Large Bird And Fish Kills Near Beebe

[Quillback]

WASHINGTON — First, the blackbirds fell out of the sky on New Year's Eve in Arkansas. In recent days, wildlife have mysteriously died in big numbers: 2 million fish in the Chesapeake Bay, 150 tons of red tilapia in Vietnam, 40,000 crabs in Britain and other places across the world.

Blogs connected the deadly dots, joking about the "aflockalypse" while others saw real signs of something sinister, either biblical or environmental.

The reality, say biologists, is that these mass die-offs happen all the time and usually are unrelated.

I still say it is UFO's,

[Tim Smith]

WASHINGTON — First, the blackbirds fell out of the sky on New Year's Eve in Arkansas. In recent days, wildlife have mysteriously died in big numbers: 2 million fish in the Chesapeake Bay, 150 tons of red tilapia in Vietnam, 40,000 crabs in Britain and other places across the world.

Blogs connected the deadly dots, joking about the "aflockalypse" while others saw real signs of something sinister, either biblical or environmental.

The reality, say biologists, is that these mass die-offs happen all the time and usually are unrelated.

I still say it is UFO's,

There has been a healthy amount of skepticism about the potential causes and severity of these kills here since the thread began.

But one reason these kinds of kills are of interest to me is that I have seen some of the mechanics behind how they are handled and they definitely leave something to be desired.

Fish kills do happen all the time, but they happen for a reason. The state of the art on researching fish kills is often not up to the task of determining those reasons. From time to time that becomes a serious problem.

For instance, a marsh in Barataria Bay that had been heavily oiled by the Macando spill experienced a fish kill in late summer. The state biologists said "it's heat, because heat drives down O2", but organic decomposition also drives down O2 and there was a substantial amount of oil in Barataria Bay during summer that might have racheted up BOD. So the Macando spill may well have contributed to that kill, but the oil industry immediately insisted there was no connection between those events.

In that case (and unfortunately in others) the state of Louisiana, anxious to reassure the public that their fish were safe to eat, agreed with BP. Yet LA had no substantive supporting evidence to let BP of the hook. Much was made of the fact that the fish that died didn't contain hydrocarbons, but the logical pathway for the spill to kill them had nothing to do with hydrocarbons.

Unless a kill is a certain size no one bothers to even count the fish. Even when formal inquiries are made, the cause of about 1/3 can't be resolved. And even when a cause is established, and there appears to be a human factor, the BP scenario above often lets the perpetrator say "well fish kills are natural, it was the heat, or just a freak occurance that had nothing to do with us". Sometimes they get away with that.

A kill here and there won't wipe out a stream, or bird population, but they are definitely something to take seriously and if they become too frequent they can do serious local damage.

It makes sense to keep an eye out for them and personally, I'd like to see better applications of technology to determine their causes.

[Quillback]

Yep I agree, we need to know the root cause of these die-offs if possibile.

[Quillback]

The truth is emerging - It's the Feds!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41178569/ns/us_news-environment/

[ollie]

Ok, I just read on CNN that the official word is out on the mass dying of these red winged birds. The Arkansas Game and Fish says they died of "blount force trauma". Duh! If you fell from the sky to the ground the same thing would happen to you! Now tell us the "reason" they fell from the sky. I'm sorry, but a child could have told us that!

[jdmidwest]

Ok, I just read on CNN that the official word is out on the mass dying of these red winged birds. The Arkansas Game and Fish says they died of "blount force trauma". Duh! If you fell from the sky to the ground the same thing would happen to you! Now tell us the "reason" they fell from the sky. I'm sorry, but a child could have told us that!

Local news reported today, they tested 13 birds and found the cause of death as Blunt Force Trauma by running into a building. I had seen an article a week or so ago in AFGC that it was caused by disorientation and flew as a group into the ground.

No poison or disease.

Anyone ever hear about the fish kill? Went by a local lake in Perry County that was almost froze over and notice a large Gizzard Shad kill all around the edges. Don't know what killed them, but it was just shad, nothing else and hundreds of them.

[Tim Smith]

Anyone ever hear about the fish kill? Went by a local lake in Perry County that was almost froze over and notice a large Gizzard Shad kill all around the edges. Don't know what killed them, but it was just shad, nothing else and hundreds of them.

Shad are super sensitive to temperature changes and will die en masse if you even look at them cross ways. Rarely any cause for concern when shad are the only species in a kill.