Hawaiian Petrel. Obesity in Parrots. Plastic Trash Kills. Wind Farm Deaths. Owl Stuck In Truck. Swallows and Sky Larks ... Bees Find Mines. ME Alewives Unblocked. Great Emigration.

 

For “Winged Wednesday”, that includes birds, bees, and fish too, as they have water wings!

Hawaiian Petrel

“The Hawaiian Petrel is called `Ua`u in Hawaiian for its haunting call, “oo ah oo,” heard after sunset near its nesting colonies. The bird’s striking dark and light plumage is easily seen at sea, where its white wing linings and belly flash during its typical “roller-coaster” flight. Male and female `Ua`u share incubation and chick-feeding duties during the nearly four months the chicks spend in their burrows between hatching and fledging.

The `Ua`u is threatened by introduction of non-native predators such as rats and cats to its nesting islands. The birds are also attracted to artificial lights, which puts them at risk of collision with power lines, guy wires, and other man-made structures. Hawaiian Petrels may also become disoriented and blinded by lights and drop to the ground, where they are easily taken by predators or hit by vehicles.

Satellite tracking studies in 2006-2008 revealed that adult `Ua`u fly huge, clock-wise circuits around the north Pacific Ocean during foraging trips. Breeding birds may traverse more than 6,000 miles in two weeks before returning to their burrows to feed their chicks.

ABC is collaborating with the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Park Service, and other partners to secure predator-free breeding habitat for `Ua`u and other seabirds on high islands in Hawai’i.

You can help the Hawaiian Petrel by joining our Spring 2013 Fundraising Challenge. We urgently need your support to conserve the Native Forests of Hawai’i and other critical bird habitats!”    Photo by Jim Denny, kauaibirds.com; Range Map by ABC

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The Health Dangers of Obesity in Parrots

“Baby is a female blue-fronted Amazon parrot who is 24 years young. When Dr. Becker met Baby, she had dull feathers, signs of over-grooming, large fat deposits on her breastbone, and several fatty masses called lipomas on both legs.

Baby was overweight from a combination of a sedentary lifestyle and a diet that consisted almost entirely of high fat seeds – her favorite food. Since obesity in birds often leads to hepatic lipidosis (fatty liver disease), Dr. Becker did some blood tests and determined that indeed, Baby’s liver function was compromised.

Baby was transitioned from her all-seed diet to a much more nutritious diet of fresh living foods and organic bird pellets. She also began taking milk thistle to support the detoxification and regeneration of liver cells.

Fortunately, Baby took to her new, healthy diet quite well and relatively quickly. Within six months, her liver function had returned to normal.

Also in this article, Dr. Becker offers tips for all bird owners on optimizing their pet’s environment and removing environmental stressors.”      Complete article at: http://healthypets.mercola.com/sites/healthypets/archive/2013/05/17/restoring-babys-health.aspx

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Stop Coca-Cola trashing Australia (or Anywhere)

 

“Coca-Cola is blocking a recycling scheme. Take action, http://bit.ly/stoptrashingaus_yt, ask your MP to support a national 'Cash for Containers' scheme.
In March, Coca-Cola won its court case to stop a popular and proven 10 cent recycling refund scheme in the Northern Territory -- a program that has already doubled recycling rates in the territory, and operated successfully in South Australia for over 30 years saving tens of millions of plastic containers from ending up in our beaches and oceans.
This loose rubbish is estimated to affect up to 65% of Australian seabirds. Some mistake the plastic for food. When they swallow too much, their tiny stomachs become so full they're unable to ingest any food -- literally starving to death on a full stomach.”

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Obama administration allows wind farms to kill eagles, birds, despite federal laws

(Dina Cappiello/ Associated Press ) - In this April 18, 2013, photo, a golden eagle is seen flying over a wind turbine on Duke energy’s top of the world windfarm in Converse County Wyo.  It’s the not-so-green secret of the nation’s wind-energy boom: Spinning turbines are killing thousands of federally protected birds, including eagles, each year.

CONVERSE COUNTY, Wyo. — “Wind farms in this corner of Wyoming have killed more than four dozen golden eagles since 2009, one of the deadliest places in the country of its kind.

But so far, the companies operating industrial-sized turbines here and elsewhere that are killing eagles and other protected birds have yet to be fined or prosecuted - even though every death is a criminal violation.

The Obama administration has charged oil companies for drowning birds in their waste pits, and power companies for electrocuting birds on power lines.

But the administration has never fined or prosecuted a wind-energy company, even those that flout the law repeatedly.

“What it boils down to is this: If you electrocute an eagle, that is bad, but if you chop it to pieces, that is OK,” said Tim Eicher, a former U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service enforcement agent based in Cody.

It’s a double standard that some Republicans in Congress said Tuesday they would examine after an Associated Press investigation revealed that the Obama administration has shielded the wind power industry from liability and helped keep the scope of the deaths secret.

The result is a green industry that’s allowed to do not-so-green things.

More than 573,000 birds are killed by the country’s wind farms each year, including 83,000 hunting birds such as hawks, falcons and eagles, according to an estimate published in March in the peer-reviewed Wildlife Society Bulletin.”  More at: http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-05-14/business/39237918_1_obama-administration-energy-companies-wind-farms

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Owl unharmed after getting hit, stuck in truck grille

CHERRYVILLE, NC (WBTV) - “A Gaston County woman says her daughter's Sweet Sixteen will be one that she'll never forget after the pair struck an owl with their truck.  Ms Mullins was driving home from the town's high school with her daughter Allison, where they had been decorating for Allison's 16th birthday the next day.

The bird flew into the path of truck, so Ms Mullins pulled over into a gas station where police freed the owl. It flew straight into a window - but recouped and took off into the night. During the midnight commotion, Allison turned 16. This is the moment the owl escaped from the front grille of the truck - and flew away unharmed.

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Upcoming Shows:

Swallows and Sky Larks ...

 

Barn Swallow

SUNDAY
Barn Swallow Splendor
by Bob Sundstrom
LISTEN NOW ►

Ovenbird

MONDAY
Spring Birds Arrive
In the Eastern Forest
by Bob Sundstrom
LISTEN NOW ►

Exploring Wenas

TUESDAY
Celebrating 50 years and One Rare Bird at Wenas
featuring Hazel Wolf
LISTEN NOW ►

Anna's Hummingbird

WEDNESDAY
Stand-still Birding
by Ellen Blackstone
LISTEN NOW ►

Eastern Meadowlark

THURSDAY
Restoring Prairies for Grassland Birds
featuring Tom Vanderpoel & Citizens For Conservation
LISTEN NOW ►

Skylark

FRIDAY
Skylark -
With Aretha Franklin
by Chris Peterson
LISTEN NOW ►

Hermit Thrush

SATURDAY
Three Brown Thrushes
by Bob Sundstrom
LISTEN

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About our other winged friends, the Bees:

Honeybees trained in Croatia to find land mines

AP Photo/Darko Bandic

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) -- Mirjana Filipovic is still haunted by the land mine blast that killed her boyfriend and blew off her left leg while on a fishing trip nearly a decade ago. It happened in a field that was supposedly de-mined.

Now, unlikely heroes may be coming to the rescue to prevent similar tragedies: sugar-craving honeybees. Croatian researchers are training them to find unexploded mines littering their country and the rest of the Balkans.”  More at: http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/05/19/honeybees-trained-in-croatia-to-find-land-mines/

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About our water winged friends, the fish:

Victory for a Heritage Fish of New England

Removal of river blockade will help restore alewives in the Gulf of Maine.  Alewives are ecologically, economically, historically, and culturally important to the St. Croix River basin and the entire Gulf of Maine ecosystem.  (FWS)

Portland, ME — “A new law that takes effect today will remove a blockade across a U.S.-Canadian border river erected nearly two decades ago that prevented alewives (river herring) from returning to their historic spawning habitat. The impediment (now understood as an ecological mistake) was established in 1995 at the request of sport fishing guides, who accused river herring of competing with them for smallmouth bass

More at: http://earthjustice.org/news/press/2013/victory-for-a-heritage-fish-of-new-england

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On This Day:

Great Emigration departs for Oregon, May 22, 1843:

“A massive wagon train, made up of 1,000 settlers and 1,000 head of cattle, sets off down the Oregon Trail from Independence, Missouri. Known as the "Great Emigration," the expedition came two years after the first modest party of settlers made the long, overland journey to Oregon.

Although U.S. sovereignty over the Oregon Territory was not clearly established until 1846, American fur trappers and missionary groups had been living in the region for decades. Dozens of books and lectures proclaimed Oregon's agricultural potential, tweaking the interest of American farmers. The first overland immigrants to Oregon, intending primarily to farm, came in 1841 when a small band of 70 pioneers left Independence, Missouri. They followed a route blazed by fur traders, which took them west along the Platte River through the Rocky Mountains via the easy South Pass in Wyoming and then northwest to the Columbia River. In the years to come, pioneers came to call the route the Oregon Trail

In 1842, a slightly larger group of 100 pioneers made the 2,000-mile journey to Oregon. The next year, however, the number of emigrants skyrocketed to 1,000. The sudden increase was a product of a severe depression in the Midwest combined with a flood of propaganda from fur traders, missionaries, and government officials extolling the virtues of the land. Farmers dissatisfied with their prospects in Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, and Tennessee, hoped to find better lives in the supposed paradise of Oregon.

On this day in 1843, some 1,000 men, women, and children climbed aboard their wagons and steered their horses west out of the small town of Elm Grove, Missouri. The train comprised more than 100 wagons with a herd of 5,000 oxen and cattle trailing behind. Dr. Elijah White, a Presbyterian missionary who had made the trip the year before, served as guide.

The first section of the Oregon Trail ran through the relatively flat country of the Great Plains. Obstacles were few, though the river crossings could be dangerous for wagons. The danger of Indian attacks was a small but genuine risk. To be on the safe side, the pioneers drew their wagons into a circle at night to create a makeshift stockade. If they feared Indians might raid their livestock—the Plains tribes valued the horses, though generally ignored the oxen—they would drive the animals into the enclosure.

Although many neophyte pioneers believed Indians were their greatest threat, they quickly learned that they were more likely to be injured or killed by a host of more mundane causes. Obstacles included accidental discharge of firearms, falling off mules or horses, drowning in river crossings, and disease. After entering the mountains, the trail also became much more difficult, with steep ascents and descents over rocky terrain. The pioneers risked injury from overturned and runaway wagons.

Yet, as with the 1,000-person party that made the journey in 1843, the vast majority of pioneers on the trail survived to reach their destination in the fertile, well-watered land of western Oregon, completing the 2,000-mile journey from Independence in five months. The migration of 1844 was smaller than that of the previous season, but in 1845 it jumped to nearly 3,000. Thereafter, migration on the Oregon Trail was an annual event, although the practice of traveling in giant convoys of wagons gave way to many smaller bands of one or two-dozen wagons. The trail was heavily traveled until 1884, when the Union Pacific constructed a railway along the route.”

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Yesterday:

Misty and I went to get Jay, and had our walk down there, then Jay and I went to Kroger’s to pick up my prescription.  The doctor had told me to take it at the same time each day with a meal, so that turned out to be lunch time.  Four more days to go.

It rained again in the night, and everything got wet on my screen porch.  The new roofing doesn’t have weather seal and flashing between it and the original shingled roof yet, so it leaked.

Jay did some more to the roof extension over my front porch, and I keep on telling him that I don't like the way it looks.  It is supposed to be an asset to the front of this house, but to me it looks terrible.  If I were proud of it, you know I would have been posting pictures!! 

Right now, it is just a waste of good material.  We are going to have a good talk about this today.