US birds: still in major trouble - March 20, 2009
A "State of the Birds" report released by the US federal government yesterday estimates that a third of the United States’ roughly 800 bird species are in danger.
The report is, in a word, depressing. It is the summation of a slew of depressing bird censuses, which together encompass 40 years worth of data. (Here are a couple of our previous posts on bird losses in the US and elsewhere.) US Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said the report “should be a call to action” (New York Times).
Half of the shorebird species have declined over the last four decades, and birds that breed in grasslands have dropped 40%. Also in trouble: any native bird on the islands of Hawai’i (including the Hawaiian crow, shown at right), which are threatened not only by human encroachment but by an army of invasive species. Kenneth Rosenberg of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology called Hawai’i “a borderline ecological disaster” (Reuters).
The usual culprits are to blame: loss of habitat, pollution, etc. But one Associated Press article provides a bizarre spin on the report by pinning much of the blame on alternative energy efforts. True, the report does mention wind turbines, but to my quick read it looks like much more space is spent discussing the consequences of traditional energy pursuits, such as oil spills and mountaintop removal.
Image: US Fish and Wildlife Service
