1.3.2011 9:33 AM

Hundreds of Birds Fall Mysteriously From the Sky (Video)

New Year's Eve saw dead birds raining down from the sky in Arkansas. Now, biologists are trying to understand why.

See how you can help the birds in your backyard.

Comments

Photo: Paul Carter / Wikimedia Commons/Wikimedia Commons

By Dan Shapley

Arkansas wildlife biologists are asking help from federal investigators to investigate the death of more than 1,000 red-winged blackbirds an starlings that fell out of the sky shortly before midnight rang in the new year Dec. 31.

Arkansas Game and Fish Commission officials say new year revelry may be the culprit, since it's unlikely that so many birds would be poisoned, take to the air and then die in mid-flight. More likely, something – like fireworks from a 2011 celebration in the City of Beebe. Other explanations include lightning or high-altitude hail – a storm had moved through around the time of the deaths.

The bodies of about 65 dead birds will be examined by the Arkansas Livestock and Poultry Commission lab and the National Wildlife Health Center lab in Madison, Wis. to verify the initial findings that trauma of some kind caused them to die, and not any internal malady.

Red-winged blackbirds are among the earliest migrants, so across the northern part of the country, their strange croaking calls from wetlands are celebrated as a sign of spring. Starlings, while known for being smart and vocal, are not native to the Western Hemisphere; they were imported from England by a lover of literature who wanted all the birds mentioned in Shakespeare to sing from Central Park in New York City. Now, they've spread across the continent, sometimes with damaging effects on native birds.

COMMENTS ()