than a tower) all day every day and then run into towers?  I don't think so.

This thing is just more idiots who get a kick out of CAUSING problems.

My turn on the Soap Box, who's next?
73, Jim

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "AA6DX - Mark" <aa6dx at arrl.net>
To: <rdhinkle at sbcglobal.net>; <towertalk at contesting.com>
Sent: Wednesday, December 13, 2006 12:23 AM
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Commercial Comms Towers and Bird Strikes

> Well .. I think most of this dead bird thing is plain HOOOIE ..   I have
> been working on and around towers since the 60s .. and have NEVER seen any
> avian mortality rates as outlined here.  Even spotted owls are smarter
than
> that!
> Perhaps the 8-land birds are different than the left coast breeds.  Of
> course, dead critters are found now and then .. they all die SOMETIME, and
> .. perhaps by hitting towers or wires.   Or... perhaps holding on to a
steel
> structure is where they prefer to meet their maker.  Have had them commit
> suicide on our windows a few times .. but not many.
> Let me iterate .. I have NEVER seen a preponderance of dead sparrows,
> robins, hawks, gulls, egrets///etc/ around any west coast tower,
commercial
> nor Amateur Radio ... and never had any at all below my VA ( Washington
DC )
> tower on top of a hill.   I would suggest that ZZ perhaps found a bunch of
> dead birds that ingested DDT or the likes, and rested on the "waaars" to
> perish ... were autopsies performed? .. And .. why, oh why, do us here in
> FAR Northern California NOT see this phenomena?  We have lots of towers,
and
> a gaggle of avians .. ???  Tell us why, oh biologist!
> Mark Nelson  -  AA6DX
> mailto: AA6DX at ARRL.NET
>
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: <rdhinkle at sbcglobal.net>
> To: <towertalk at contesting.com>
> Sent: Sunday, December 10, 2006 8:06 PM
> Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Commercial Comms Towers and Bird Strikes
>
>
> OK guys, I'll take a poke at this too.... As a long time ham and
> professional wildlife biologist, I can tell you from personal experience
> that tall communication towers are lethal to songbirds, and in massive
> quantities. On one occasion, I picked up a heaping full bushel of
> neotropical migratory songbirds (warblers, thrushes, orioles, tanagers and
> others) under the nearest TV tower in Lansing Michigan, near the MSU
campus.
> Tall towers continue to kill as many hundreds of thousands of migrating
> songbirds as they move through Central America, Mexico, the US and Canada
> during both spring and fall migrations. Exhaustion only seems to be a
factor
> on foggy nights, when the birds become confused by the lighting.
Otherwise,
> it's mainly direct strikes against the tower itself and the numerous guy
> lines that each tower needs. Nearly all songbirds migrate at night (tough
to
> avoid what you can't see) so most of the fatalities are between dusk and
> dawn. The recent addition of a jillion cell phone towers adds to the
> carnage. One publication states:
> _________________________________________________________
>
> "Lighted communication towers turn out to be one of the more serious
> problems for birds, especially for migratory species that fly at night.
One
> study began its conclusion with, "It is apparent from the analysis of the
> data that significant numbers of birds are dying in collisions with
> communications towers, their guy wires, and related structures." Another
> report states, "The main environmental problem we are watching out for
with
> telecommunication towers are the deaths of birds and bats."
>
> This is not news, as bird collisions with lighted television and radio
> towers have been documented for over 50 years. Some towers are responsible
> for very high episodic fatalities. One television transmitter tower in Eau
> Claire, WI, was responsible for the deaths of over 1,000 birds on each of
24
> consecutive nights. A "record 30,000 birds were estimated killed on one
> night" at this same tower. In Kansas, 10,000 birds were killed in one
night
> by a telecommunications tower. Numerous large bird kills, while not as
> dramatic as the examples cited above, continue to occur across the country
> at telecommunication tower sites.
>
> The number of telecommunication towers in the U.S. currently exceeds
77,000,
> and this number could easily double by 2010. The rush to construction is
> being driven mainly by our use of cell phones, and to a lesser extent by
the
> impending switch to digital television and radio. Current mortality
> estimates due to telecommunication towers are 40 to 50 million birds per
> year. The proliferation of these towers in the near future will only
> exacerbate this situation. "
> ___________________________________________________________
>
> The mechanisms involved in migration by various species remain poorly
> understood, whether magnetic fields or celestial navigation (night) or
light
> polarization, landmarks, magnetic fields, regional low frequency sounds or
> other means (day), most migratory methods seem to lead massive flocks of
> individual or mixed species along "ancestral" migration routes. When we
put
> up a tall tower, they fly into it. The addition of many new towers to the
> additional losses from constant habitat loss result in a marked, long-term
> decline in migratory songbird numbers. I don't think that most ham towers
> are tall enough to contribute significantly to bird strike losses, though
> certainly some occur. Perhaps the switch to commercial satellite radio,
TV,
> voice and data comms and other communications will bring the day when the
> iron comes down and the skies are clear again.
>
> If you want to see something impressive, start watching Doppler Radar
> reports from the Cuba-Florida-Georgia region starting in early April
through
> early May, and see hundreds of millions of songbirds lift off as darkness
> falls each evening and head north. On one hand, it's a pretty stunning
radar
> report; on the other hand, it shows us how finite songbird populations
are.
>
>
> Bob Hinkle, KK8ZZ
> Solon, Ohio 44139
> Grid: EN91gj
>
>
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