Wildlife officials say hundreds of dead sea birds are washing up on beaches from Marin to Monterey, and suspect a problem with their food supply may be to blame. Hundreds of Brandt”s cormorants began washing up on beaches in mid-April, surprising sea bird experts who had seen the bird”s population …
May, 2009
April, 2009
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26 April
RSPB call to curb seabird slaughter
The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) has called on Greenland to stop hunters slaughtering seabirds after research linked the destruction with declining populations across Europe. Every summer the country’s thousands of hunters attack the roosting colonies of seabirds such as kittiwakes, eider ducks and guillemots, often shooting …
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24 April
Dog kills 50 wedge-tailed shearwaters in Molokai preserve
A loose dog killed 50 adult wedge-tailed shearwaters yesterday at a breeding colony at The Nature Conservancy”s Moomomi Beach Preserve.
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16 April
Three new birds on the critical list
Three bird species have joined the likes of the kakapo, the black robin and the rowi kiwi on the list of critically endangered New Zealand birds. The conservation status of 428 birds was assessed by a panel of experts in a three-yearly review to identify those most in need of …
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15 April
Climate change makes migrations longer for birds
Bird migrations are likely to get longer according to the first ever study of the potential impacts of climate change on the breeding and winter ranges of migrant birds. A team of scientists, led by Durham University, have published findings that show that the marathon flights undertaken by birds to …
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10 April
Palin Administration Ignores Science in Denying State Endangered Species Act Protection to Kittlitz’s Murrelet
Today the Alaska Department of Fish and Game denied a petition to protect the imperiled Kittlitz’s murrelet under Alaska’s Endangered Species Act. This Alaska seabird is declining precipitously due to threats from global warming, oil pollution, and fisheries-bycatch mortality that have placed it on a trajectory to extinction.
March, 2009
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29 March
Save South Africa’s penguins, give them a home
Nesting in the sparkling sand, preening on the rocks and darting through the waters, the penguins on the southern tip of Africa are the ultimate crowd-pleaser. But crisis looms. Short of food, exposed to predators and the African sun, their numbers are plummeting. But salvation may rest in a simple …
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29 March
800 dead penguins found dead in Southern Chile
In just the past few days, hundreds of dead magellanic penguins (Spheniscus Magellanicus) have washed ashore in Chile’s Region XI, the daily La Tercera reported Sunday. So far experts are in the dark about what’s killing the sea birds, more than 800 of which have been found on the beaches …
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26 March
Eagle endangered by fishing line
Every morning, photographer David Gray comes to a Pinellas County cemetery to shoot photos of a pair of eagles and their two eaglets. Wednesday, he got shots of the mother eagle and the babies, but there were no sign of the father eagle. “Typically, he”s in and out every hour …
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24 March
Twenty years on, some birds still haven’t recovered from Exxon Valdez oil spill
Twenty years ago today—at 12:04 AM on March 24th, 1989—the Exxon Valdez tanker struck Bligh reef in Prince William Sound causing 10.8 million gallons of crude oil to spill into the sea. The spill decimated the ecosystem and wildlife for 11,000 square miles and became one of the world”s most …
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19 March
U.S. birds threatened by habitat loss, invasives, report says
Almost a third of the 800 bird species in the United States are endangered, threatened or in significant decline, according to a report released today by Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. Over the last 40 years, the loss of habitat, destruction by invasive species and other threats caused a …
February, 2009
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26 February
Study links seabird deaths to soap-like foam
In late 2007, hundreds of dead and stranded seabirds washed up on the shores of Monterey Bay, their feathers saturated with water and coated with an unknown substance. After an intensive investigation, scientists determined that a massive “red tide” bloom of marine algae had produced a foamy soap-like substance that …