Bird-watchers in Oregon are sounding the alarm after an unusually quiet spring. They connected the concerning absence to severe weather conditions along the birds’ migratory path.
What’s happening?
Bird-watchers noticed an obvious decline in the number of bird species they observed this spring. One birder with the Bird Alliance of Oregon decided to check the information.
“When in the past, on a birdsong walk on Mount Tabor, you might come across five or six Nashville warblers; this year there were zero,” said Brodie Cass Talbott, according to KLCC.
He looked at national data collected by academic researchers, and the results were startling: 43 million birds migrated through Oregon between April and May. That’s a 47% drop from that period last year…