Tag: wildlife

Research Exposes Wind Projects Cause Approx. 70% of Animals to Become Displaced

Numerous issues have been identified with wind turbines installed on land as well as offshore – economic (see 1, 2, 3, 4), environmental (see 1, 2), health, and safety.  In regard to the environment, last month, a court in France ordered the dismantling of a wind farm because of its adverse impact on local birds.  More recently scientists concurred again that wind turbines have a negative effect on wildlife.

The transition to renewable energy is central to our efforts to build a low-carbon future. But it is not without its own environmental downsides, as highlighted by a new review showing that the majority of birds and mammals studied to date are displaced from their habitats by wind-power developments.

Wildlife and wind turbines are an uncomfortable mix. Rotating turbine blades can make short work of anything unlucky enough to collide with them, but direct mortality is only part of the story. Having reviewed the available evidence from around the world, biologists in Finland have found that 63 per cent of bird species, 72 per cent of bats and 67 per cent of terrestrial mammals are displaced from areas where turbines are installed.

Some of the most pronounced effects were found among owls, cranes and reindeer, which were displaced an average of 5km from wind-power developments.

Anne Tolvanen of the Natural Resources Institute Finland, a co-author of the study published in the journal Biological Conservation, says that more data on more species is required if the impacts of new wind farms on the most vulnerable species are to be minimised. “The problem is that the research always comes a bit too late,” she says.

Some of the most pronounced effects were found among owls, cranes and reindeer, which were displaced an average of 5km from wind-power developments.

According to Will Cresswell, professor of biology at the University of St Andrews, who was not involved in the work, the paper “shows the profound effects” of wind-power developments on natural habitats. But he suggests that such impacts can be mitigated. “In short, put turbines in the right place,” he says. “Agricultural land – already compromised in terms of biodiversity and with high disturbance – is ideal, producing both energy and food from the same loss of natural habitat more or less.

“But then the real issue with onshore turbines presents itself, at least in the UK: ‘not in my back yard,’” adds Cresswell. “This is of course another classic disturbance/avoidance effect, but at least humans, being rational, can see the logic of ‘better in my back yard, than in the national park or nature reserve.’”

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Federal Agency Says Offshore Wind Farm Will Likely “adversely affect” Whales and Other Marine Mammals

Opposition to offshore wind projects is increasing worldwide and not only because dead whales and other marine life keep washing up on beaches (see 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8).  While some still don’t believe that whales and other marine life are being affected by offshore wind development, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently confirmed that they are – just not that badly.

The lone remaining offshore wind project in New Jersey with preliminary approval is likely to “adversely affect” whales and other marine mammals, but its construction, operation and eventual dismantling will not seriously harm or kill them, a federal scientific agency said.

In a biological opinion issued Monday night, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the Atlantic Shores project, to be built off the state’s southern coast, is not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of any species of endangered whales, sea turtles, or fish.

Nor is it anticipated to destroy or adversely modify any designated critical habitat, the agency said.

Jennifer Daniels, the company’s development director, called NOAA’s decision “the next step forward” for the project.

It’s “a testament to the five years and 40-plus environmental assessments completed to ensure we are delivering safe, reliable, renewable power in a way that prioritizes responsible ocean development,” Daniels wrote.

The ruling is nearly identical to one the agency issued in April for the now-canceled Ocean Wind I and II projects, which would have been built in the same general area.

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‘I’ve never seen anything like this’: Japan says reason behind 1,200 tonnes of fish washing ashore is unknown

Officials in Japan have admitted they are struggling to determine why hundreds of tonnes of fish have washed ashore in recent days.

Earlier this month, an estimated 1,200 tonnes of sardines and mackerel were found floating on the surface of the sea off the fishing port of Hakodate in Hokkaido, forming a silver blanket stretching for more than a kilometre.

On Wednesday, officials in Nakiri, a town on the Pacific coast hundreds of miles south of Hokkaido, were confronted with 30 to 40 tonnes of Japanese scaled sardines, or sappa, which had been observed in the area a couple of days earlier.

Local fishers scrambled to collect the fish, fearing their carcasses would lower the oxygen content of the water as they decompose and damage the marine environment.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” a fisher who has worked in the area for 25 years told the Mainichi Shimbun. “It was only around last year that we began to catch sappa in Nakiri. It makes me wonder if the marine ecosystem is changing.”

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Thousands of tons of dead fish wash ashore in Japan – three months after the nation released treated Fukushima radioactive water into the sea

Thousands of tons of dead fish have washed up on a beach in northern Japan, prompting speculation that the release of treated radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear plant has wrought havoc on local ecosystems. 

The sardines and some mackerel washed ashore in Hakodate on Japan’s northernmost main island of Hokkaido on Thursday morning, creating an unsettling sliver blanket that covered almost a mile of shoreline. 

Officials could not come up with an explanation for the phenomenon, but Takashi Fujioka, a Hakodate Fisheries Research Institute researcher, posited a number of theories as to why the fish could have died en-masse.

He said they may have become exhausted due to a lack of oxygen while moving in a densely packed school in shallow waters, or may have suddenly entered cold waters during their migration and succumbed to shock.

There have been several recorded cases of similar phenomena springing up on several parts of Japan’s coastline.

But this particular phenomenon occurred just three months after Japanese authorities began releasing treated radioactive water back into the sea – a move which angered its neighbours including China and South Korea.

China has since banned Japanese seafood and criticised the country as being ‘extremely selfish and irresponsible’, with the Chinese Communist Party’s flagship newspaper The Global Times writing it could open ‘Pandora’s box’ and trigger fears of a ‘real-life Godzilla’. 

South Korean protestors also attempted to enter the Japanese embassy in Seoul carrying banners which read ‘The sea is not Japan’s trash bin’.

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More Than A Hundred Bird Species About To Be Renamed Because … Racism

More than a hundred bird species are about to be renamed because their monikers have been deemed “offensive” and “exclusionary” by some due to their connection to the “racist” pasts of the people who the birds were named after.

The American Ornithological Society, an organization responsible for standardizing English bird names across the Americas, announced on Wednesday that dozens of birds in U.S. and Canada will be renamed because birds who were named in honor of people can be upsetting to some, The New York Times reported.

“There is power in a name, and some English bird names have associations with the past that continue to be exclusionary and harmful today,” Colleen Handel, the society’s president and a research wildlife biologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Alaska, said.

“We need a much more inclusive and engaging scientific process that focuses attention on the unique features and beauty of the birds themselves,” she added. “Everyone who loves and cares about birds should be able to enjoy and study them freely—and birds need our help now more than ever.”

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Nuclear Weapons Turned Wild Boars Into an Irradiated Menace, Study Finds

Nuclear weapons tests that took place in the mid-20th century are still a major source of radioactivity in Germany’s wild boars, accounting for anywhere from 10 to 68 percent of contamination in meat samples from these animals, reports a new study. 

The discovery could help to explain why wild boars have remained so much more radioactive than other species in their ecosystems, which is a longstanding problem known as the “wild boar paradox.” Previously, scientists assumed this radiation was almost entirely produced by the catastrophic meltdown of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor in 1986, but the new research shows that weapons tests are also a substantial and long-lived source of environmental contamination, a finding that is particularly ominous in light of Russia’s nuclear saber-rattling during its invasion of Ukraine.

Nuclear fallout produces radioactive particles, including isotopes of the element cesium, which can still be found in ecosystems today. Radiocesium has a half-life of 30 years, meaning that half of it decays in that time period, so it makes sense that concentrations of the contaminant have been gradually receding in Europe over time. 

Wild boars are the bizarre exception to this rule. Radiocesium levels in these animals have remained constant, a puzzling fact that has rendered them unsafe to eat and has thus contributed to a rampant overpopulation of boars across Europe as demand for their meat has plummeted.

Now, scientists co-led by Georg Steinhauser and Bin Feng, who are radiochemists at the Vienna University of Technology, have discovered that much of this persistent contamination can be traced back to nuclear weapons testing. 

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New documentary ‘proves’ building offshore wind farms does kill whales

The increase in whale, dolphin, and other cetacean deaths off the East Coast of the United States since 2016 is not due to the construction of large industrial wind turbines, U.S. government officials say.

Their scientists have done the research, they say, to prove that whatever is killing the whales is completely unrelated to the wind industry. 

But now, a new documentary, “Thrown To The Wind,” by director and producer Jonah Markowitz, which I executive produced, proves that the US government officials have been lying.

The film documents surprisingly loud, high-decibel sonar emitted by wind industry vessels when measured with state-of-the-art hydrophones. And it shows that the wind industry’s increased boat traffic is correlated directly with specific whale deaths

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Government kills hundreds of Minnesota wolves to protect ranchers’ profits

It’s not easy being a wolf in northern Minnesota.

Every year dozens of the animals die of starvation, disease, parasites, vehicle traffic and poaching.

But the No. 1 killer of Minnesota wolves may come as a surprise: agents of the federal government, acting with the full force of the law.

In 2022, there were 174 documented wolf deaths in Minnesota, according to the latest state Department of Natural Resources data. Of those, 142 were killed by a relatively obscure arm of the U.S. Department of Agriculture called the Wildlife Services division.

Wildlife Services is tasked with mitigating conflicts between humans and wild animals. In Minnesota, the agency’s staffers answer complaints from ranchers who lose cattle and other livestock to wolf predation. The agency documents and verifies those complaints, and looks for non-lethal ways to protect threatened livestock, like wolf-proof fencing.

If those options don’t work, the agency traps and kills wolves deemed responsible for the loss. USDA officers kill more wolves in Minnesota than in all other states combined, according to the program’s annual reports.

That work is effectively a government handout to ranchers, who receive publicly funded protection for their privately held livestock. The ranchers also receive cash compensation from state taxpayers for their lost cattle, which in 2022 totaled $100,000 for 78 wolf predation claims, or an average of about $1,300 per claim.

While individual ranchers can experience significant losses if wolves repeatedly target their cows, the overall impact on the state’s cattle population is negligible. There are about 2.2 million cows in the state, according to USDA data. The five or six dozen documented and verified wolf kills in a given year amount to a few thousandths of 1 percent of the total population.

But the USDA’s actions in response inflict a steep toll upon Minnesota’s wolves. The 142 kills amount to fully 5% of the state’s estimated wolf population.

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SECRETIVE FEDERAL AGENCY’S DAYS OF KILLING PETS WITH POISON BOMBS MAY FINALLY BE ENDING

PATCHES OF SNOW dotted the ground when Canyon Mansfield stepped outside on March 16, 2017. The hill behind the 14-year-old’s home in Pocatello, Idaho, was not particularly large. At the summit, Mansfield would only be 300 yards from his house, and yet, he treasured the visits.

With its sweeping mountain view, the hill was Canyon’s refuge. His 3-year-old yellow lab, Kasey, was his constant companion there.

The two set off as usual that afternoon. Kasey was thrashing one of his toys when Canyon spotted a sprinkler-like object protruding from the ground. He ran a finger along the device. Suddenly, he heard a pop, and an orange cloud burst forth. Canyon lunged back as the front of his body was doused in chemicals. The burning began immediately.

As Canyon grasped for snow to irrigate his eyes, he heard Kasey grunting near the device. He called to him, but he didn’t come. He stopped what he was doing and ran to him. Dropping to his knees, Canyon watched as Kasey writhed in spasms. Frothing at the mouth, the dog’s eyes turned glossy. The boy didn’t want to leave, but he knew he needed help. He sprinted down the hill for his mother.

Canyon’s father, Mark Mansfield, a family doctor, was at work when the boy called for help. He raced home as fast as he could. Pulling into the property, Mansfield rushed to Kasey and positioned himself above the dog, prepared to perform mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Canyon stopped him. It’s poison, Canyon said.

Kasey was dead, and Canyon’s head was pounding like never before. Toggling between his training as a physician and his horror as a parent, Mansfield struggled to sort out his son’s symptoms from the trauma he’d just experienced. He told Canyon to get into the shower immediately.

While his son cleaned up, Mansfield called the Bannock County Sheriff’s Office. A bomb and hazmat team were dispatched. Longtime Sheriff Lorin Nielsen was at a loss, trying to answer what felt like an absurd question: Who would plant a bomb in Pocatello?

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Study reveals that ravens were attracted to humans’ food more than 30,000 years ago

University of Tübingen and the Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment team investigates human-raven relationships

Wild animals entered into diverse relationships with humans long before the first settlements were established in the Neolithic period around 10,000 years ago. An international study by researchers from the Universities of Tübingen, Helsinki and Aarhus presents new evidence that ravens helped themselves to people’s scraps and picked over mammoth carcasses left by human hunters during the Pavlovian culture more than 30,000 years ago in what is now Moravia in the Czech Republic.

The large number of raven bones found at the sites suggests that the birds in turn were a supplementary source of food, and may have become important in the culture and worldview of these people.

The study’s lead authors are Dr. Chris Baumann, who currently conducts research at the Universities of Tübingen and Helsinki, and Dr. Shumon T. Hussain from Aarhus University, an expert in the deep history of human-animal interaction, along with Professor Hervé Bocherens of the University of Tübingen and the Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment. The study has been published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution.

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