How to Protect Bird Species from Extinction

Video Transcript

"In the previous segments we’ve spent a lot of times talking about the wonders and pleasures of birding: how to get involved, some of the equipment that you need, some of the places that you can go, some of the ways that you can attract birds to your yard. But there’s another whole layer to understanding birds and bird study and it has to do with conservation. Sadly and in many areas, bird species are declining and they’re declining for a variety of reasons. In some cases and perhaps most importantly it’s habitat destruction and habitat loss. For birds that are very specialized and are requiring of open meadows for example or a forest or wetlands, if these environments are degraded or if they are changed in some way or if they’re fragmented and broken up in ways that makes them less contiguous than they were historically. Bird species in some cases actually drop out or they certainly decline. For migratory species there are all manner of concerns, as we increasingly erect cell towers and communication towers, many nocturnal nighttime migrating species are killed in colliding with these structures in the same way that tall lighted structures in cities at night can be very attractive and destructive to bird species that are migrating at night, if the get confused in foggy weather and literally fly into the lights or into the glass. In the same way as habitat is fragmented as a result as human habitation and more and more human development takes place, there are various camp following predators. Things like raccoons and striped skunks for example or possums and indeed our own domesticated animals like cats and dogs, that are very prominent predators on many birds that would nest in suburban situations in particularly in ground nesting species. So these are things that we need to think about and in terms of our efforts to attract birds to our yard, obviously we want to make sure that we provide a safe haven for birds and not situations that in fact are going to set them up for population falls. So that the selections of the places that we place our feeders and erect birdhouses are all important considerations in terms of small things that we can do on behalf of bird species. Pesticides and chemicals at one time were very pernicious events in terms of causing the decline of some of the species that we’ve talked about in this program, things like the peregrine falcon and the bald eagle for example are species that were very seriously effected as a result of egg shell thinning as a consequence of too much pesticides in their systems. Unfortunately even though DDT and some of the other hard pesticides that cause these problems, in fact have been taken off the market. For many of our migratory species they still come in contact with these compounds when they leave the con-flying to the United Sates. Likewise even in suburban situations where various types of chemicals are regularly applied to lawns and to trees and vegetation as herbicides, some of these very same chemicals can be pernicious to bird species. So I think its incumbent upon all of us with an interest in birds to think about these things and to govern our behavior in ways that will benefit birds. One of the ways that certainly is appropriate is to support organizations like Mass. Audubon. Massachusetts Audubon Society is a very large organization 100,000 members, we have 41 Sanctuaries throughout the commonwealth of Massachusetts and supportive organization like Mass. Audubon is perfectly appropriate in terms of supporting bird conservation, advocacy and education about the very things that many of love. So in closing it’s been my pleasure to work with you and I hope you’ve enjoyed this segment of Expert Village."