So, it seems they're going to build the nation's largest wind farm off the coast of Padre Island in Texas. Environmentalists are up in arms about ... wait for it ... the birds. Oy.
This bit from Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson is amusing:
"Those who are concerned about view sheds shouldn't have a problem," he said. "There's nobody there to look at it."
Nice bank shot!
Speaking of view sheds and wind farms, I confess I haven't been following the latest drama over the much-discussed Cape Wind project all that closely, cause it makes me want to pull my hair out.
First Sen. Don Young (R-Alaska) offered an amendment to kill it. I think that one died. Then Young offered another amendment giving Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney, a longtime project opponent, the power to kill it. In conference committee, Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) whittled the amendment down so it only applied to wind projects in Nantucket Sound and then attached it to a Coast Guard funding bill.
Incidentally, Stevens said his opposition to the project had nothing to do with a chummy closed-door deal with Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.). No, no. It grew out of his staunch support for states' rights! (Even though Mass. officials are still reviewing the plan. And Romney doesn't have power to block any other energy projects in the state. And the amendment is written to apply only to this one project.) An inspired bit of federalism, I must say.
It looked like that might be the end of the road for Cape Wind. But then, out of nowhere, a Bush DoE official wrote Congress urging them to drop the amendment. And the chairs of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Pete Domenici (R-N.M) and Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), threatened to veto the bill of the amendment stayed.
And that's where things stand.
I have nothing particular to add, other than this: My support for the project is a lot less certain than it used to be since the Bush administration weighed in. I have trouble believing it did so out of any love for wind power, so what's the ulterior motive? One reader wrote in, convinced that the Bushies are trying to pave the way for off-shore oil drilling. I don't know if I see that connection, but it does seem like a decent rule of thumb that when you end up on the same side of energy issues as Bush, you need to make very sure you're not getting duped.
It's important not to see the debate over Cape Wind as pro-wind vs. anti-wind. The specifics matter.
(And then there's this kind of incoherent, fact free anti-wind vituperation. Sheesher. Everybody calm down.)
Why buying cheap energy certificates worsens climate change
More power, less roadkill: How one professor’s landscape has shifted
Comments
View as Flat
Eric de Place Posted 7:34 am
11 May 2006
Look, I'm as radibly pro clean energy as the next eco-geek (it's what I do full time). But it would be a huge tragedy to replace our destructive energy portfolio with one that hammered nails into the coffin for our dwindling biodiversity. Obviously we need clean power ASAP, but we should also be just a little smart about where to put it.
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Eric de Place Posted 7:36 am
11 May 2006
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David Roberts Posted 7:57 am
11 May 2006
If you use Firefox, there's an extension that will run spellcheck for you inside text boxes. It's called Spellbound:
http://spellbound.sourceforge.net/
I couldn't live without it.
www.grist.org
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caniscandida Posted 9:39 am
11 May 2006
But the second greatest cause of bird fatalities for which humans are responsible is something that would be extremely easy to correct: thoughtless cat owners let their cats run free outdoors. Cats are terrificly successful predators. They will catch and kill prey even when they are not hungry. Cat owners should never put their cats outdoors. Not only is it clearly not good for birds and other small vertebrates; it is not good for cats either. Cats who are kept inside all the time live upwards of 15 years on average. Cats who are allowed to roam free outdoors get into all kinds of trouble, and live an average of only 5 years.
Feral cats are a complicated problem of a different sort. Animal-welfare organizations tend to favor capture-neuter-release programs, which in the short term do nothing to help the birds, but may be more helpful in the long term as the population of feral cats declines.
I met Paul Kerlinger around 10 years ago, and think very highly of him. He conducts surveys annually of the nesting sites of herons, egrets, terns and other birds on the small uninhabited islands around New York City; and he asks for volunteers to assist him, through New York City Audubon. I was one of those volunteers on one trip. It was not exactly fun -- most of us ended up with poison ivy, for one thing -- but it was certainly educational.
I think we can be confident that the great majority of bird lovers are most certainly in favor of developing sources of renewable energy, and that it is only with great reluctance that they would wish to halt a wind-farm project. Massachusetts Audubon's careful study of the Cape Wind project, resulting finally with their endorsement of it, is commendable.
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Biodiversivist Posted 12:25 pm
11 May 2006
What can you do to reduce the threat to migrating birds short of picking sites that are not in their migration routes? Also, if he is wrong and the mortality is significant, what would they do about it? Tear down a billion dollars worth of wind turbines?
I am all for wind power but at least study the site first to verify it won't be a disaster and adjust the plans to minimize the problem if one is found.
The fact that wind turbines kill a negligible number of birds is a little misleading if they kill a lot of the wrong kind, like raptors and migrating waterfowl. One snowy owl is worth about a million non indigenous starlings or house wrens.
That article in the Seattle Times was wanting. Since when would the Sierra club support windmills to pander to anybody? Sure they are subsidized, what the hell isn't? Time will tell if they are economically viable and in the mean time they are producing electricity without much envrionmental impact. If we are looking for the least of evils, wind is one of them.
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Help acquire and protect ecological hotspots, give to a conservation organization: http://www.saveourbiodiversity.com
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atreyger Posted 3:57 pm
11 May 2006
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Shalini Ramanathan Posted 6:54 pm
11 May 2006
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caniscandida Posted 9:06 pm
11 May 2006
Anyway, the owls are only rarely found in the northern borders of the US South, in years when lemmings are running low. No signs of them yet near the Gulf Coast of Texas. Starlings are everywhere all the time.
In animal-rights ethics, of course, to which I have no idea whether C & K subscribe, the death of one is equivalent to the death of the other.
To Shalini and Atreyger: Avian intelligence should not be underestimated. Corvids and psittacids (crows and cousins, parrots and cousins) in particular have shown remarkable signs of intelligence. But there is plenty of anecdotal evidence too that suggests that chickens and songbirds, whose intelligence we usually do not esteem very highly, really do know what is what.
As to why they fly into things, such as the windows of sky-scrapers -- but not very often the blades of wind turbines, C & K tell us -- , my suspicion is that when they are flying swiftly on long-distance missions, they are sort of on auto-pilot, and meanwhile are inwardly taking a nap.
Nick Park has a lovely appreciation of birds and what they are capable of. See "Chicken Run," and "Wallace and Gromit and The Wrong Trousers."
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rgsullivan Posted 11:55 pm
11 May 2006
More information about the Programmatic EIS is available at the OCS Renewable Energy and Alternate Use Programmatic EIS Information Center Web site at: http://ocsenergy.anl.gov
The Web site includes information about the EIS purpose and process, public meetings, Native American consultation, and how the public can get involved. The site also provides information about ocean renewable energy technologies, hydrogen generation, and alternate uses for offshore oil and gas platforms, and a lot of other resources. Users may subscribe to an e-mail service, which provides notification of public meetings and other EIS-related news and events by e-mail. The Web site also includes a public comment form for submittal of scoping comments for the Programmatic EIS; the scoping comment period just started May 5 and ends July 5, 2006.
Public meetings for this EIS begin May 18 in Washington DC, and will also be held in Long Island, Trenton, Boston, Atlanta, Orlando, Austin, Long Beach, San Francisco, Portland. This is a chance for you to provide "official" input on these topics, and also to spread the word to others who may be interested.
Bob Sullivan
Argonne National Laboratory
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atreyger Posted 1:11 am
12 May 2006
The turbine blades are moving SLOW, so that most birds are actually quite capable of getting out of the way. I guess my point was that if there is an errant 'idiot' bird that flies into one, what are the chances that the bird wouldn't have flown into a tree?
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kmp Posted 3:00 am
12 May 2006
I grew up in a beach town and seagulls are notoriously dumb. Most windows of any size will have big, black, construction-paper seagull outlines, in an attempt to convince the gulls of the dire consequences of slamming their tiny little noggins into said window. Yet, even with this Grim-Reaperesque warning, gulls will forever be slamming into your windows. However, they can spot an errant crab from 100 yards, dive with amazing speed and accuracy to pluck the unsuspecting crab from his afternoon walk, use a dock or a sidewalk as "tool" for breaking open said crab and simultaneously fight off their seagull buddies from their hard-earned snack.
However, seaside idylls aside, who says oil pipelines, coal mining, and electric power plants don't have a hand in killing birds? (and lions and tigers and bears, oh my). Granted, the site does seem unfortunate, but have you ever thought of what it looks like from the other side of the fence? Damn tree-huggers are never friggin' satisfied. They bitch and bitch about renewable power, we spend billions to build the biggest windfarm in the country and now all they can do is bitch about the birds! You've got to admit, we're not the easiest crowd to please.
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ericr Posted 3:30 am
12 May 2006
As to birds and the spinning blades, some misconceptions have been expressed here. The blades are not "braked" to go slower. They are feathered to maintain a more or less constant rpm to keep in phase with the AC grid. The rpm is slower than on small machines because the massive blades (commonly around 150 feet) would be under too much stress if they went around faster. A huge gearbox (which industry journal Windpower Monthly has called the "Achilles' heel" of industrial wind) translates (with a certain loss of the kinetic energy) the 15-20 rpm of the blades to the much (about 40 times, I think) faster shaft speed needed for the generator. The blades may look slow from a distance, but at the tips they are moving well over 150 mph (180 mph on GE's 1.5-MW model).
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lale Posted 7:10 am
12 May 2006
In fact, it's usually progressive types who shine on renewable energy but in the case of Cape Wind, it's sadly not been so. This project may come and go, but what will Senator Kennedy do when the next wind proposal comes along in someone else's backyard? How can he credibly talk about energy independence, clean power and global warming? This is such a disappointment, of course, but to see McCain and Bush stealing the thunder on this, should concern the entire democratic party.
From the start, the whole project was framed for the public with false choices. I happen to have a coal and oil burning power plant in my backyard so don't have the option of selecting a perfect uninterrupted horizon on my shore. We need to power and the grid operators have pleaded for the power. Mass Audubon even signed off on this project. For me and most of America, and even 6:1 people in Massachusetts, the real choice is between wind turbines miles offshore v. asthma, pollution, war, and global warming.
Nature never breaks her own laws -da Vinci
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ericr Posted 8:30 am
12 May 2006
People who accept the intrusion of wind turbines, even convincing themselves that the towers are attractive, do so because they think they are making a difference. The sad fact is that they are not and can not, because of their intermittent and variable power. And that is why others consider their impact not only unacceptable but offensive.
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atreyger Posted 9:13 am
12 May 2006
The speed you're right about, it is moving about 190 mph at the tips at peak speed. I think I was thinking about rpms during 'normal' days, when it is about 7 rpms. In any case, wind farms still cause a minor component of bird deaths per year (something like 1 per turbine per year). (several sources).
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atreyger Posted 9:14 am
12 May 2006
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99kestrel Posted 2:09 pm
12 May 2006
You shouldn't be grasping at straws. I have heard the cry, "But we have to do SOMETHING."
That something in the form of wind turbines is worse than nothing.
If you erect wind turbines in the midst of one of the major migration flyways, you destroy biological diversity and are doing NOTHING to eliminate CO2 or add reliable electricity.
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99kestrel Posted 2:18 pm
12 May 2006
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Biodiversivist Posted 2:28 pm
12 May 2006
Someone needs to build a spreadsheet that lays out the benefits and costs of each energy scheme so we can get a feel for how they rate. For example, the cape wind project is 150 times more efficient per acre than soy-based biodiesel. It takes 15 acres to meet the energy needs of just one person. This either makes the wind farm look good in comparison, or soy-based biodiesel look ridiculous, depending on your viewpoint.
That is a form of energy density. Conventional powerplants use very few acres. The key is to put these other sources where they do not destroy biodiversity. Most of the planet is uninhabitable desert or ocean. We have lots of room, but limited resources.
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Help acquire and protect ecological hotspots, give to a conservation organization: http://www.saveourbiodiversity.com
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Biodiversivist Posted 2:47 pm
12 May 2006
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Help acquire and protect ecological hotspots, give to a conservation organization: http://www.saveourbiodiversity.com
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atreyger Posted 4:53 pm
12 May 2006
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amazingdrx Posted 8:58 pm
12 May 2006
And plenty of unused space on all those rooftops, parking lots, and highways to use for solar power.
Only the capital is needed to get it all going. The subsidies now going to nuclear and fossil industries would spur the transition were they instead devoted to consumer purchase of renwable power, home solar/wind installations, and plugin vehicles.
Figure 10,000 kwh per year for a small efficient home and plugin vehicle. That can come from home solar/wind in many areas.
But powering it from very large wind/wave power installations would only take 1 unit per square mile, that could power say 10,000 homes and vehicles of this efficiency. Is that about 150 homes per acre?
Not really, because the wind/wave machines would only occupy a small fraction of that square mile of surface area.
Land and sea around and under the machines would not be affected adversely, in fact it would allow natural areas to pay their own way with power generation and would block pond net fishing, that is destroying much of the life in the oceans, from coastal waters.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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ericvw Posted 12:49 am
13 May 2006
Windmills in the 70s in California, with small blades and fixed direction, definitely killed migratatory songbirds and the raptors that fed on them. But newer larger windmills, with generally slower moving blades.
The proposed Padre Island installation may be on a migratatory route, which sounds bad at first. But, are the birds actually flying at the height of the windmills at that part of the route? Are they migrating song birds? Or are they migrating water fowl, which might be in the water near the windmills? It would be easy for an orinthologist to determine this.
For Cape Wind, I've heard that sea ducks use the area where the wind farm is proposed. But I don't now if they would be impacted by the blades. THe mercury in the fish they eat - mostly from burning coal - is presumably much worse.
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Bob Holt Posted 4:09 am
13 May 2006
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99kestrel Posted 5:37 am
13 May 2006
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David Roberts Posted 7:01 am
13 May 2006
This piece of conventional wisdom maddens me. Who says we want to simply "replace" huge, centralized power plants? What we want is to replace the whole paradigm of massive, inefficient, fossil-fuel-burning plants with a more distributed, flexible grid with a variety of energy sources (not just wind) sited close to energy consumers, combined with substantial increases in energy efficiency and conservation. Such a system would be far more reliable and resilient than the present model (ask people who've been through a brownout how "reliable" our current power grid is).
Of course no energy source is simply going to plug in to the present system to replace coal. But so what? That's a strawman.
www.grist.org
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99kestrel Posted 9:54 am
13 May 2006
When there were tax breaks, I installed solar panels on the roof. They were to help heat the home during the winter. Immediately afterward, we had 6 weeks without sun. They worked to some degree in the spring and fall but were useless in the winter. When the fans stopped working, they were not worth the expense of repairing.
Wouldn't the same problem occur here for photovoltaic panels?
Last year, I did install a geothermal heating system, and that DOES work. Of course it takes electricity to run the heat pump.
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Jaguares3 Posted 12:11 pm
13 May 2006
the windmills could be turned in a direction to deflect the hurricane away from land, possibly saving great damage to the oilwell platforms.
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windnbs Posted 11:28 pm
13 May 2006
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amazingdrx Posted 12:21 am
14 May 2006
It only encourages them.
Unfortunately some environmental groups have fallen for this scam. As they have for "new, safer, cleaner" coal and nuclear technology.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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swan Posted 7:54 am
14 May 2006
This is the wintering grounds of one of the rarest creatures in North America according to U.S. Fish & Wildlife folks - the whooping crane. My grandmother, who was a card-carrying member of the Audobon Society, was active in the establishing of the sanctuary for the whooping cranes in the 30s. The whooping cranes made a comeback from less than 20 to several hundred today. My favorite outings with my grandmother when I was growing up in South Texas were spent in the marshes around the refuge waiting quietly behind a stand of cattails hoping for a peek at the reclusive whooping crane. My nature lovin' grandparents inspired my life-long journey as a nature mystic, writer and activist. I also consider myself a responsible environmentalist. I see no need to disturb the important habitat of this rare and beautiful bird to put up a wind farm in that particular place. The wind farm is an excellent idea. It should work very well down near South Padre Island where the beach front condos that use up all the energy it would be producing can see their tax dollars at work. The name of my online magazine is Wildflower Stew - http://wildflowerstew.org - the subtitle is "You Can't Eat the View" - but maybe you can watch it go round and round . . . . . swan . . . . .
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Ana Unruh Cohen Posted 2:19 pm
14 May 2006
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swan Posted 11:50 pm
14 May 2006
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Storm Dragon Posted 9:14 am
16 May 2006
I have lived, for a number of years now, on a ranch with quite a few cats, (for rodent control), and a healthy and diverse population of wild birds. While it is true that the cats sometimes kill birds, I have seen no evidence that their occasional predation is having a destructive effect on the bird population as a whole.
Now, I'm not saying that cat predation is never a problem. My observations, after all, were made in a rural area, with an abundance of trees, shrubs, and natural cover. I can believe that the situation might be quite different in a suburban area, with less cover, more environmental pollutants, and an abundance of raccoons, (which raid nests, and often find abundant food, and few predators, in the suburbs). In difficult conditions like these, the killing of birds by domestic cats might well have a greater impact than it would in a healther and more balanced environment.
it seems to me that the situation with windmills might well be similar. What do you think?
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atreyger Posted 1:50 pm
16 May 2006
Up here, shrublands and old ag fields are on the decline, and that provided habitat to many spp. Down south, well, I'm not that familiar with all the countries, but Costa Rica is doing all right, Haiti, not so much... You can think of each individual country and think about the socio-economic and environmental problems and come to your own generally fair guesses as to the state of bird habitat.
P.S. Ya can't forget all the other factors either, such as the cowbirds: they're expanding their range with negative consequences.
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caniscandida Posted 4:01 pm
16 May 2006
I would ask everyone to follow David's link, in the fourth line, "the birds," to the Curry&Kerlinger site. I am not a researcher, but these people really know their birds and their population statistics, and we should trust their analyses. In other reputable sources I have read about the dangers to songbirds posed by cats on the loose, consistent with what C&K report from Audubon.
Storm Dragon, Draco Procellarum, you do not tell us what the bird fauna is like on your ranch. The birds that have our attention as being most threatened by cats are songbirds, in a woodlands environment. For example there have been recent controversies over what to do about feral cats in Wisconsin and in San Francisco. If you are in the West, in a rather treeless area, possibly your cats take a quail from time to time, but otherwise they are going after rodents and lizards and snakes. As for crows and buzzards, it is your cats that are the potential prey. To say nothing of rattlers and coyotes. And that is a point that the Humane Society makes: cats out of doors tend to have unnaturally short lives.
Swan, somehow I do not think whooping cranes are going to fly into wind turbines. They are indeed magnificent birds, of course, true American treasures, and we do well to do all we can to preserve them. One of the happiest days of my life was when I visited Bosco del Apache in New Mexico, and saw, amongst all the other wonderful birds, their spectacular mixed flock of sandhill and whooping cranes. I hope to visit Aransas some day.
A-Treyger, you are certainly right that introduced rats (and let us call a spade a spade, when we say "rodents," we do not mean beavers or chipmunks or porcupines) have devastated the populations of ground-nesting birds on islands discovered by Europeans in the modern age. As to whether rats climb trees in North America and plunder the nests of songbirds up there, I would not put it past them, but have never heard of it. And Curry&Kerlinger make no mention of rats.
You are absolutely right that habitat loss, at both ends of their migration, is the biggest long-term threat to songbirds. The Latin American situation is precarious, though there are signs of hope. But one of the problems with US-based organizations dedicated to wildlife conservation is that they are pretty good at fund-raising for North American animals, e.g. wolves and grizzlies, and yet there are other faunas in Southern regions which could use some funding too.
And also right: Cowbirds and cuckoos will always be with us.
Once again: I am in favor of windfarms, I do not expect they are responsible for significant bird mortality when sited carefully, and I believe that is the conclusion of Curry&Kerlinger.
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atreyger Posted 12:56 am
17 May 2006
Yep, songbird nest predation (and not only ground nest) in our forests is largely driven by our native fauna. That's nature for you.
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sukumar Posted 10:34 am
17 May 2006
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caniscandida Posted 6:44 pm
17 May 2006
Cats have been the domestic companions of humans apparently for all of history. More often than not, probably, they have been "put to work" as hunters of rodents, and so have been given free run at least of areas where food is stored. Nevertheless, even when they have the opportunity to "escape," they tend to want to stay around their humans.
It is true that many cats take advantage of an open door or window, and run away. Why? Out of frustration at being shut up inside? Could be.
Cats are famously on the fence between domesticity and the wild: see Rudyard Kipling's wonderful Just-So Story, "The Cat Who Walked By Himself." (The Dog comes off kind of silly. Like a certain dog I know, in fact.) I am in fact very interested in the welfare of cats and dogs and other animals, and have thought about what kinds of stimulation and experience their humans ought to give them. No doubt the Humane Society of the United States, and Best Friends, have plenty of suggestions.
At this point, given the statistics that I have referred to, it seems overly sentimental and short-sighted to allow one's cat her time outside, stalking in the woods, playing panther games. It is not safe for her physically -- whatever good it may do for her mentally, spiritually, etc. -- ; and it is not good for many endangered species of songbirds.
On evolving together: Yes, Sukumar, that is a good point. Unfortunately the songbirds are being threatened by a number of dangerous circumstances, and it is not good to add to that number a highly adapted non-native predator who has the advantage of being able to go indoors when she wants.
Interesting that you should pair birds with alligators. I suppose alligators can catch a distracted heron from time to time. They are actually pretty close cousins, both being archosaurs. In fact, if birds did not evolve from a theropod dinosaur, another archosaur (we are allowed to use the E-word in Grist?), a majority opinion at this point, then it is likely that they arose from the crocodilians, as some hold-out ornithologists believe.
A-Treyger, nest predation indeed can impose a significant limit on bird populations. Whether deer mice and field mice are major players in that game, I rather doubt.
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atreyger Posted 1:19 am
18 May 2006
All the predation on bird eggs they have seen (either experimentally with 'silly putty' eggs or caught on camera) was due to small rodents: chipmunks and deer mice. While snakes may play a bigger role in the tropics (I'm actually not really sure if they do), in the Northeastern US, specifically oak-hickory forests of Duchess county, these rodents drove nest predation.
I am sure that while this is a relatively small locality, these results can be extrapolated to much of oak-hickory and northern hardwood forest, and I am sure that the authors of that paper have suggested it to be true. I am too lazy to get the citations, but I was there, and I have seen the results, and i think this actually has been replicated elsewhere.
As a matter of fact, rodents are the biggest ecological driver in forests, they connect seed predation, nest predation, insect predation, are a major vector for Lyme and other diseases, are prey to various predators, and a whole bunch of other neat things, such as a major source of mortality for most shrub and tree seedlings during winter, when the food supplies run out.
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caniscandida Posted 5:29 am
18 May 2006
Apologies to the rats, and to all rattophiles, for having maligned them earlier.
That said, it remains unclear to me how often these incredibly cute little critters resort to birds' eggs and insects. Agreed, they are omnivores, and opportunists. And one or another is mentioned in the Kaufman book as even going for lizards, so I would not put it past them to include not only birds' eggs on their menus, but nestlings too. But how often does that happen? Unlike carnivores, who know what they want, food-wise, and target those items, it seems that these rodents go bumbling along, finding seeds and other plant matter to be their most reliable food source, and so that constitutes the bulk of their diet; but only if an unattended nest comes into view will they go check out what it may have to offer. That is, they do not wake up and say to themselves, "Today I feel like a nice omelet." Or do they?
Anyway, the interaction of species is distorted nowadays by the grotesque explosion in the numbers of white-tailed deer, who are munching up the forest understory. That is putting pressure on many birds, and presumably on other animals too.
To bring this back to wind turbines: Nothing in the calculus has changed; if anything, the problem that is already recognized has now become clearer. The populations of many migratory songbirds are dropping. Even absent human-caused factors, birds must cope with significant limits, such as nest predation. But now, on top of that, humans are responsible for severely adding to those limits, especially by destroying crucial habitat, and secondarily but not inconsiderably introducing to the birds' environment glass windows and cats. Does the erection of wind farms pose yet another big problem for migratory songbirds? So far, evidence suggests No, if the siting of those wind farms is done thoughtfully. Meanwhile, it is good to know that people are paying attention.
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Storm Dragon Posted 10:13 am
19 May 2006
Magpie
Scrub Jay
Northern Oriole*
Nuthatch
Titmouse
Oregon Junco
Sparrow {several kinds)
Flycatcher(ditto)
Western Bluebird*
Mockingbird
Starling (not common, fortunately)
Cedar Waxwing+
Red-shafted Flicker
Steller's Jay*
Townsend's Warbler+
Western Tanager+
House Finch*
Goldfinch
Anna's Hummingbird
Other Hummingbirds*
California Quail
Wild Turkey
Roadrunner+
Red-tailed Hawk
Red-Shouldered Hawk
Peregrine Falcon+
Golden Eagle
Bald Eagle
Great Blue Heron+
Acorn Woodpecker (I think)
Sapsucker
Turkey Vulture
Crow
Mourning Dove
Band-Tailed Pidgeon
As noted, this is a partial list. I have omitted species such as Killdeer, and Western Meadowlark,
which are found in my general area, because they prefer more open country than that found around my house. I have also omitted many of the local species of waterfowl, because I do not live that close to a large body of water, and swallows, because they do not seem to nest on the ranch where I live. I am sure, also, that there are other species that I have not yet identified.
Species marked with a star are generally seasonal,
And those marked with a cross are rarely seen. I hope this is helpful.
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caniscandida Posted 1:27 pm
19 May 2006
I am sure you have a couple of owls, though you do not mention them.
Anyway, to get back to cats, I am not trying to be a Puritan or an Inquisitor here, I am only passing along these reputable opinions, to the effect that they should be kept indoors. In fact, I trust someone like you terrificly, to know what your cats are up to when they are outside. I gather that other cat-owners are much more thoughtless. You have a few small birds on your list, some of which may be endangered, e.g. the "rarely seen" Townsend's warbler. (Though in my estimation warblers are never very easy to see.) But in fact, given all those raptors that you mention, and the indubitable fact of life that you have coyotes somewhere close by, I am more worried about your cats than about your birds.
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Storm Dragon Posted 2:27 am
22 May 2006
You guessed right...I am located in Central California, at the southern end of the Santa Lucia range, and I hope, one day, to see a condor in the wild
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Alternative Energy Posted 10:33 am
28 May 2006
We should examine all types of alternative energy and research which energy sources will best fit into our local ecosystems. Other renewable sources such as geothermal power, solar power, tidal power and wind power may be better suited depending on the local ecosystem. Compromises should be made depending on the concerns of local citizens and envrionmentalists.
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atreyger Posted 1:56 pm
11 Jun 2006
First, why would anyone think that they are ugly? I think they look awesome, if not majestic.
Second, how can we ignore this vast amount of energy that is always there?
My buddy lives at the site of the Jordanville proposed wind project, and there's definitely a ton of wind by his place, almost too much to be comfortable at an exposed site. It's a shame people are against this for some reason beyond my understanding.
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amazingdrx Posted 9:19 pm
11 Jun 2006
But in this case the project would not be environmentally destructive like big dam projects tend to be. Huge wind machines move very slowly, the bigger the scale the easier it is for birds to avoid collisions.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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