Now that H5N1 has been found in the European Union, Dutch poultry farmers are advised to pen their birds as soon as possible.
“The sooner the better” said Jan Wolleswinkel, from the Dutch Organization for Poultry Farmers (NOP). The group is imposing a rule on the nation’s farmers to pen their birds.
The Netherlands interior minister has already called on farmers to shelter their birds away from possible contact with migratory birds from March 1.
A family of bald eagles has returned to their Llano County, Texas nest site. The group of three adult birds tend to a nest nine miles north of Llano on Texas Highway 29. The adult eagles, two females and one male, have been tending to the nest this season. One eaglet hatched in late January. Excellent photos and nest activity details are captured at Cottonwood Photography.
U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot a hunting companion during a quail hunt this weekend.
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In the last few weeks dozens of protected birds have been illegally shot or poisoned in Beglium. The culprits are hunters, who consider the birds of prey to be “competitors”. The bird protection group Vogelbescherming Vlaanderen has asked the government to take action.
On Friday a forest ranger from the natural area Opglabbeek found a dead red kite, a rarely seen raptor. The bird was shot and had lead in the chest and leg area.
A spokesperson for Vogelbescherming Vlaanderen said, “Every year, just before the breeding period, many birds of prey are shot and poisoned. The poisoned birds eat bait set out for foxes.”
Vogelbescherming also points out that the poison is a health hazard for humans. The poisons release dangerous toxins in the atmosphere, like strychnine and carbofuran.
“On Saturday BirdLife Malta has discovered the first breeding record of the Little Grebe (Blongun Zghir — Tachybaptus ruficollis) at Simar Nature Reserve.” Read Roberta Scerri’s story New Bird Breeding in Malta at di-ve.com.
A New York Times Science article on the new species of New Guinea includes a photo slide show featuring the new bird species.
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Urban Eyes is a service combining CCTV networks and pigeons to provide an alternative view on the city. Users have to feed the pigeon with Urban Eyes bird seed. The special seed can be bought in a camera shop and contains RFID tags.
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Some harmless-looking birds on the Galapagos Islands off the coast of South America have developed a surprising technique for surviving the dry season: drinking the blood of other, larger birds. Watch the “vampire birds” in action.
At Germany’s Bremerhaven Zoo, male penguins have paired together and care for pebbles as if they are eggs. Zoo officials tried to get the gay penguins to mate with females brought in from Sweden, with no success. Read the story German zoo fails to make gay penguins straight at Expatica.
Nature organizations and volunteers conducted a survey of Bohemian Waxwings in the Netherlands on 4 and 5 February. Waxwings are not native to the Netherlands.
A total of 1745 birds were counted. The birds come from arctic forests and have typically been rare visitors to the Netherlands. According to Waarnerming.nl, a website where users can note birds and other animals they have spotted in the wild, it is the third time in four years that the number of Waxwings counted in the Netherlands has increased. This year, however, was the first time an organized count was conducted.
Most of the birds were counted in Gelderland, with 443 individuals counted in ten groups. Many birds were also noted in the provinces Zuid Holland, Noord Holland, Overijssel and Utrecht. In the other provinces a maximum of 4 groups per province was noted.
The Waxwings are presently concentrated in the middle of the country. At the beginning of January a great number of the birds were noted in the north of the country, but most of them have now disappeared. Therefore it is expected that the population is moving south, as it has also been noticed in past years.
The Waxwing lives in the forest in northern areas, but while overwintering in the Netherlands they prefer to roost in urban areas. The birds are not afraid of people, likely because in their breeding areas they normally don’t have contact with humans.
Because of their unexpected, invasive behavior, in earlier times they were considered to be bringers of misfortune, hence their Dutch name Pestvoge”, or plague bird.
