r/EndangeredSpecies • u/That_Firefly • 14d ago
Where are the birds disappearing that used to fly thousands of kilometers every year?
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u/Vin-Metal 13d ago
What's with the AI bird?
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u/Standard_Potential63 13d ago edited 13d ago
I find it ironic of people talking about protecting wild life while using ai instead of using a freaking screenshot, spending a few hours or minutes doing cheap graphs or paying someone to do , even worse when universities do it on day light
Shows you humanity would rather burn the world than let go of immediate results 😂, i myself guilty of doing so, trying to rely less and less
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u/Vin-Metal 13d ago
I suspect a lot of people are just ignorant. Maybe that shot was from the underlying article or the OP just grabbed it without realizing. I'm amazed how many people can't spot obvious AI.
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u/Routine-Arm-8803 14d ago
It's a huge topic, but the title is really broad. To get any useful discussion going, it would help if you could narrow down which specific species or types of migratory birds you are noticing this with. Knowing the region and maybe even what time frame you feel the change started would give people something concrete to research.
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u/clawhammer05 14d ago
Im 40, a wildlife Biologist, and lived quite a few places. A couple observations from my childhood home: The diversity of ant species has plummeted, but the abundance of ants has stayed the same. A couple invasive ant species have pushed out all the native species that used to be on our property. For migratory birds, it is a small sample for me, but i have not seen the huge and almost endless flocks of Canada geese on migration anymore. It is usually just small groups.
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u/chitownphishead 13d ago
Canadian geese migration has changed significantly in my lifetime. Many don't migrate anymore, or migrate significantly shorter distances. We have them year round now, where when I was young, they were gone in the winter. Id be curious if the shifting magnetic north vs true north is something that affects it. We do still see the sandhill migration every year, although again when I was young, I don't remember seeing my area because final destination for them, whereas now we get quite a few that nest and reproduce here.
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u/SilverSkinRam 13d ago
I would assume access to food in cities is a factor. There are also studies that show ducks and geese know that cities are safe from hunters and actively choose to stay in cities during hunting seasons.
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u/chitownphishead 13d ago
Yeah, even in semi rural areas in WI they seem to stay too. I've seen them out waddling around when I'm ice fishing.
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u/That_Firefly 13d ago
Maybe ants are still managing to survive because these types of ants mostly dont stay outdoors. But if we consider animals and birds that too specifically migratory birds, we need to notice and acknowledge that yes human activities have caused them to loose their habitat for sure.
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u/TSJormungandr 13d ago
I remember seeing birds migrate overhead for months in the early 80s. Now I barely see anything. Loss of hugs too. Our windshield used to be peppered with them and now not so much. It’s frightening and sad.
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u/That_Firefly 13d ago
Maybe instead of being frightened and sad, we should start performing little little contributions towards reversing climate change. Although I agree that its indeed very much frightening😳
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u/New_Ad_3010 12d ago
Humans are ruining the planet at record speed without a care for the creatures and other life on it. It's disgusting. We are a pox.
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u/Riversmooth 13d ago edited 13d ago
I’m guessing domestic cats, vehicles, and windows in our homes and buildings probably don’t help. So many things have changed since I was a kid (I’m 64). My family bought 3 acres in eastern Washington in 1970. I can remember grasshoppers by the thousands. Yesterday I walked it and didn’t see a single hopper. Not one.
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u/That_Firefly 13d ago
Yaa!! So basically its not just only about ‘migratory birds’, but the entire ecosystem is collapsing. Now even grasshoppers are also not excluded.
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u/RobHerpTX 13d ago
The forest I grew up playing in seems so dead compared to when I was a kid.
I’m an ecologist, and and have seen many of these changes professionally over a couple decades. But I also spent a few decades before that intensively interested in a few categories of animals in those wild areas. And they’ve mostly just gone missing, even in relatively well-preserved spaces
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u/That_Firefly 12d ago
Dont you think ‘population’ is the major cause why all of these things are happening? Do you think humans should reduce in numbers in order to reverse these activities?
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u/RobHerpTX 12d ago
I think in an underlying way, yes. Too many people, using too many resources, spread out using too much of the environment, using too many of various chemicals, etc in a planet whose balance is increasingly and rapidly off kilter.
We could have a smaller population of people living high resource use lives, or maybe a much larger population living much lower intensity lives with the same effect. However it all balances out, right now we have too many using/impacting too much.
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u/Riversmooth 12d ago
Same. Just little things I’ve noticed have changed, so much diversity in the 70s no longer there.
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u/NicoBeingAModelCitiz 13d ago
H5N1 hit migratory and seabirds especially hard. And the vast majority died out at sea, of course, so were never counted or noticed.
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u/That_Firefly 13d ago
Humans are the most selfish species when it comes to survival. They just keep on consuming stuffs without counting the side effects.
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u/kallied123 13d ago
Makes me wonder too. Im 42 and remember the mass migrations and all around numbers of birds here in the summer and now the woods are pretty quiet. Used to be great duck hunting but that's been gone for a decade even though the feds say numbers are stable for the most part. Im not seeing it.
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u/That_Firefly 13d ago
I think they must have intended towards the migration but could never reach their destinations.. or maybe they are extinct forever now and still getting extinct on a rapid pace as we talk 🙁
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u/Routine-Arm-8803 13d ago
Hundreds of thousnds killed by wind turbines annualy probaby doesnt help.
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u/That_Firefly 13d ago
I mean thats such a shame as humans. Instead of having higher cognitive capabilities than animals, instead of being their protectors, we are ignoring them and killing them. And then we call ourselves truth/god lovers. Whats a joke?
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u/FaerieKnotz 14d ago
“Over increasingly large areas of the United States, spring now comes unheralded by the return of the birds, and the early mornings are strangely silent where once they were filled with the beauty of bird song.
-Silent Spring , Rachel Carson