From: https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/09/three-billion-north-american-birds-have-vanished-1970-surveys-show
Shorebirds such as sanderlings may be dwindling because of habitat loss.
Three billion North American birds have vanished since 1970, surveys show
North America's birds are disappearing from the skies at a rate that's shocking even to ornithologists. Since the 1970s, the continent has lost 3 billion birds, nearly 30% of the total, and even common birds such as sparrows and blackbirds are in decline, U.S. and Canadian researchers report this week online in Science. "It's staggering," says first author Ken Rosenberg, a conservation scientist at the Cornell University Laboratory of Ornithology. The findings raise fears that some familiar species could go the way of the passenger pigeon, a species once so abundant that its extinction in the early 1900s seemed unthinkable.
The results, from the most comprehensive inventory ever done of North American birds, point to ecosystems in disarray because of habitat loss and other factors that have yet to be pinned down, researchers say. Yet ecologist Paul Ehrlich at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, who has been warning about shrinking plant and animal populations for decades, sees some hope in this new jolt of bad news: "It might stir needed action in light of the public interest in our feathered friends."
In past decades, Ehrlich and others have documented the decline of particular bird groups, including migratory songbirds. But 5 years ago, Rosenberg; Peter Marra, a conservation biologist now at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.; and their colleagues decided to take a broader look at what is happening in North America's skies. They first turned to the North American Breeding Bird Survey, an annual spring census carried out by volunteers across Canada and the United States, which has amassed decades of data about 420 bird species. The team also drew on the Audubon Christmas Bird Count for data on about 55 species found in boreal forests and the Arctic tundra, and on the International Shorebird Survey for trends in shorebirds such as sandpipers and plovers. Aerial surveys of water bodies, swamps, and marshes filled out the picture for waterfowl. All together, they studied 529 bird species, about three-quarters of all species in North America, accounting for more than 90% of the entire bird population.
I would imagine climate change is having an impact on bird populations. It is distressing as most news is these days.
ReplyDeleteAnd pesticides and development, too.
DeleteUK is similar. Many things supoosedly to blame, but pesticides on farms is reported to be one of them. Under UE rules, a strip of uncultivated land all around each field must be left. This helps, of course, but if we actually do leave the EU. one supposes that this will fall by the wayside. We have hedges on each side of our garden (yard), and we have nests every year. We don't cut or even trim the hedges until September, so that there is no chance of disturbing a late nest. We also grow shrubs that have berries; we leave seed heads on all the last of the flowers and don't cut them down until our spring clean-up. This helps with feeding. I guess Americans who care about things do the same, eh? Sad what the planet is coming to, and only ourselves to blame. But at least I feel we can do our best, tell others and hope it rubs off on them.
ReplyDeleteBut I was really surprised by the percentage in the States - there is still so much wilderness and national parks. I mean - ONE THIRD?????
Truly shocking. I think development must play a big part. Even in our rural area, the big stores have come in over the last 20 years and taken over what used to be known as the meadow. In fact the street is still named that, and we all speak of going down to the meadow. I knew it when it was that. Birds do nest in the ceilings/roofs of the big stores.
DeleteThere has been a lot on Gardeners' World about the situation in England. And of the importance of everyone's garden.
Interesting that you mention the rule ending with Brexit. Somehow I've had it in my head that it was the EU that brought about big field, mono culture farming, with not as many hedgerows. Do I have that wrong??
Sad but true.
ReplyDeleteYes.
DeleteI read this article the other day and find this so sad and disturbing.
ReplyDeleteEvery one of us must do what we can in our own yards and acres.
DeleteI just read about this today, too. It's heartbreaking.
ReplyDeleteYes, it is.
DeleteHeartbreaking. And more pesticides and herbicides are used for home yards than for agriculture in the US.
ReplyDeleteIsn't that just unbelievable. It seems that the lessons of organic gardening written about decades and decades ago weren't learned. And there is so much press now about not killing every weed and not having such big lawns. I'm appalled. And of course, now so many people have landscape people who come take care of their places. We are so out of touch with the natural world. It kills me.
DeleteSad and terrifying to think that we are letting this happen. And another more recent cause is all of those massive wind farms spread throughout the country that kill thousands of birds every day, including bald eagles by the score.
ReplyDeleteI've wondered about this. All the talk is alternative energy - solar which most of us can't afford, and wind which does such horrors. And now there is the anti-wood group that says we are poluting. Excuse me. Shaking my head here.
DeleteI have no words. It is so very sad.
ReplyDeleteIt sure is.
DeleteThis makes me so sad. I've noticed this more the last 2 years but, I thought it was because we had to remove our bird feeders because of condo rules bears in the area.
ReplyDeleteCondos don't allow bird feeders?!! What?
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