Birds are wise

A new study has been published. It shows that some types of birds are highly averse to road noise:

Biologists have known that bird populations decline near roads. But pinpointing noise as a cause has been a problem because past studies of the effects of road noise on wildlife were conducted in the presence of the other confounding effects of roads. These include visual disturbances, collisions and chemical pollution, among others.

Researchers created a phantom road on a ridge southeast from Lucky Peak, near the Idaho Bird Observatory’s field site. Putting speakers in trees, they played roadway sounds at intervals, alternating four days of noise on with four days off during the autumn migratory period. The researchers conducted daily bird surveys along their phantom road and at a nearby control site.

“We documented more than a one-quarter decline in bird abundance and almost complete avoidance by some species between noise-on and noise-off periods along the phantom road,” Barber said. “There were no such effects at control sites. This suggests that traffic noise is a major driver of the effects of roads on populations of animals.”

boisestate.edu, Study Documents Effects of Road Noises on Migratory Birds

I can’t even imagine the stress caused to the poor wildlife that manages to hang on on my street with the outrageous noises occurring constantly including leafblowers, vehicle horns, and other equipment. Its sickening what humans do.

One of my neighbors has a humminbird feeder and while its nice to see hummingbirds around, I feel bad that they would be drawn to stay in this inhabitable place because of the food.