Boerenlandvogels – WP

Auteur: Eric

  • Not all smiles on annual bird count in Starved Rock State Park

    Steve Gillam, Starved Rock volunteer Tom Williams and Starved Rock State Park natural resource coordinator Lisa Sons exchanged jokes and friendly chitchat as they trudged over a muddy path along a field edge, wetland and woods at Matthiessen State Park. They were not seeing many birds, despite sunny, breezy conditions and diverse habitat, during their after-lunch hike over their territory in the Starved Rock Audubon Society Christmas bird count. And they said they had not seen many birds in the morning among the oak trees and canyons in the Matthiessen Dells area.

    They were surprised that they didn’t see a yellow-bellied sapsucker, a hairy woodpecker or any red-headed woodpeckers, even though the oak-filled lawn was prime habitat. They had seen red-bellied woodpeckers and large pileated woodpeckers, Audubon Society Christmas bird counts have been showing a decline in red-headed woodpecker numbers in the U.S. northwest of the Ohio River for several years now.

    Though they were having a pleasant time on the New Year’s hike, the birders also expressed concerns. “This year altogether we’ve noticed how quiet it is,” Williams said. He has participated in the bird count hikes, comprised of three days of counting, since 1969, when he first participated at age 12 with his father, Jerry. Sons discussed stories, studies and statistics she has seen from the national Audubon Society about a crash in bird populations nationwide and worldwide.

    During the hike, Gillam started talking about a study that indicated some sparrows that came into contact with insect-repelling neonicotinoid, used to pretreat corn and soybean seed, had their appetites suppressed before migrating. The sparrows in the study departed two or three days late on migration, and then have difficulty completing migration or could arrive late and not find mates. (Makers of the pretreatment coating, Bayer, refute claims that their product is a factor in population decline.)

    Source: News Tribune, Jan 6, 2020
    https://www.newstrib.com/2020/01/06/not-all-smiles-on-annual-bird-count/amota5k/

  • EU doet landbouwgif thiacloprid in de ban

    Het in de landbouw gebruikte bestrijdingsmiddel thiacloprid wordt verboden in de EU omdat het risico’s voor de gezondheid en het milieu met zich meebrengt. De Europese Commissie maakte maandag officieel bekend de vergunning niet te verlengen, op basis van een wetenschappelijk advies van de Europese Autoriteit voor Voedselveiligheid (EFSA).

    Lees verder in Trouw van 20 januari 2020:
    https://www.trouw.nl/duurzaamheid-natuur/eu-doet-landbouwgif-thiacloprid-in-de-ban~be1232f1/

  • The number of monarchs continues to be alarmingly low

    Monarchs in California form a distinct group from the larger, eastern population. Separated by the spine of the Rocky Mountains, the two clusters have different migration routes. While eastern monarchs pass through the central U.S. to overwinter in Mexico, western monarchs ride out the cold in coastal California between Mendocino County and Baja California. The Xerces Society coordinates groups of volunteers to perform annual counts throughout the western range each Thanksgiving.

    During the 2017 count, volunteers reported a total of 192,668 butterflies across 263 sites — itself a gradual decline of more than 90% from historical populations in the millions. The following year, however, something particularly shocking happened. Results from 2018 tallied only 28,429 butterflies, a decline of 86% in a single year and of 99.4% since the 1980s. By their estimates, only one butterfly remains alive today for every 160 in the past, placing the species below a critical threshold of 30,000 needed to guard against extinction.

    This year, the number of monarchs visiting overwintering sites totaled only 29,418, another disappointingly low count. The situation has become so dire that the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife Services has been petitioned to list the species as endangered. In Pacific Grove, the Monarch Sanctuary counts likewise dropped an order of magnitude, from 7,350 in 2017 to 815 in 2018. In the most recent release, the Sanctuary reported only 642 butterflies.

    Source: Monterey Herald, Jan 23, 2020

    More discouraging results from monarch count prompts some locals to action

  • Mayfly numbers drop by half since 2012

    Mayflies, which form swarms in the billions that are visible on weather radar, are in steep decline, mirroring the plight of insects worldwide. Every summer, mayflies burst forth from lakes and rivers, taking to the skies of North America. These insects, which are particularly abundant in the northern Mississippi River Basin and Great Lakes, live in the water as nymphs before transforming into flying adults. They synchronize their emergence to form huge swarms of up to 80 billion individuals—so massive that, in waterside towns, they are sometimes scooped up with snowplows. These insect explosions provide food for a wide variety of animals, from perch and other commercially important freshwater fish to birds and bats.

    But new research shows that mayflies are in decline. Since 2012, mayfly populations have declined by more than 50 percent throughout the northern Mississippi and Lake Erie, according to a study published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Levels of neonicotinoid pesticides have risen in recent years in Lake Erie and many freshwater systems in the Midwest. The chemicals, which are toxic to many insects, have been measured in Great Lakes tributaries at levels 40 times greater than protective levels set by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Aquatic Life Benchmark, according to a 2018 study.

    Source: National Geographic, Jan 20, 2020
    https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/2020/01/mayfly-insect-populations-in-decline/

  • Oligotrophic bacterium Hymenobacter latericoloratus CGMCC 16346 degrades the neonicotinoid imidacloprid in surface water

    The intensive and extensive application of imidacloprid in agriculture has resulted in water pollution and risks to aquatic invertebrates. However, pure bacteria remediation of imidacloprid in surface water environments has not been studied. Here, we isolated an imidacloprid-degrading bacterium from a water environment, examined its imidacloprid degradation in pure culture and surface water, sequenced its genome, and compared its Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COG) protein categorization with that for another imidacloprid-degrading bacterium. The isolate was an obligate oligotrophic bacterium, Hymenobacter latericoloratus CGMCC 16346, which degraded imidacloprid via hydroxylation by co-metabolism in pure culture. Resting cells degraded 64.4% of 100 mg/L imidacloprid in 6 days in the presence of co-substrate maltose, and growing culture degraded 40.8% of imidacloprid in 10 days. H. latericoloratus CGMCC 16346 degraded imidacloprid in surface water without co-substrate supplementation and retained imidacloprid-degrading activity after 30 days. The half-life of imidacloprid in surface water was decreased from 173.3 days in the control to 57.8 days by CGMCC 16346 inoculation. Genome sequencing and COG analysis indicated that carbohydrate metabolism and transport, cell wall/membrane biogenesis, and defense mechanisms are enriched in H. latericoloratus CGMCC 16346 compared with the copiotrophic imidacloprid-degrading Pseudoxanthomonas indica CGMCC 6648, indicating that H. latericoloratus CGMCC 16346 is adapted to live in oligotrophic water environments and biofilms. H. latericoloratus CGMCC 16346 is a promising bioremediation agent for elimination of imidacloprid contamination from surface water.

    Source:
    Guo, L., Dai, Z., Guo, J. et al. Oligotrophic bacterium Hymenobacter latericoloratus CGMCC 16346 degrades the neonicotinoid imidacloprid in surface water. AMB Expr 10, 7 (2020) doi:10.1186/s13568-019-0942-y

  • In een halve eeuw zijn drie miljard vogels verdwenen in Noord-Amerika

    In een halve eeuw is de vogelpopulatie drastisch afgenomen in Noord-Amerika. Canada en de VS tellen ruim drie miljard vogels minder. Die alarmerende cijfers komen naar voor in een studie die werd gepubliceerd in het gerenommeerde vakblad Science. De wetenschappers trekken aan de alarmbel.

    Het team van Amerikaanse en Canadese onderzoekers, onder leiding van ornitholoog Kenneth Rosenberg van de Cornell University, analyseerde gegevens van verschillende langlopende monitoringprogramma’s in Noord-Amerika. Sommige metingen gaan zelfs terug tot 1970. Binnen zo’n monitoring tellen vogelaars in het voorjaar op vaste locaties welke vogels ze tegenkomen en in welke aantallen.

    De conclusies van de omvangrijke studie zijn alarmerend. Vogels in Noord-Amerika verdwijnen aan een schrikbarend snel tempo. De totale vogelpopulatie in de landen is sinds 1970 met 29 procent afgenomen. Het zou gaan om in totaal bijna 3 miljard vogels.

    Bron: HLN, 20 september 2019
    https://www.hln.be/wetenschap-planeet/milieu/absoluut-dramatisch-op-50-jaar-tijd-drie-miljard-vogels-verdwenen-in-noord-amerika-en-is-het-in-belgie-ook-zo-erg~a3613cb0/

  • Het aantal egels in Vlaanderen is de laatste 10 jaar gehalveerd

    In tien jaar tijd is het aantal egels in Vlaanderen gehalveerd. “Alarmerend”, klinkt het bij Natuurpunt. Want als er niks gebeurt, zijn er over tien jaar misschien helemaal géén egels meer. Over de precieze oorzaak van de achteruitgang bestaat nog geen duidelijkheid. “We zien wel al enkele factoren die een rol spelen. Zo merken we dat de egel een slachtoffer is van het verkeer en van het dichte wegennetwerk in België. Bovendien is het aantal insecten afgenomen, waardoor de overlevingskansen van de egel verminderen”, klinkt het bij Natuurpunt. “Maar het valt niet uit te sluiten dat er nog andere factoren zijn die een rol spelen. Daarvoor is nog meer onderzoek nodig.”

    Bron: HLN, 16 juli 2019
    https://www.hln.be/wetenschap-planeet/dieren/aantal-egels-in-10-jaar-gehalveerd-dit-kan-u-doen-om-hen-te-redden~ab92a94c/?referer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.nl%2F

  • In 2018 was imidacloprid in de glastuinbouw nog steeds een probleemstof

    Het Hoogheemraadschap (HH) Delfland heeft een meetnet om de waterkwaliteit van het glastuinbouwgebied te monitoren: er zijn 23 meetlocaties in het meetnet voor de glastuinbouw, namelijk op 3 referentielocaties buiten het glastuin-bouwgebied, 5 boezemlocaties en 15 locaties in glastuinbouwgebied. Op deze locaties zijn elke maand bestrijdingsmiddelen gemeten.

    De polders waar in 2018 gemiddeld de meeste (aantal) bestrijdingsmiddelen zijn aangetroffen, zijn: Vlotwatering (gemeente Westland), Oude Campspolder (gemeente Westland en Midden-Delfland), Hoefpolder (gemeente Westland) en de Oranjepolder (gemeente Westland). Per meting werden op de locatie Vlotwatering 15 stoffen aangetroffen en in de andere drie polders 14 stoffen.

    In het hele meetnet glastuinbouwgebied zijn 12 verschillende bestrijdingsmiddelen gemeten die de norm hebben overschreden. De stoffen die op de meeste locaties de norm overschrijden zijn imidacloprid (toegelaten onder restricties), pirimicarb (toegelaten) en carbendazim (niet toegelaten). De grootste overschrijdingen zijn afkomstig van de stoffen abamectine (toegelaten), deltamethrin (toegelaten) en esfenvaleraat (toegelaten).

    Bron: HH Delfland

  • Das Insektensterben ist global

    Das Verhältnis von Insekten und Landwirtschaft ist ein durchaus ambivalentes. Auf der einen Seite sind sie als Schädlinge für Ernteausfälle verantwortlich. Vor allem in den tropischen Ländern können sie bis zu 40 Prozent der Ernten vernichten. Sie werden deswegen von der Agrarwirtschaft intensiv bekämpft: Weltweit hat sich der Verbrauch von Pestiziden seit 1950 um das 50fache erhöht. Auf der anderen Seite ist Landwirtschaft ohne Insekten kaum denkbar. Sie sind unerlässlich für die Bodenqualität, indem sie Dung und abgestorbenes Material zersetzen. Sie vertilgen auch Schädlinge – eine einzige Marienkäferlarve etwa frisst 200 Blattläuse pro Tag. Und sie bestäuben drei Viertel der wichtigsten Kulturpflanzen weltweit und steigern deren Erträge.

    „Ein Drittel der Produktion von Nahrungsmittel global braucht diese Bestäubungsdienstleistung der Insekten. Der ökonomische Wert der Bestäubung von Insekten wird auf zwischen 200 und 600 Milliarden US-Dollar geschätzt“, erklärt Barbara Unmüßig von der Böll-Stiftung.

    Landwirtschaft und Insekten seien untrennbar miteinander verbunden. Umso fataler sei es, dass die Landwirtschaft selber der Sektor sei, der am stärksten die Insekten bedrohe: Eine erste Überblicksstudie der Uni Sydney geht davon aus, dass mehr als 40 Prozent aller Insektenarten weltweit abnehmen und ein Drittel aller Insektenarten vom Aussterben bedroht ist.

    Auch andere Studien aus verschiedenen Teile des Welt zur Entwicklung der Insektenpopulationen weisen alle in die gleiche Richtung: Nach unten. Demnach ist global die Hälfte der Käfer und Schmetterlingsarten rückläufig und 46 Prozent der Hautflügler. In Deutschland betrifft der Artenschwund mehr als 90 Prozent der 107 Ameisenarten, 70 Prozent der Schmetterlingsarten, 50 Prozent der Wildbienenarten sind bedroht. Auch die Käfer gehen stark zurück.

    Quelle: Deutschlandfunk, im Januar 2020
    https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/umweltstudie-das-insektensterben-ist-global.697.de.html?dram:article_id=467408

  • IUCN’s new Red List reports alarming decline in global freshwater fish species

    Freshwater fish species globally are under grave threat according to the latest edition of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)’s Red List. In fact, over half of Japan’s endemic freshwater fishes and more than a third of freshwater fishes in Mexico were threatened with extinction, the list of threatended species released on July 18, 2019, said.

    The main reasons behind this were the usual suspects, namely loss of free-flowing rivers and agricultural and urban pollution. It was revealed recently that two-thirds of the world’s great rivers no longer flow freely. Another noteworthy factor was competition with and predation by invasive alien species of fish.

    “The world’s freshwater fish species, which number almost 18,000, are undergoing a dramatic and largely unrecognised global decline, as made apparent in the high levels of extinction threat to freshwater fish species in Japan and Mexico,” William Darwall, head of the IUCN Freshwater Biodiversity Unit, was quoted as saying in a press statement by the IUCN.

    “The loss of these species would deprive billions of people of a critical source of food and income, and could have knock-on effects on entire ecosystems. To halt these declines, we urgently need policies on the human use of freshwaters that allow for the needs of the many other species sharing these ecosystems.”

    Source: Down to Earth, 19 July 2019
    https://www.downtoearth.org.in/news/wildlife-biodiversity/iucn-s-new-red-list-reports-alarming-decline-in-global-freshwater-fish-species-65743