Continued thoughts on recent Red-wing Blackbird deaths

I have been thinking more about the recent deaths of Red-Wing Blackbirds in Arkansas and Lousiana, and possibly more found in Kentucky.

The news of the day has focused on fireworks celebrations causeing the birds to become frightened, take flight in the dark and due to their bad eyesight collide mid air into eachother during the panic. This is also a hard to believe explanation considering the amount of firework celebrations that occur around the world every year. If fireworks were enough to cause a flock of birds to wake up and go into a panic mass deaths of birds would be more common. Granted it could be that somehow reports of events were never reported in the past.

I decided to look into what ways blackbird flocks have been known to be controlled and something stands out to me. The use of a chemical called Avitrol. On their website its explained its a chemical frightening agent added to bait grains.

"The active ingredient in Avitrol baits, 4-aminopyridine, is an acute oral toxicant which acts on the central nervous system and the motor nervous system. Its action on the motor nervous system usually causes behaviors characteristic of those seen in an epileptic seizure. Birds eating the treated bait will be affected in a manner that, varying by species, will artificially cause them to emit distress and alarm cries and visual displays used by their species when they are frightened or injured. This may include flying erratically, vocalizing, trembling, dilation of the pupils and other symptoms indicative of loss of motor control. This will frighten the flock and cause it to leave the site. In laboratory testing, if the dose is lethal, death will usually occur within an hour following administration. If the dose is sub-lethal, there will be a recovery period which may be as short as 4 to 5 hours. Surviving birds have no lasting effects from 4-aminopyridine. "

"By limiting the amount of bait available to relatively few birds, the remainder of the flock can be frightened away from most sites with a minimum of mortality."

 SOURCE: http://www.avitrol.com/about.php


So what if the cause of the Red-wing blackbird deaths in arkansas was a large scale use of the Avitrol baits? It seems like a more plausible explanation for the huge number of birds in a small area. I am unsure of any exact laws on hwo many blackbirds can be intentionally killed using the chemical or any other flock control measures at any given time. But if there are restrictions then coinciding an intentional mass kill with something like fireworks, strong storms and the like would at least throw some uncertainity about what the actual cause could have been.

There are also other methods for frightening the birds:

"Devices need to be employed especially in the early morning and in late afternoon when the birds are most actively feeding. Crops such as sweet corn, which are vulnerable to blackbirds for only a few days before harvest, may not be too difficult to protect; however, the task becomes more formidable for crops such as sunflower and sorghum, which may be vulnerable for up to six weeks. Propane exploders (some with timers that automatically turn them on and off each day) are the most popular frightening devices. In general, use at least one exploder for every 10 acres (4 ha) of crop to be protected. Elevate exploders on a barrel, stand, or truck bed to “shoot” over the crop, and move them around the field every few days."

 "A variety of other bird-frightening devices, including electronic noise systems, helium-filled balloons tethered in fields, radio-controlled model planes, reflecting tapes made of mylar (Fig. 5), tape-recorded distress calls for birds, and various types of scarecrows, are also occasionally used to rid fields of blackbirds. The effectiveness of these devices is highly variable, depending on the persistence of the operator, the skill used in employing a device, the attractiveness of the crop, the number of birds, and the availability of alternate feeding sites. As mentioned with regard to propane exploders, birds tend to adjust or adapt to frightening devices. It is usually best to use two or more devices than to rely on a single device."

http://icwdm.org/handbook/birds/Blackbirds.asp

 (the same info seems to be located at http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/birds/blkbird/control.htm )

So quite possibly it could have been a combination of techniques, coinciding with fireworks and luckily strong storms to aid to the confusion.

Some birds have been taken to Madison, WI for testing and we wont have an answer for a few days or so.

I am not trying to reinforce the idea of some mass government cover up. I think it is more likely a small scale local cover up of the excessive use of control measures for a flock of birds.

I haven't had time to figure out any connection to the fish kill that was also in Beebe in the last week. It may be a coincidence or something more troubling.