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THE mass attack by seabirds on a coastal town that inspired Alfred Hitchcock's thriller The Birds may finally have been explained. Biologists have blamed toxic algae eaten by the birds for damaging their brains and making them so aggressive that they dived at people, buildings and moving cars in Capitola, California, in 1961. Hitchcock's film, released two years later, was inspired partly by the event and partly by a short story by Daphne du Maurier about an unexplained avian attack on a Cornish farm worker and his family. In the Californian incident, hundreds of normally unaggressive sooty shearwater gulls suddenly,...

Birds in central California are significantly larger than they were 25 to 40 years ago, and researchers believe it may be because they are bulking up in body weight to ride out severe storms related to global climate change. Over the last 25 years, a robin, for example, has increased about an eighth of an inch in wing length and about 0.2 ounces in mass, according to a paper published online in Global Change Biology. The findings fly in the face of assumptions based on an ecological benchmark known as Bergmann’s rule: Birds and mammals tend to be larger at...

One of seven oil companies charged with killing migratory birds during drilling operations in North Dakota has agreed to plead guilty and pay $12,000. Slawson Exploration Co. Inc., of Wichita, Kan., was charged under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act with for killing 12 birds that died after allegedly landing in oil waste pits in western North Dakota from May 6 through June 20. Under a plea agreement filed in federal court Monday, Slawson will pay $12,000 — or $1,000 per bird — to the nonprofit National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. The maximum penalty for each misdemeanor charge under the Migratory...

You may have gotten wind of the seven North Dakota oil companies recently charged in federal court with the deaths of 28 migratory birds. The birds allegedly landed in oil waste pits in western North Dakota last spring; the maximum penalty for each charge under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act is six months in prison and a $15,000 fine, the AP said. But did you know that wind-power companies are responsible for more than 400,000 bird deaths annually, and not one has faced a single charge? The Wall Street Journal knows it, opining yesterday that the prosecutions are “bird-brained,” especially...

Robots of a Feather... LIS/Swiss Federal Institute of Technology A rendering of flying robots in Switzerland; connecting lines indicate Wi-Fi links. Relying on algorithms created to render flocks of birds in computer graphics, engineers have created flying robots that travel in swarms.

Does San Francisco have a serious problem with birds flying into tall buildings? Was there a good reason the Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a "bird-safe" building ordinance last month? I asked Supervisors David Chiu and John Avalos on Saturday why they supported the measure, at a mayoral candidates debate hosted by the West of Twin Peaks Central Council. Their answers were instructive. Chiu seemed put out that he had been asked such a trivial question. The board has spent about "40 seconds" on the measure, he assured me, less time than during Saturday's debate. Avalos answered that he knows...

A Story of Love, Compassion, Friendship & Loyalty About eight years ago a wild Australian Sulphur Crested Cockatoo flew into a car and broke its wing. The motorist took it to the Vet in Nerang, Queensland, who had to amputate the wing. We adopted her - for which we needed a National Parks and Wildlife permit - and kept her in a cage outside where she was often visited by wild Cockatoos. One of the things that impressed us was how she would push lettuce leaves through the bars of the cage, offering food to visitors.

On my last trip to the thrift shop there was a mysterious Nauguhyde bag in the show case. Y'all know me, LOL, I just had to look!The Pentax ME Super was made around 1980, it's a compact by SLR standards but built like a brick. This is the SE version, top ot the crop.I got a 50mm f2 Pentax lens and an 80-200 f4,5, all in mint condition, a 2X TC and a bunch of filters, plus a really nice bag.These are with the 80-200 f4.5.I had the film run at Walgreens and scanned the negatives on my Epson 3590.

An enormous jawbone found in Kazakhstan is further evidence that giant birds roamed - or flew above - the Earth at the same time as the dinosaurs. Writing in Biology Letters, researchers say the new species, Samrukia nessovi, had a skull some 30cm long. If flightless, the bird would have been 2-3m tall; if it flew, it may have had a wingspan of 4m. The find is only the second bird of such a size in the Cretaceous geologic period, and the first in Asia. The only other evidence of a bird of such a size during the period was...

Title and link only -- Gannett stationhttp://wusa9.com/news/article/161065/158/Woodpecker-Saving-Daughter-Costs-Mom-500

One of the world's most famous fossil creatures, widely considered the earliest known bird, is getting a rude present on the 150th birthday of its discovery: A new analysis suggests it isn't a bird at all. Chinese scientists are proposing a change to the evolutionary family tree that boots Archaeopteryx off the "bird" branch and onto a closely related branch of birdlike dinosaurs. Archaeopteryx (ahr-kee-AHP'-teh-rihx) was a crow-sized creature that lived about 150 million years ago. It had wings and feathers, but also quite un-birdlike traits like teeth and a bony tail. Discovered in 1861 in Germany, two years after...

According to this Mother Jones article, cats kill birds -- many of which are vital to the ecosystem -- at an alarming rate. Wind tunnels have nothing on Kitty. Also, feral cats are disease-toting menaces -- and their population has tripled over the last four decades. Efforts to staunch the numbers with trap-neuter-return aren't enough. (They do not, however, suck the breath out of new babies. At least give them that.) Seems harsh, yes? I am not a cat lover. In fact, I'm a card-carrying not-cat lover, though I've owned cats -- if you can actually own a cat. I...

A pair of bald eagles nesting near the U.S. Post Office in Dutch Harbor, Alaska, has taken to dive-bombing customers, in one case drawing blood, authorities said on Tuesday.

Dr. Michael Collins, Naval Research Laboratory scientist and bird watcher, has published an article titled "Putative audio recordings of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis)" which appears in the March issue of the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America. The audio recordings were captured in two videos of birds with characteristics consistent with the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. This footage was obtained near the Pearl River in Louisiana, where there is a history of unconfirmed reports of this species. During five years of fieldwork, Collins had ten sightings and also heard the characteristic "kent" calls of this species on two occasions. Scientists...

A central Kansas family hopes to learn what caused the deaths of dozens of birds that fell from trees outside their house. Elizabeth Stange says it started with one or two birds tumbling to the ground Thursday afternoon, followed by dozens more. The Sterling woman told KWCH-TV that the birds all died within minutes of each other. By evening, Stange says, she and her family collected about 50 birds from their driveway and yard. Stange says a local veterinarian told her the birds probably ate something poisonous. But a few were sent to Kansas State University for a closer look....

This captioned photo was too good not to share. Anybody want to try for a better caption?

I tied two bells to one of our cats to keep her from going after cats, but she still got one this morning. I rescued the bird, but now he can't really fly. He let me pick him up and put him in, ironically, a cat carrier. So I'm looking for advice. He's resting comfortably now. How soon should I try to feed him? What about water, small cup or big bowl? He's mostly white, with a little bit of grey.

YANKTON, S.D. (KTIV) -- It's happened in places like Louisiana, Arkansas and Kentucky. Hundreds of birds mysteriously found dead. Folks in Yankton, South Dakota, thought they were being added to the list after hundreds of dead birds were found there on Monday. Turns out the unpleasant feathered discovery has a solid explanation. They were poisoned. Some had thought 200 starlings found dead in Yankton's Riverside park had frozen to death. But they were actually poisoned on purpose, by the US Department of Agriculture. Many of the European Starlings discovered by a passerby, were laying on the ground or frozen in...

SANTA ROSA -- Days after massive bird die-offs in the south, Sonoma County officials Tuesday had a mystery of their own as more than 100 bird carcasses were discovered near Geyserville. California Highway Patrol Officer Jon Sloat said the birds were discovered on to Independence Lane at about 2:30 p.m. Saturday. The California Department of Fish and Game was notified and a local warden responded. He took several of the birds away to be identified and tested by a biologist, Sloat told the San Rosa Press Democrat. The birds all appeared to be the same species – small in size...

Large bird kill reported near Geyserville Posted by PD on January 10th, 2011 By RANDI ROSSMANN THE PRESS DEMOCRAT While scientists and specialists are investigating why massive numbers of birds have dropped dead from the sky elsewhere in the country, Sonoma County now has its own bird deaths mystery to solve, reported the CHP. More than 100 birds were found dead Saturday afternoon clustered on the ground off of Highway 101, south of Geyserville, Officer Jon Sloat reported Monday. Officers responded to Independence Lane at about 2:30 p.m. Saturday and found dozens of birds dead on and around the roadway....

It's been said that Mankind will destroy itself. Unfortunately, during the past 100 years the human race has worked hard to make this prediction come true. Nuclear arsenals can destroy Mankind many times over. Alien biological weapons exist that can annihilate all humanity. Toxins are available that are so deadly a few drops in a city's water supply can kill millions. Yet another weapons technology has been under development for some decades.

Witnesses in Italy said thousands of turtle doves fell from the sky, Wednesday, Jan. 5, following a series of incidents in the United States and Sweden. According to residents in the town of Faenza, birds were falling from the sky like “little Christmas balls." The reports are similar to witness accounts from New Year’s Eve when Arkansas partygoers took cover as 4,000 red-winged blackbirds and starlings pinged cars, rooftops and roadways. Unlike birds that died in other areas of the world, the turtle doves were found with a strange blue stain on their beaks. “We have no idea,” a witness...

As we approach the end of time amid a flurry of bloody feathers, fish carcasses, and plentiful crab cakes, Google has, as it always does, given us a means of approaching our imminent demise easily and with style. A new Google Map created yesterday – “Mass Animal Deaths” – shows areas of the world that have experienced a recent wave of animal deaths, complete with a link to an article explaining each instance, as well as the number of animals found dead in each case. From dead snapper in New Zealand to birds exploding over Arkansas, troubling animal deaths are...

BEEBE, Ark. (AP) -- Preliminary lab results show the blackbirds that fell from the sky in central Arkansas died from blunt force trauma

A TV station in the East Texas town of Tyler reports that hundreds more dead birds have been discovered along the sides of a highway bridge. This news adds fresh fuel to a growing conundrum over the cause of hundreds of thousands of avian deaths in localities thousands of miles apart. The station, KLTV, acknowledges that around 200 birds were found dead this morning on state highway 155. The birds, identified as American coots or mud-hens, are the first of this species to be cited in the recent spate of deaths. As with previous cases, the cause of death is...

STOCKHOLM (AFP) – In a week that saw unexplained massive bird deaths in the southern United States, up to 100 birds were found lying in a snow-covered street in Sweden Wednesday, officials said. "Most were dead," Christer Olofsson of rescue services in the southwestern town of Falkoeping said of the 50 to 100 jackdaw birds, a type of crow. Ornithologist Anders Wirdheim said the find was surprising. "This is unusual," he told tabloid Aftonbladet, which posted online a reader's photo of dozens of black birds littering a snow-covered road. "They are probably jackdaws. They spend the winter in large flocks....

State officials say they are investigating a "very large" fish kill in the Chesapeake Bay, but suspect cold temperatures killed them, rather than any water-quality problems. An estimated 2 million fish have been reported dead from the Bay Bridge south to Tangier Sound, according to the Maryland Department of the Environment, which investigates fish kills. The dead fish are primarily adult spot, with some juvenile croakers. Agency spokeswoman Dawn Stoltzfus said bay water quality appears acceptable, and biologists believe "cold-water stress" the likely cause of the fish kill. Spot are susceptible to colder water, she said, and normally leave the...

(CBS/AP) LABARRE, La. - State biologists are trying to determine what killed an estimated 500 birds that littered a quarter-mile stretch of highway in Pointe Coupee Parish. The birds included red-winged blackbirds and starlings. The birds were found Monday along Louisiana Highway 1, about 300 miles south of Beebe, Ark., where more than 3,000 blackbirds fell from the sky three days earlier.

This is getting weird. Four days after an estimated 4,000 to 5,000 red-winged blackbirds fell from the sky in Beebe, Ark., about 500 more dead birds were found lying lifeless on a quarter-mile-long stretch of highway in Pointe Coupee Parish in Louisiana. The birds, red-winged blackbirds and starlings, were discovered on Monday, Baton Rouge's The Advocate reported. Biologists will send some of the birds to labs in Georgia and Wisconsin to conduct necropsies and tests to determine the cause of death. After examining the birds found in Arkansas, state officials concluded that they had died as a result of blunt...

AP link only.

CNN) -- Arkansas game officials hope testing scheduled to begin Monday will solve the mystery of why up to 5,000 blackbirds fell from the sky just before midnight New Year's Eve. The birds -- most of which were dead -- were found within a one-mile area of Beebe, about 40 miles northeast of Little Rock, the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission said. The blackbirds fell over about a one-mile area, the commission said in a statement. As of Saturday, between 4,000 and 5,000 blackbirds had been found dead, said Keith Stephens with the commission. "Shortly after I arrived, there were...

Thousands of dead fish have turned up in an Arkansas river just days after 3,000 birds mysteriously dropped dead from the sky, but authorities say the deaths are not related. An estimated 100,000 dead drum fish are floating along a 20-mile stretch of the Arkansas River and washing up on the river's banks near the town of Ozark in the northwestern part of the state. The dead fish were discovered just after 3,000 red-wing blackbirds fell from the sky in the town of Beebe, more than 100 miles from the site of the dead fish. Officials, who tripled the early...

Bemused U.S. officials are looking into why more than 1,000 blackbirds crashed from the sky in Arkansas on the final day of 2010. In scenes reminiscent of the FlashForward drama series, state wildlife employees were searching the town of Beebe after scores of birds fell to the ground late on New Year's Eve, continuing into the early hours of the morning. High winds and tornadoes swept through Arkansas on New Year's Eve, killing seven people, and state staff believe the bizarre incident could be down to the severe conditions.

The AP said more than 1000 birds fell from the sky, but CNN put the number at up to 5000.

BEEBE, Ark. – Wildlife officials are trying to determine what caused more than 1,000 blackbirds to die and fall from the sky over an Arkansas town. The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission said Saturday that it began receiving reports about the dead birds about 11:30 p.m. the previous night. The birds fell over a 1-mile area of Beebe, and an aerial survey indicated that no other dead birds were found outside of that area.

If the birdlife on earth didn’t have enough to worry about, like dwindling habitats, air pollution and the hostile ecosystem of cities, they now have the added perplexity of going gay. A study conducted by researchers from the University of Florida and Peradeniya University in Sri Lanka found that relatively low doses of methylmercury in the diet of male ibises resulted in their pairing up with each other, snubbing the females, to the extent of building nests together (in other words, moving in together). Methylmercury has been seeping into groundwater from industries for ages now.

I don't ever remember seing this many birds in one place at the same time.After shooting these pics, another wave just as big came through.

. . . . . A page from Big Fur Hat's Big Book of Bird Brains at RIGHTNETWORKText by G. VanderleunSpecies: Massive Bill Vulture (Scumsukingus Pigus) Habitat: Casinos, union halls, and wherever fine graft is served Voice: The faint susurration common to all fork-tongued reptiles. Amplified. Diet: Livers of American children yet unborn. Range: Assisted living facilities from Georgetown to Reno.

WOODSIDE — 1960s songbird Joan Baez is "resting comfortably" at an undisclosed location after falling 20 feet to the ground from a treehouse — a treehouse she purposely had built without walls because she wanted to sleep among real birds at her Woodside, Calif., home.

Someone has slipped sliced-open beer cans around the necks of at least three gulls in the Bay Area, and now an animal rescue group is trying to find the birds and the person or people responsible. "It's sick. What's the next level of this kind of abuse?" said Rebecca Dmytryk of Monterey County-based WildRescue. Dmytryk said she first heard about the birds after getting some disturbing photos at the end of September that showed a gull with half a Budweiser can stuck around its neck like a collar. She has confirmed sightings at Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco, a beach...

Probably the most interesting bird spotted in Nova Scotia after the passage of hurricane Earl, was a Calliope hummingbird from the American western mountains, where they are uncommon at best. The male is the only hummer whose coloured throat feathers form streaks against a white background. The red feathers on its throat can be distended. It is the smallest U.S hummer. How the southwestern hummingbird ended up in Nova Scotia, is a mystery. It might have been migrating south to its wintering grounds in north west Mexico when it got caught up in Earl's vortex. The question now is whether...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. – A 49-year-old Jackson man has been arrested in Ann Arbor following a fight with the pet parrot carried in his backpack. Police told Annarbor.com for a story Wednesday that witnesses reported the colorful bird was shaken so violently that its feathers were scattered. Three 911 calls were made following the Tuesday night incident. Lt. Renee Bush said the parrot was "squawking loudly" when officers arrived.

The wandering albatross has the largest known wingspan of any living bird, at times reaching nearly 12 feet. But millions of years ago, there was a bird with wings that dwarfed those of the albatross, researchers now report. The newly named species, Pelagornis chilensis, which lived about 5 million to 10 million years ago, had a wingspan of at least 17 feet. This is the largest wingspan known in any bird. Although other, larger estimates have been made, they were based on fossils of feathers, and not on an intact skeleton, as in this case. The report is in The...

Sorry for the long hiatus, but life called me and I had to reply. But here I am, back again in all my thrifty glory, with some fun things to share and some amazing things to look forward to. Today, the fun sharing stuff: I’ve been to a few yard sales recently and picked up oodles of stuff for a song or two. Some of it was stuff to keep, like a Lucy Davies framed print of a blue and white kitchen counter (much like my own) to hang above my kitchen counter! Asking price was $2.00, but since I...

No new stuff, can't get the critters to work my schedule. I just put some oldies together.This night shift work is rough!

American white pelicans, blue-winged teal and long-billed curlews are enjoying the Montana summer, but their wintering grounds are threatened by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Wildlife managers on the Gulf Coast are already scrambling to prepare for the arrival of millions of birds that will start leaving their northern breeding grounds as early as this month. They include Montana species like the piping plover and sandpipers, followed by scaups and blue-winged teal in August. Since the undersea well blew out April 22, 130 miles southeast of New Orleans, oil has been pouring into the Gulf of Mexico at between 35,000...

White House Enacts Rules Inhibiting Media From Covering Oil Spill By Noel Sheppard Created 07/03/2010 - 11:28 The White House Thursday enacted stronger rules to prevent the media from showing what's happening with the oil spill in the Gulf Coast. CNN's Anderson Cooper reported that evening, "The Coast Guard today announced new rules keeping photographers and reporters and anyone else from coming within 65 feet of any response vessel or booms out on the water or on beaches -- 65 feet." He elaborated, "Now, in order to get closer, you have to get direct permission from the Coast Guard captain...

Day 53 of the Gulf oil disaster and no end in sight!On Day 52, I asked: "Does Obama Care More About Protecting Unions Than Cleaning Up Oil Spill? Why hasn't he accepted cleanup help from friends overseas?" Today, we have another report on the Jones Act. Pay special attention to the words of James Carafano from the Heritage Foundation: [VIDEO AT SITE] Jones Act Slowing Oil Spill Cleanup? by: Brian Wilson Fox News June 10, 2010 ...After 50 plus days of oil flowing freely into the gulf, the question could be asked: Why do effective and proven foreign clean up...

Since late last week a flood of pictures of oil-coated Gulf of Mexico birds—and conservationists painstakingly cleaning them—has added new emotional impact to the BP oil spill. Some experts—citing traditionally low survival rates for rescued birds—are controversially arguing it would be better to immediately and humanely kill the suffering birds. In a Spiegel Online article last month, German biologist Silvia Gaus argued that workers helping birds caught in the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, should "kill, not clean." Gaus said studies show that more than 99 percent of rehabilitated birds will die anyway as a result of oil exposure, mainly due...

Video showing heroic efforts by people who are cleaning the oil off the pelicans from the Gulf of Mexico area during the past two months since the start of the massive BP oil spill. Also showing the detailed process in how these birds are cleaned up. God Bless these people, that are TRULY PROFILES IN COURAGE.