Dramatic video shows bird strike at wind turbine (1 Viewer)

rockfowl · Apr 8, 2011

Be warned, it's not that pleasant! Strangely this is aimed at the American situation despite the fact that it involves an very unfortunate Griffon Vulture in Crete - http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/bird-strike-video.html#cr

Lmc3598 · Apr 8, 2011

Poor thing, hope people tried to help it before it died

eagle golden · Apr 8, 2011

rockfowl said:
Be warned, it's not that pleasant! Strangely this is aimed at the American situation despite the fact that it involves an very unfortunate Griffon Vulture in Crete - http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/bird-strike-video.html#cr

I wonder why large birds of prey are attracted to these wind farms, could it be the updrafts they make, I was also wondering if the blades cannot be painted with a colour that stands out more for the birds, I hope something can be done, especially when birdlife cyprus are hoping to bring some griffin vultures from create, to replenish there dwindeling stocks, if they are this dangerouse I wonder why the R.S.P.B supported the ones in the outer hebridies. I heard this from a couple who had come over from Lewis to loch garten to complain,about this.

Andrew Rowlands · Apr 8, 2011

eagle golden said:
I wonder why large birds of prey are attracted to these wind farms ...

Large birds need lift from wind to save energy, wind farms need wind to create energy. That they both occur in the same places should come as little surprise.

This bird looks like it was actively searching for food, maybe it'd found corpses of other victims there previously.

One of the very early studies from the infamous Altamont Pass wind farm in California listed more staff employed outside the area on a feeding project (to entice birds away from the wind farm) than they had looking for evidence of bird strikes on the wind farm itself.

Ficedula · Apr 8, 2011

eagle golden said:
I wonder why large birds of prey are attracted to these wind farms.

Recent work I heard discussed on radio 4 suggests that the main reason for these sharp-eyed birds failing to see turbine blades is that they are intently interested in what is on the ground where they find food. As open country birds, they have never needed to evolve an alertness to what is in front of them once they are aloft and above normal tree-top hight. Analogous to animals on remote island that have no fear of predators that suddenly arrive in their domain.

Barred Wobbler · Apr 8, 2011

Ficedula said:
Recent work I heard discussed on radio 4 suggests that the main reason for these sharp-eyed birds failing to see turbine blades is that they are intently interested in what is on the ground where they find food. As open country birds, they have never needed to evolve an alertness to what is in front of them once they are aloft and above normal tree-top hight. Analogous to animals on remote island that have no fear of predators that suddenly arrive in their domain.

The blades are also moving at the speed of a light aircraft. One every second.

Chlidonias · Apr 8, 2011

Lmc3598 said:
Poor thing, hope people tried to help it before it died

from the article itself: "The bird suffered a broken wing and has been in rehab for over a year, and is still unable to fly."

the video was uploaded to youtube on 3 Nov 2009

Barred Wobbler · Apr 9, 2011

Chlidonias said:
from the article itself: "The bird suffered a broken wing and has been in rehab for over a year, and is still unable to fly."

the video was uploaded to youtube on 3 Nov 2009

But before and after then (Nov 2009) there have been numerous incidents of raptors being killed by wind turbines, sea eagles in Norway are notorious examples.

The difference is that this video shows an actual event. The majority of the rest go unrecorded because the birds are killed without witnesses with video cameras. The only evidence is the corpse, or more likely the absence of the dead birds in the sky following the scavenging of the corpses.

Even so, there are many recorded incidences of eagles, kites, vultures and other birds being killed by turbine blades - with photos of the results. The difference is that this link shows a real-time moving event. I believe that the people who were involved in the rescue of the bird in the video were para-gliders who were on the scene. An extended video showing the capture of the bird is available in Youtube.

A wind-farm near Zaragosa in Spain was shut down a couple of years ago because of the number of vultures that were being killed.

Barred Wobbler · Apr 9, 2011

See here.

http://savetheeaglesinternational.org/

Chlidonias · Apr 9, 2011

I was only making reference to this specific bird in response to Lmc3598's post, not in any way at all to wind turbines vs birds in general

Dramatic video shows bird strike at wind turbine (1 Viewer)

More options

rockfowl

Mark Andrews

Lmc3598

Well-known member

eagle golden

Well-known member

Andrew Rowlands

Well-known member

Ficedula

velico ergo sum

Barred Wobbler

Well-known member

Chlidonias

Well-known member

Barred Wobbler

Well-known member

Barred Wobbler

Well-known member

Chlidonias

Well-known member

Similar threads

Users who are viewing this thread