Dead birds washing up at Great Salt Lake

[flashl]

SALT LAKE CITY - Thousands of dead birds are washing up on the Great Salt Lake shore. "We've received a lot of calls — everybody's worried about avian influenza," said Leslie McFarlane, wildlife-disease coordinator at the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.

But the dead birds are free of bird flu.

Avian cholera killed more than 15,000 birds on the lake last fall, most of them eared grebes, a duck-like bird. The common bacteria can quickly spread through a bird population, McFarlane said.

...

There are hundreds of thousands of birds that migrate through the area, she said, and the 15,000 or so deaths won't hurt the overall population.

YN

[wordpix]

1. "15,000 or so deaths won't hurt the overall population." WTF? This wildlife "expert" sounds like a

Bush shill: "Heckuva job, Brownie!" Nothing happening here, move along!

[malakai2]

2. It may very well not hurt the population

If that is on par with natural mortality rates due to other factors, and it's compensatory rather than additive, a proper census wouldn't be able to detect a change.