Atlantic Puffin caught in flight / Uploaded to Flickr by Stig NygaardBird and birding news
- Scientists have retrieved DNA from 2500-year-old moa feathers and identified four extinct moa species. Their plumage was mostly drab, to avoid predation from the also extinct Haast's Eagle.
- The US Fish & Wildlife Service's annual survey of breeding waterfowl found 13% more birds this year than last year. You can read the full report (pdf) at their website.
- New Jersey will purchase 78 acres of a 96-acre tract in Cape May and protect it as a migratory bird preserve. The land had been slated to become a housing development.
- A speeding driver killed more than four dozen birds on a beach in Oregon.
- More than 500 Ring-billed Gulls were killed on the Cuyahoga River in Ohio after several hundred gallons of cooking oil leaked out of a sewer pipe.
- A survey of woodland birds in the UK has found sharp declines over the past 30 years. Nightingales have declined by 95%; starlings, linnets, lesser redpolls, and spotted flycatchers have all fallen more than 80%.
- Most black-legged kittiwakes are able to avoid inbreeding, according to a study of kittiwake genetics. The source of this ability is still unclear.
- South African birders have collected over one million bird records in their project to create a second South African Bird Atlas. The original atlas project was conducted from 1987-1991.
- Scientists are fitting Atlantic Puffins with GPS recording tags to learn why the Farne Islands population has been declining.
- Seed-eating birds help protect a forest in Tanzania by keeping seed-killing beetles in check. The beetles will not feed on seeds that have already passed through a bird's digestive tract.
- Common Terns are now nesting on a manmade island at Britain's Santholme nature reserve.
- The RSPB reports that more than 50 peregrines have been shot, poisoned, or trapped this year in the U.K.
- A group is trying to bring Trumpeter Swans to the Chesapeake region.
- An American Airlines plane hit a bird shortly before landing at La Guardia Airport.
- 10,000 Birds: Time to Buy a Duck Stamp… or Not
- Coffee and Conservation: Research: Andean shade coffee quality habitat for birds
- Great Auk or Greatest Auk: Year of the Hoodie
- Bug Girl: Ospreys Return to Lower Michigan
- John Rakestraw: Marsh Wren Dust-bathing
- Jersey Birder: June 29 - Black Rail
- Bioephemera: Even pigeons can recognize "bad" art
- The Center for Biological Diversity has filed another petition to protect the giant Palouse earthworm, one of the few native earthworms in the Northwest, under the Endangered Species Act.
- Climate change is decreasing the average size of wild Soay sheep on a Scottish island since the mild winters make it easier for smaller sheep to survive.
- According to the latest IUCN report, 869 species have gone extinct in the past 500 years, and another 17,000 plant and animal species are currently threatened with extinction. The numbers may be an underestimates since only 2.7% of the world's 1.8 million described species have been assessed.
- Sea ice between Greenland and Svalbard is at its lowest level in the past 800 years.
- This month, various places will be holding butterfly counts, coordinated by the North American Butterfly Association.
- An invasive ladybird beetle is putting native ladybirds and many other species at risk in the U.K.
- New research suggests that much of the Mississippi Delta will disappear by 2100. Dams and climate change are the main causes of the problem.
- Vineyards in California are using goats and sheep to graze away invasive weeds.
- San Francisco residents and businesses are now required to compost food scraps and biodegradable materials.
- DesertBlog: Interior fast-tracks Big Solar on public lands
- The Clade: Destroying the Joshua trees in order to save them
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