tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/raptors-69379/articlesRaptors – The Conversation2023-11-16T19:03:39Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2163582023-11-16T19:03:39Z2023-11-16T19:03:39ZGiant eagles and scavenging vultures shared the skies of ancient Australia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/555992/original/file-20231026-21-xbm5tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C0%2C7507%2C3686&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A flock of vultures (_Cryptogyps lacertosus_) and Australian ravens watch and wait (left), as an adult eagle _Dynatoaetus pachyosteus_ feeds on the carcass of a dead _Diprotodon_ (centre), while a younger bird seeks to join in. In the nearby treetops, a second adult _D. pachyosteus_ feeds its hungry chick (right).</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">John Barrie</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Today, Australia is home to 17 species of hawks and eagles. But the fossil record shows some other, rather special raptors were present in the relatively recent past. </p>
<p>Tens of thousands of years ago, Australia was home to species such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/australias-extinct-giant-eagle-was-big-enough-to-snatch-koalas-from-trees-200341"><em>Dynatoaetus gaffae</em>, the largest eagle ever to have lived in Australia</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/it-was-long-thought-these-fossils-came-from-an-eagle-turns-out-they-belong-to-the-only-known-vulture-species-from-australia-187017"><em>Cryptogyps lacertosus</em>, our only known vulture</a>. </p>
<p>Now, we have discovered another ancient eagle shared the skies with these prehistoric predators. In a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/03115518.2023.2268780">new paper in the journal Alcheringa</a>, we describe the formidable <em>Dynatoaetus pachyosteus</em>, based on fossils found in the Naracoorte Caves in South Australia.</p>
<h2>A new eagle unearthed</h2>
<p><em>Dynatoaetus pachyosteus</em> (the name means “powerful eagle with thick bones”) lived during the Pleistocene (a time period spanning from 2.5 million to 11,700 years ago). It had a wingspan similar to that of a wedge-tailed eagle, but with much more robust and powerful wings and legs. It was slightly smaller than its cousin, the massive <em>Dynatoaetus gaffae</em>. </p>
<p>This formidable predator would most likely have preyed on medium to large marsupials and birds. It may even have attacked juveniles and weakened individuals of huge megafaunal species like the <a href="https://theconversation.com/fossil-find-reveals-giant-prehistoric-thunder-birds-were-riddled-with-bone-disease-173745">giant flightless bird</a> <em>Genyornis</em>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556402/original/file-20231028-30-aal6zi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An illustration of an eagle feeding a chick, together with photos of four bones." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556402/original/file-20231028-30-aal6zi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556402/original/file-20231028-30-aal6zi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556402/original/file-20231028-30-aal6zi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556402/original/file-20231028-30-aal6zi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=402&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556402/original/file-20231028-30-aal6zi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556402/original/file-20231028-30-aal6zi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556402/original/file-20231028-30-aal6zi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=505&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The large extinct eagle <em>Dynatoaetus pachyosteus</em> (left) and comparison of its humerus or upper arm/wing bone (centre) to that of a modern female wedge-tailed eagle (right). Scale bar = 10mm.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">John Barrie (reconstruction) / Ellen Mather (photos)</span></span>
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<p><em>Dynatoaetus pachyosteus</em> shared the Pleistocene landscape with at least two other large eagles, the huge <em>Dynatoaetus gaffae</em> and the wedge-tailed eagle we know today. For these species to coexist, they would have likely needed to have slightly different ecological roles to avoid outright competition. </p>
<p>“Niche separation” typically occurs by <a href="https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/resource-partitioning-and-why-it-matters-17362658/">exploiting different kinds of food or habitats</a>. These three eagles most likely coexisted by specialising in hunting different prey and nesting in different places.</p>
<p>The occurrence of both species of the <em>Dynatoaetus</em> genus in Australia (and nowhere else) has implications for the evolution of eagles. <em>Dynatoaetus gaffae</em> and <em>D. pachyosteus</em> presumably evolved from a common ancestor in Australia that diverged into two species, a process that typically takes a very long time. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australias-extinct-giant-eagle-was-big-enough-to-snatch-koalas-from-trees-200341">Australia's extinct giant eagle was big enough to snatch koalas from trees</a>
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<p>This suggests the ancestor of this genus was already ensconced on our continent millions of years before the two Pleistocene species arose. <em>Dynatoaetus pachyosteus</em> and <em>D. gaffae</em> together form a rare example of a raptor genus diversifying into multiple species entirely on the Australian continent (what scientists call “endemic evolutionary radiation”). </p>
<p>There are only two raptor genera today restricted to Australia, and both consist of only a single species: <em>Hamirostra</em> (the black-breasted buzzard) and <em>Lophoictinia</em> (the square-tailed kite).</p>
<h2>Primitive vultures of ancient Australia</h2>
<p>Our research has also revealed intriguing new information about another extinct raptor, the vulture <em>Cryptogyps lacertosus</em>. </p>
<p>Fossils from the Green Waterhole (also known as Fossil Cave), in the Tantanoola district near Mt Gambier, give us a more complete picture of this species. We found several paired wing bones, two shoulder bones, a vertebra and a toe bone, all probably from a single individual. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/it-was-long-thought-these-fossils-came-from-an-eagle-turns-out-they-belong-to-the-only-known-vulture-species-from-australia-187017">It was long thought these fossils came from an eagle. Turns out they belong to the only known vulture species from Australia</a>
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<p>The additional bones of <em>Cryptogyps</em> indicate it was a rather primitive vulture, less adapted for the long periods of soaring flight characteristic of modern vultures.</p>
<p>Thanks to the sediment around the fossils, we also have a very precise date of when <em>Cryptogyps</em> was alive. Many of the Green Waterhole fossils were buried in a deposit of calcite rafts – crystals that form on the surface of still bodies of water in caves. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556401/original/file-20231028-24-5h6thl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Photos of several bones and an illustration of a vulture-like bird" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556401/original/file-20231028-24-5h6thl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556401/original/file-20231028-24-5h6thl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=689&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556401/original/file-20231028-24-5h6thl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=689&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556401/original/file-20231028-24-5h6thl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=689&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556401/original/file-20231028-24-5h6thl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=866&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556401/original/file-20231028-24-5h6thl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=866&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556401/original/file-20231028-24-5h6thl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=866&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Fossil bones from the wing and shoulder of the extinct vulture <em>Cryptogyps lacertosus</em>, recovered from Green Waterhole, South Australia. Scale bar = 50mm. Life reconstruction top right.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ellen Mather (photos) / John Barrie (reconstruction)</span></span>
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<p>Today, most of the cave is submerged because of a high water table, but in the past, it was mostly dry. A pool of water deeper in the cave was where these calcite rafts formed. </p>
<p>The water was likely what attracted animals into the cave in the first place. These animals then died, and their bones sank to the bottom of the pool along with the calcite rafts. Our team dated these calcite rafts – and thus the entombed <em>Cryptogyps</em> fossils – at approximately 60,000 years old.</p>
<h2>Mammal extinctions affect birds of prey</h2>
<p>When we think of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/did-people-or-climate-kill-off-the-megafauna-actually-it-was-both-127803">mass extinction</a> of Australian megafauna, we tend to think about the demise of large mammals, such as the “giant wombat” <em>Diprotodon optatum</em>, the “marsupial lion” <em>Thylacoleo carnifex</em>, and the giant short-faced kangaroo <em>Procoptodon goliah</em>. Some large reptiles are also commonly recognised as victims: the giant goanna (Megalania) <em>Varanus priscus</em>, the constricting snake <em>Wonambi naracoortensis</em>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/meet-the-biggest-and-most-bizarre-skink-ever-found-in-australia-it-became-extinct-47-000-years-ago-206764">even a giant armoured skink</a> <em>Tiliqua frangens</em>.</p>
<p>But as we can see from the case of our large eagles and vultures, other groups of animals were also affected. Birds of prey, especially large and scavenging species, <a href="https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/The-Late-Pleistocene-Continental-Avian-extinction-Tyrberg/6cfc6bfea30c8b5635d5250eede1556c4d654402">went extinct around the world during the Late Pleistocene</a>, their food supply likely affected by the loss of large mammalian species. Australia appears to have been no exception to the rule.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556394/original/file-20231028-27-4hz9e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Two photos of eagles in flight, one with a white belly and the other with dark, patterned wings." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556394/original/file-20231028-27-4hz9e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556394/original/file-20231028-27-4hz9e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556394/original/file-20231028-27-4hz9e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556394/original/file-20231028-27-4hz9e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556394/original/file-20231028-27-4hz9e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=476&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556394/original/file-20231028-27-4hz9e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=476&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/556394/original/file-20231028-27-4hz9e1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=476&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The wedge-tailed eagle (<em>Aquila audax</em>) and the white-bellied sea eagle (<em>Icthyophaga leucogaster</em>) are the largest birds of prey found in modern Australia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Michael Lee</span></span>
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<p>The new fossils reveal many of Australia’s large birds of prey did not survive the megafaunal extinction event in the Late Pleistocene, roughly 50,000 years ago. The two largest species that managed to persist to the present are the wedge-tailed eagle, which is a generalist hunter found throughout the continent, and the white-bellied sea eagle, which targets fish and has a coastal distribution. </p>
<p>It is likely our three extinct large raptors – two giant eagles and a vulture – were too specialised as hunters and scavengers of megafauna to adapt to a rapidly changing world. Their extinction likely caused a further cascade of effects through the ecosytem: in Asia, for instance, more recent loss of vultures has led to increased populations of scavenging feral dogs and higher prevalance of <a href="https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/02/220214095744.htm">diseases such as rabies</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216358/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ellen K. Mather received funding from BirdLife Australia Raptor Group.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Lee receives funding from the Australian Research Council, Flinders University and the Royal Society of South Australia</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Trevor H. Worthy has received funding from The Australian Research Council for research on fossil birds. He has previously worked for Flinders University and now has an adjunct status there.</span></em></p>New fossils reveal Australia was once home to a much greater diversity of huge eagles and vultures, which died off alongside ‘giant wombats’ and ‘marsupial lions’.Ellen K. Mather, Adjunct Associate Lecturer in Palaeontology, Flinders UniversityMike Lee, Professor in Evolutionary Biology (jointly appointed with South Australian Museum), Flinders UniversityTrevor H. Worthy, Associate Professor, Vertebrate Palaeontology Group, Flinders UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2121842023-08-25T05:19:28Z2023-08-25T05:19:28ZRat poison is killing our beloved native owls and tawny frogmouths – and that’s the tip of the iceberg<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/544711/original/file-20230825-15-cf4fu6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=37%2C5%2C3251%2C2357&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/eastern-barn-owl-south-australia-2205796803">Imogen Warren, Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>There’s nothing quite like having a rodent problem in your home. Most people will do anything to get rid of them. </p>
<p>Australians usually reach for rat poison, without a second thought. Most of these poisons – sold at supermarkets and hardware stores – are “<a href="https://apvma.gov.au/node/87226#what-is-an-anticoagulant-rodenticide">second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides</a>” (SGARs) also known as single-dose anticoagulants. These extremely powerful poisons stay in the body for many months. It takes only a single feed to kill a rodent, usually within a week. </p>
<p>With the rodent problem solved, our house is once again our castle, and all is well. Right? </p>
<p>Unfortunately, use of rat poison is leading to the wide-scale poisoning of Australia’s nocturnal predatory birds, including the crowd favourite tawny frogmouth and Australia’s largest owl, the majestic powerful owl. <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969723049185#bb0020">Our new research</a> reveals the alarming extent of the problem. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Help save owls from rodenticide poisoning (BirdLife Australia)</span></figcaption>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-control-invasive-rats-and-mice-at-home-without-harming-native-wildlife-180792">How to control invasive rats and mice at home without harming native wildlife</a>
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<h2>Poisoning in tawny frogmouths and owls</h2>
<p>Anticoagulant rat poisons are effective at killing rodents, but they also accumulate in the liver and muscle tissues of predators that eat the poisoned animals. </p>
<p>The SGARs do not kill immediately, it can take many days. During that time, the rodent – or any other animal that eats the poison – can keep eating more. The poison does not leave the body but continues to accumulate in tissues while attacking the body’s capacity to clot blood. Eventually the poisoned animal dies from internal bleeding. </p>
<p>While still alive, the poisoned animal makes easy prey because it becomes lethargic and doesn’t behave in a normal, cautious manner.</p>
<p>Eating a single poisoned rodent probably won’t kill a predator, but what happens when predators are exposed to poisoned prey all the time? This is probably what is happening in our cities, suburbs and farms, every day of the year.</p>
<h2>Here’s what we found</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969723049185#bb0020">Our new research</a> reveals alarming levels of rat poisons in our nocturnal predatory birds. Across four species, we found a staggering 92% of the 60 dead birds we tested had been exposed to these poisons. The concentration of SGARs in the liver was such that toxic or lethal impacts were likely to have occurred in 33% of powerful owls we tested, 68% of tawny frogmouths, 42% of southern boobooks and 80% of barn owls.</p>
<p>Testing for rat poison is not a pretty job. The only accurate way is to test the animal’s liver. Over the last two years, our team had the gruesome job of collecting and dissecting the livers of 60 dead owls and tawny frogmouths (24 powerful owls, 19 tawny frogmouths, 12 southern boobooks, and five eastern barn owls). Most birds were from Victoria. We were aided by concerned citizens who found and reported these dead birds to us, often collecting the bodies themselves and keeping them in their fridges.</p>
<p>Of the 55 birds found to have rodenticides in them, every one contained brodifacoum. Brodifacoum is the most widely available SGAR in Australia. It is highly potent and can stay in the body for more than 100 days. That means animals can accumulate more in their bodies as they continue to eat poisoned prey. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/mouse-plague-bromadiolone-will-obliterate-mice-but-itll-poison-eagles-snakes-and-owls-too-160995">Mouse plague: bromadiolone will obliterate mice, but it'll poison eagles, snakes and owls, too</a>
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<h2>Are we also poisoning other native animals?</h2>
<p>Our research shows poisoning rodents is poisoning our predators, in large numbers. This is widespread across urban areas, agricultural areas and forests on the edge of suburbia.</p>
<p>Given the high rate of exposure to rat poisons, it is likely predator populations will decline. Losing our predators to poisoning will have widespread consequences, for natural systems and urban environments. Birds of prey help to keep rodents (and other species prone to reaching high numbers) in check. </p>
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<span class="caption">A powerful owl eating a common brushtail possum.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">John White</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
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<p>We are probably inadvertently poisoning other native animals. Powerful owls do not eat many rats, they prefer to dine on native possums and gliders. The common brushtail possum, with its broad diet and penchant for living in roof cavities, is no doubt directly feasting on rat poison.</p>
<p>So the high level of rat poison we found in nocturnal predators is likely the tip of a poisoned iceberg.</p>
<h2>Is this a new ‘Silent Spring’ moment?</h2>
<p>In 1962, biologist Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring introduced the world to the impacts of pesticides on humans and non-target species. This catalysed investigations into pesticides such as DDT, which were being passed up the foodchain and “bio-accumulating” in raptors, decimating populations. Now, the devastating impacts of SGARs are becoming more widely recognised. </p>
<p>Our research, along with a growing body of <a href="https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/jvms/81/2/81_17-0717/_article">international evidence</a>, highlights the need to introduce restrictions on the availability of SGARs in Australia. </p>
<p>As with DDT in the 1980s, many countries such as the <a href="https://www.epa.gov/rodenticides/restrictions-rodenticide-products">United States</a>, <a href="https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/environment/pesticides-pest-management/legislation-consultation/rodenticide-ban">Canada</a> and the <a href="https://www.thinkwildlife.org/stewardship-regime/">United Kingdom</a> are moving to ban public access to SGARs or substantially restrict how they can be used.</p>
<p>But Australia is lagging on the effective regulation on the use of SGARs. Currently, SGARs are <a href="https://apvma.gov.au/node/87226#what-is-an-anticoagulant-rodenticide">approved for use</a> “in and around domestic, commercial, industrial and agricultural buildings”. They are not approved for use in crops, in the open, or in other areas accessible to non-target animals or children. But these restrictions are not sufficient. It is also likely many people do not follow instructions when they use rat poisons. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/544442/original/file-20230824-19-rnjxqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A tawny frogmouth with its head to one side, looking serious" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/544442/original/file-20230824-19-rnjxqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/544442/original/file-20230824-19-rnjxqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/544442/original/file-20230824-19-rnjxqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/544442/original/file-20230824-19-rnjxqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=352&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/544442/original/file-20230824-19-rnjxqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/544442/original/file-20230824-19-rnjxqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/544442/original/file-20230824-19-rnjxqs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=443&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">One of Australia’s favourite birds, the tawny frogmouth.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">John White</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/spooky-stealthy-night-hunters-revealing-the-wonderful-otherworld-of-owls-209498">Spooky, stealthy night hunters: revealing the wonderful otherworld of owls</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>What are the alternatives to rat poison?</h2>
<p>Next time you reach for the rat poison, consider the consequences. There is a very strong likelihood you will poison more than rodents – you could be poisoning a tawny frogmouth or owl. </p>
<p>Try to approach the problem without using poisons. In particular, avoid any SGAR-based products (those containing brodifacoum, bromadiolone, difenacoum, difethialone and flucoumafen as the active ingredients). </p>
<p>There are ways to control rats and mice <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-control-invasive-rats-and-mice-at-home-without-harming-native-wildlife-180792">without harming native wildlife</a>. Trapping technology has come a long way and the latest methods are far more effective, humane and efficient than the old-fashioned spring-loaded mouse trap.</p>
<p>We can also make our homes less attractive to vermin, by clearing vegetation close to the house, reducing the availability of food sources such as pet food and compost, and blocking access to the building. And of course, we can support our natural predators to do what they do best, without putting themselves in harm’s way.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/212184/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There’s shocking new evidence of rodenticide poisoning in Australia’s nocturnal predatory birds. High concentrations of the active ingredients were found in 92% of the 60 dead birds they tested.John White, Associate Professor in Wildlife and Conservation Biology, Deakin UniversityRaylene Cooke, Associate Professor, Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2002052023-05-04T12:10:11Z2023-05-04T12:10:11ZVagrant, machine or pioneer? How we think about a roving eagle offers insights into human attitudes toward nature<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523517/original/file-20230430-2790-u17iy1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=10%2C20%2C3484%2C1943&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The roaming Steller's sea eagle in Georgetown, Maine, Jan. 1, 2022.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/2mV4kjv">Dominic Sherony/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://ebird.org/species/stseag">Steller’s sea eagle</a> is one of the largest and most aggressive raptors in the world. With an 8-foot wingspan and striking white markings, these birds tower over their bald eagle cousins. </p>
<p>Steller’s are sublime, but they aren’t beautiful in the way people often sentimentalize animals. Most adult Steller’s survived by <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/29774180">beating their weaker sibling to death</a> in the nest within weeks of birth and were rewarded for their aggression by nurturing parents. No wonder they can <a href="https://www.nhbs.com/stellers-sea-eagle-book">fight off brown bears</a> and hunt on the sea ice of the Russian Arctic. </p>
<p>Since mid-2020, one individual Steller’s sea eagle has drawn <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/05/science/stellers-sea-eagle.html">national media attention</a> because of the <a href="https://www.audubon.org/news/inside-amazing-cross-continent-saga-stellers-sea-eagle">vast distances</a> it has traveled – from Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula to Alaska, then to Texas, eastern Canada, New England, and most recently, a <a href="https://media.ebird.org/catalog?taxonCode=stseag&regionCode=CA-NL&mediaType=photo">reported sighting on May 2, 2023 in Newfoundland</a> – and the extreme lengths to which <a href="https://www.newscentermaine.com/article/news/local/once-in-a-lifetime-birders-flock-to-see-extremely-rare-stellers-sea-eagle-georgetown-maine-russia-bird-wildlife-maine/97-7c82e9af-fcce-427c-9aee-863672a92dc7#">birders are going to glimpse it</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1622676468626034704"}"></div></p>
<p>Biologists have learned remarkable things about migratory birds’ <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691224886/vagrancy-in-birds">navigational skills</a> and how they can malfunction because of weather or illness. But these discoveries cannot answer the questions that most interest me. Can a bird travel for curiosity or pleasure, and not just for necessity or instinct? And if it can, how would we know it? </p>
<p>This last question is important, because it’s possible that humans are oblivious to the agency of the nonhuman world around us. In my view, anomalies like this Steller’s can open brief windows beyond our <a href="https://www.britannica.com/search?query=anthropocentrism">anthropocentrism</a>. </p>
<p>I research <a href="https://www.bu.edu/english/profile/adriana-craciun/">environmental humanities and the social dimensions of science</a>, and these questions are currently at the heart of these fields. I believe the extraordinary voyage of this raptor invites us to ask pressing questions about epistemology – how science knows what it knows. It also reveals hidden assumptions on which we rely when we presume that humans alone have the capacity to act for reasons that biology or environment cannot entirely explain. </p>
<h2>The language of vagrancy and belonging</h2>
<p>When migratory birds like this sea eagle appear outside their typical range, ornithologists call them “vagrants.” The scientific language of belonging draws on a shared cultural vocabulary for both human and nonhuman beings. Terms like vagrant, native, invasive, migrant and colonist all emerge from <a href="https://www.academia.edu/462808/The_Rise_and_Fall_of_Biotic_Nativeness_A_Historical_Perspective">centuries of political discourses</a> describing which persons belong where. </p>
<p>Vagrancy laws <a href="https://www.londonlives.org/static/Vagrancy.jsp">punished the itinerant poor</a> beginning in Elizabethan times, scapegoating “vagabonds” for spreading disease, disorder and idleness. In the 19th-century U.S., a new wave of <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1rfsq2g">vagrancy laws</a> targeted freed Black Americans and then migrant laborers from southeastern Europe. The latter were known as “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0019793916636094">birds of passage</a>,” the original term for migratory birds. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523310/original/file-20230427-14-ch4yn6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Painting of a woman with children, surrounded by police on a snowy street." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523310/original/file-20230427-14-ch4yn6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523310/original/file-20230427-14-ch4yn6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523310/original/file-20230427-14-ch4yn6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523310/original/file-20230427-14-ch4yn6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523310/original/file-20230427-14-ch4yn6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523310/original/file-20230427-14-ch4yn6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523310/original/file-20230427-14-ch4yn6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=606&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In ‘What is Called Vagrancy’ (1854), Belgian artist Alfred Stevens depicts police leading a mother and her ragged children to prison.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_is_Called_Vagrancy#/media/File:Alfred_Stevens_What_is_Called_Vagrancy.jpg">Wikipedia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>An 18th-century naturalist studying bird migration, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1098/rstl.1746.0078">Mark Catesby</a>, described what modern ornithologists call exploratory migratory behavior by comparing the birds to his contemporaries: “Analogous to the lucrative searches of man through distant regions, birds take distant flights in quest of food, or what else is agreeable to their nature.” </p>
<p>Writing in the age of exploration and colonization, Catesby simultaneously humanized birds’ inquisitive flights and naturalized Europeans’ exploration and colonization. Today, scientists and birders do the same thing. We describe birds’ anomalous movements through the dominant paradigms of our time: <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691224886/vagrancy-in-birds">instinct, mechanized responses to environmental cues and genetics</a>.</p>
<h2>Birds as machines</h2>
<p>I turned to two bird biologists to ask whether this Steller’s could be traveling for reasons of volition, not just instinct or necessity. In response, both ornithologists used the same word to describe the birds they study and admire: machines. </p>
<p>Ultimately, it seems, no matter how far you fly, there is no escaping the “hard-wired” mechanism that confines the nonhuman world in most experts’ view. As biologist <a href="https://theconversation.com/e-o-wilsons-lifelong-passion-for-ants-helped-him-teach-humans-about-how-to-live-sustainably-with-nature-150045">E.O. Wilson</a> summarized, “All animals, while capable of some degree of specialized learning, are <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/191841/consilience-by-edward-o-wilson/">instinct driven, guided by simple cues</a> from the environment that trigger complex behavior patterns.”</p>
<p>But reducing nonhuman animals to machines lacking agency ignores the surprising history of machines. Historian of science <a href="https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/R/bo21519800.html">Jessica Riskin</a> argues that the tradition of seeing all biological life – humans included – as clocklike machines includes an overlooked dimension in which “machine-like meant forceful, restless, purposeful, sentient, perceptive.” Machines were seen by some scientists from the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Enlightenment-European-history">Enlightenment period</a> as lifelike: self-organizing, unpredictable and restless mechanisms driven by a vital inner agency. </p>
<p>Machines have always been more than just machines. This “contradiction … at the heart of modern science” – the restless vitality of mere “machines” – is precisely what this eagle’s singular behavior manifests for us. As a fugitive from the confines of our knowledge, this raptor is as much a machine as you or I, and just as capable of surprising.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/CwOhnQqQ2f0?wmode=transparent&start=52" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Historian Jessica Riskin discusses centuries of debate about whether living things have agency and can transform themselves.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Birds as persons</h2>
<p>Although scientists have traditionally reduced many aspects of animal life to biological mechanisms, new research is challenging this perspective. Recent studies show that animals exhibit <a href="https://iupress.org/9780253222039/queer-ecologies/">remarkable ranges of sexual expression</a> as well as <a href="https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/wild-things/five-surprising-animals-play">playing</a> and <a href="https://news.uchicago.edu/do-animals-dream-david-m-pena-guzman">dreaming</a> behaviors. These findings are driving exciting investigations into animals’ inner lives and their capacity for joy and spontaneity. </p>
<p>However, even when researchers study individual bird personality as a possible explanation for why “<a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691224886/vagrancy-in-birds">bold and aggressive bird individuals</a>” are more prone to vagrancy than shy individuals, they reduce personality to particular genes. </p>
<p>By suggesting that the wide-ranging sea eagle may be willfully exploring, some might say I am anthropomorphizing her. But the problem of anthropomorphism is culturally and historically specific. Not all cultures do it, or do it in the same way. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523299/original/file-20230427-299-vnsrxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=19%2C0%2C4267%2C2853&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A large black and white raptor soars over a snowy field." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523299/original/file-20230427-299-vnsrxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=19%2C0%2C4267%2C2853&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523299/original/file-20230427-299-vnsrxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523299/original/file-20230427-299-vnsrxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523299/original/file-20230427-299-vnsrxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523299/original/file-20230427-299-vnsrxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523299/original/file-20230427-299-vnsrxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523299/original/file-20230427-299-vnsrxj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Steller’s sea eagle near Sapporo, Japan.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/2458L7V">Sascha Wenninger/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In contrast to Western cultures, many Indigenous peoples – along with <a href="https://theconversation.com/animism-recognizes-how-animals-places-and-plants-have-power-over-humans-and-its-finding-renewed-interest-around-the-world-181389">believers in animism</a> – live in a world shared with diverse persons, only some of them human. In these cultures, anthropomorphism is not an issue: All living organisms like plants and animals – and even <a href="https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/braiding-sweetgrass-excerpt/">nonliving ones, like glaciers or mountains</a> – may be considered as animate persons – subjects and agents that merit ethical consideration, not merely objects to be cared for or used. A global “<a href="https://news.climate.columbia.edu/2021/04/22/rights-of-nature-lawsuits/">rights of nature</a>” movement is gaining ground as a legal strategy rooted in such Indigenous ideas of relating to nonhuman persons.</p>
<p>In the Steller’s sea eagle’s home of <a href="https://brill.com/display/title/31825">Kamchatka and the Amur estuary</a>, myths abound of giant eagles that carry off whales and hunters. Before Christian conversion three centuries ago, people there described the creator of the world, and of humans, as a raven called Kutkkh, a powerful being across the North Pacific to be feared and respected – a person to be reckoned with.</p>
<h2>Symbol or anomaly?</h2>
<p>The roaming sea eagle’s initial journey from Alaska to Texas in March 2021 followed a record-breaking southward plunge of Arctic air in February 2021. This deadly event sent temperatures <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-texas-electricity-system-produced-low-cost-power-but-left-residents-out-in-the-cold-155527">plummeting below freezing in Texas</a> and U.S. Sen. <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/18/ted-cruz-cancun-power-outage/">Ted Cruz fleeing to Cancún</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523314/original/file-20230427-18-n2e3x3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Image of the globe showing a cold air mass spilling south from the Arctic." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523314/original/file-20230427-18-n2e3x3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523314/original/file-20230427-18-n2e3x3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=654&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523314/original/file-20230427-18-n2e3x3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=654&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523314/original/file-20230427-18-n2e3x3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=654&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523314/original/file-20230427-18-n2e3x3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=822&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523314/original/file-20230427-18-n2e3x3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=822&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523314/original/file-20230427-18-n2e3x3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=822&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A potent arctic weather system chilled much of the U.S. in February 2021. Many scientists believe climate change contributes to such events by altering atmospheric circulation patterns.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://eoimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/images/imagerecords/147000/147941/northamerica_geos5_2021046_lrg.png">NASA Earth Observatory</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Arctic is the <a href="https://theconversation.com/arctic-report-card-2022-the-arctic-is-getting-rainier-and-seasons-are-shifting-with-broad-disturbances-for-people-ecosystems-and-wildlife-196254">fastest-warming zone on Earth</a>. Only <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330925199_Masterov_V_B_Romanov_M_S_Sale_R_G_2018_Steller's_Sea_Eagle_Snowfinch_Publishing_Coberley_UK">some 6,000 Steller’s remain</a>, because of climate change and human disturbance – especially <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/russias-sakhalin-1-near-full-oil-output-after-exxon-exit-source-2023-01-09/">Russian oil production around Sakhalin</a>. The extraordinary movements of Arctic air and of this singular eagle bring the distant consequences of climate change far south, into the Texas oilfields.</p>
<p>Scientists now think that vagrants may be playing an important role as “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2018.06.006">first responders” to environmental changes</a>, and “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2018.06.006">vanguards” of range shifts</a>. This shift from vagrant to vanguard may be a radical and welcome change. But it also highlights the tenacious power of anthropocentrism in always seeing animals as human analogs. </p>
<h2>Beyond categories</h2>
<p>For the past two winters, I have trekked to Maine hoping to spot the roving Steller’s. In February 2023 I ended up on the same frozen bridge on Maine’s Back River as in 2022, along with my teenage son and dozens of birders from across the continent. </p>
<p>One birder who had flown from Minnesota to see the eagle – and, like me, never did – offered to nail a nickel to the bridge as a reward for the first of us to spot the elusive prey. He was referring to a scene in Herman Melville’s “<a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/files/2701/2701-h/2701-h.htm">Moby-Dick</a>” in which Ahab nails a gold doubloon to the mast as a promised reward for being first to spot the white whale. </p>
<p>In the scene, each crew member reads the symbols on the coin in a highly subjective way. As Ahab says, “every man but mirrors back his own mysterious self”: The act of interpreting an image or animal is deeply subjective. This theme is central to “Moby-Dick” and is why the book inspires more <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/08/the-endless-depths-of-i-moby-dick-i-symbolism/278861/">symbolic readings</a> than perhaps any other novel.</p>
<p>Philosophers <a href="https://files.libcom.org/files/A%20Thousand%20Plateaus.pdf">Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari</a> read the white whale as a provocation to see beyond dualistic categories and symbols. They see the whale as “The Anomaly” – a dangerous flight from normative categories like normal/abnormal, human/nonhuman. Like this sea eagle, Moby-Dick “is neither an individual nor a genus; he is the borderline.” He resists the very possibility of categorization, not merely the categories themselves. </p>
<p>To embody “a phenomenon of bordering” in this way is to test and hopefully evade the powers of symbol-making animals like ourselves. Keeping the mind open to this Steller’s sea eagle as an anomaly in this sense is freeing for eagles and other persons, including humans. I believe this rare bird’s fugitive journey offers an even rarer glimpse of the mysterious intentions of animals as individuals, traveling at the borderline of our imaginations and beyond.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200205/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adriana Craciun does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A Steller’s sea eagle, native to the Asian Arctic, has traveled across North America since 2021. A scholar questions whether the bird is lost – and how well humans really understand animals’ actions.Adriana Craciun, Professor of English and Emma MacLachlan Metcalf Chair of Humanities, Boston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2003392023-02-26T19:04:30Z2023-02-26T19:04:30ZAustralia’s red goshawk is disappearing. How can we save our rarest bird of prey from extinction?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511625/original/file-20230222-28-yy4h34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=15%2C9%2C2011%2C1827&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Patrick Webster</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Australia’s red goshawk once ruled the skies. But now this almighty raptor, affectionately known as The Red, has become our nation’s rarest bird of prey.</p>
<p>Concern for the species prompted our new research. We completed the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01584197.2023.2172735">first comprehensive population assessment</a> of the red goshawk using a dataset of all known records (1978–2020). The results were even worse than expected. </p>
<p>We were shocked to discover The Red had completely disappeared from more than a third (34%) of its range. The species is almost certainly extinct in New South Wales and the southern half of Queensland. </p>
<p>This bird is declining – and probably just barely hanging on – in a further 30% of its range, spanning northern Queensland from the Gulf to the Wet Tropics. The rest of northern Australia is the last stronghold for the species. </p>
<p>Although nationally listed as vulnerable, we argue this species requires urgent uplisting to endangered. High priority must be given to conservation action now, before it’s too late. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511621/original/file-20230222-26-fj93hf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511621/original/file-20230222-26-fj93hf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511621/original/file-20230222-26-fj93hf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511621/original/file-20230222-26-fj93hf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511621/original/file-20230222-26-fj93hf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=520&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511621/original/file-20230222-26-fj93hf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=520&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511621/original/file-20230222-26-fj93hf.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=520&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Adult female red goshawk with kookaburra prey.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Chris MacColl</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A striking bird of prey</h2>
<p>The red goshawk (<em>Erythrotriorchis radiatus</em>) is an evolutionary oddity, with no near relatives in this country. It is a top predator, with rainbow lorikeets, sulphur-crested cockatoos, and blue-winged kookaburras its preferred quarry. </p>
<p>Remarkably, the average female is nearly twice the size of the average male, with this relative size difference making it one of the most dimorphic raptors in the world. </p>
<p>This striking bird first came to the attention of Western scientists around 1790, when a specimen was found nailed to an early settler’s hut near Botany Bay. </p>
<p>Since then, it has captivated birdwatchers with its rich rufous (red) plumage, sharp gaze, and immense feet and talons. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.environment.gov.au/cgi-bin/sprat/public/publicspecies.pl?taxon_id=942">Historically, it was found</a> along Australia’s eastern and northern coastal fringe, from Sydney, north to Cape York Peninsula, and across to the Kimberley region of Western Australia. But over the years, keen observers noticed their occasional glimpses of this almighty hawk became rarer. Then suddenly people were no longer seeing them, in certain regions. </p>
<h2>Slipping towards extinction</h2>
<p>Recording the extinction and ongoing loss of the red goshawk over two thirds of its known range in our lifetime was shocking. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511902/original/file-20230223-2744-uxqf8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Map of Australia showing the distribution of the red goshawk within the various ecoregions" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511902/original/file-20230223-2744-uxqf8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511902/original/file-20230223-2744-uxqf8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511902/original/file-20230223-2744-uxqf8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511902/original/file-20230223-2744-uxqf8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=420&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511902/original/file-20230223-2744-uxqf8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511902/original/file-20230223-2744-uxqf8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511902/original/file-20230223-2744-uxqf8q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=528&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Map showing assessment of the red goshawk’s breeding status across its range.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Chris MacColl</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While the destruction of habitat through land clearing, which is still rampant in both <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/feb/17/land-clearing-in-nsw-triples-over-past-decade-state-of-the-environment-2021-report-reveals">New South Wales</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-queensland-is-still-ground-zero-for-australian-deforestation-196644">Queensland</a>, is a key reason for this loss, other factors must be at play. </p>
<p>We know that degraded forests, like those that are <a href="https://theconversation.com/native-forest-logging-makes-bushfires-worse-and-to-say-otherwise-ignores-the-facts-161177">logged</a> or suffer from inappropriate fire regimes, <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-018-0490-x">lose many</a> of their species, particularly those higher up the food chain. </p>
<p>However, this doesn’t aptly describe the loss of red goshawk from seemingly large areas of intact habitat, such as Shoalwater Bay or Conondale National Park. </p>
<p>More research is needed to unpick why this species has disappeared so quickly and over such an immense area. <a href="https://raresgroup.com.au/red-goshawk/">Current efforts</a> focus on potential disease threats, poor breeding, low juvenile survival rates, and developing a better understanding of how they use the Australian landscape.</p>
<h2>The Red’s last refuge</h2>
<p>Our research reveals northern Australia is the last stronghold for this species. Cape York Peninsula supports the last known breeding population in Queensland. The Top End, Tiwi Islands, and Kimberley regions also sustain vital breeding populations. </p>
<p>This is unsurprising given northern Australia supports the world’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/ecocheck-australias-vast-majestic-northern-savannas-need-more-care-59897">largest intact tropical savanna</a> ecosystem. Yet, despite limited broad scale habitat loss to date, these northern savannas are <a href="https://theconversation.com/ecocheck-australias-vast-majestic-northern-savannas-need-more-care-59897">under threat</a> from inappropriate fire regimes, weeds, cattle, and the onset of climate change. These threats can interact and compound one another, posing increasingly complex challenges for land managers trying to save species like the red goshawk. </p>
<p>For example, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/field-of-nightmares-gamba-grass-in-the-top-end-12178">fire-intensive gamba grass</a>, an invasive weed, is spread by livestock. Climate change may extend the fire season, through lengthier dry spells. Hot treetop fires incinerate nests and the chicks inside them. The intensity and seasonality of storms is also increasing, as well as thermal extremes, threatening young during the nesting season. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511623/original/file-20230222-18-o1hp5b.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511623/original/file-20230222-18-o1hp5b.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511623/original/file-20230222-18-o1hp5b.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511623/original/file-20230222-18-o1hp5b.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511623/original/file-20230222-18-o1hp5b.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511623/original/file-20230222-18-o1hp5b.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/511623/original/file-20230222-18-o1hp5b.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Two small red goshawk nestlings, the maximum this species can have.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Chris MacColl</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Tropical savannas may be increasingly compromised through large scale vegetation clearing and fragmentation. Preparing land for <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-15/federal-government-investigating-land-clearing-nt/101852502#:%7E:text=The%20federal%20government%20is%20investigating,way%20for%20a%20cotton%20industry">crops such as cotton</a> or mines for minerals such as bauxite can remove big swathes of habitat. Efforts to obtain other natural resources such as timber and gas also fragment otherwise intact landscapes. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Large trees being felled as native forest is cleared in Queensland" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512140/original/file-20230224-28-awdcga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512140/original/file-20230224-28-awdcga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512140/original/file-20230224-28-awdcga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512140/original/file-20230224-28-awdcga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512140/original/file-20230224-28-awdcga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512140/original/file-20230224-28-awdcga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512140/original/file-20230224-28-awdcga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Land clearing remains rife in Queensland, undermining efforts to conserve wildlife and reduce carbon emissions.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://theconversation.com/queensland-moves-to-control-land-clearing-other-states-need-to-follow-58291">Kerry Trapnell/The Wilderness Society</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The Red deserves better protection</h2>
<p>Australia is blessed with unique bird life. Nearly half of our birds are found nowhere else on Earth. </p>
<p>But the nation’s rarest bird of prey is in trouble. The red goshawk deserves better protection. At the very least, the species needs to be uplisted from <a href="https://www.environment.gov.au/cgi-bin/sprat/public/publicthreatenedlist.pl">vulnerable</a> to endangered by the federal government. This will more accurately reflect current extinction risk and prioritise conservation action. And there’s no time to waste, because red goshawk habitat continues to be cleared – permission was granted to clear a total of <a href="https://conbio.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/csp2.12860">15,689 hectares</a> of red goshawk habitat between 2000 and 2015, which is more than any other threatened species had to contend with. </p>
<p>The Red needs to be recognised as a flagship species for northern Australia, to promote conservation of its remaining habitat. Intervention would benefit many other threatened species, because what’s good for them is good for many others. In this way, the red goshawk is one of the most <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/01/cost-effective-conservation-study-identifies-key-umbrella-species/">cost-effective</a> ‘umbrella species’ for conservation action. </p>
<p>To secure the longterm survival of this beautiful bird, we need better protection across the tropical north, expanding both <a href="https://www.dcceew.gov.au/environment/land/indigenous-protected-areas">Indigenous Protected Areas</a> and national parks. These areas can be managed directly for conservation, but working with the agricultural and extractive industry is also critical. Low numbers of red goshawks are distributed across a vast area, covering multiple tenures, so all parties need to work together if this species is to persist in the north.</p>
<p>We must not repeat past mistakes and allow habitat in the tropical north to be fragmented, rendering the landscape unable to support native predators like the red goshawk. This means rigorously assessing developments and implementing protections commensurate with the large areas that The Red requires. </p>
<p>If we can’t look after such an ecologically important, charismatic, and iconic species such as The Red, what hope do we have for <a href="https://theconversation.com/just-ten-mps-represent-more-than-600-threatened-species-in-their-electorates-83500">Australia’s many other threatened species</a>?</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/native-birds-have-vanished-across-the-continent-since-colonisation-now-we-know-just-how-much-weve-lost-176239">Native birds have vanished across the continent since colonisation. Now we know just how much we’ve lost</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200339/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher MacColl receives funding and support from Rio Tinto Weipa, the Australian Wildlife Conservancy, the Queensland Department of Environment and Sciences, and the University of Queensland. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Watson has received funding from the Australian Research Council and National Environmental Science Program and receives funding from South Australia's Department of Environment and Water. He serves on scientific committees for Bush Heritage Australia, SUBAK Australia, BirdLife Australia and has a long-term scientific relationship with the Wildlife Conservation Society. He serves on the Queensland Government's Land Restoration Fund's Investment Panel.</span></em></p>The first comprehensive population assessment of the raptor affectionately known as The Red reveals a species in trouble. Australia’s rarest bird of prey needs our help.Christopher MacColl, PhD Candidate, The University of QueenslandJames Watson, Professor, The University of QueenslandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1941752022-12-04T08:54:46Z2022-12-04T08:54:46ZA dangerous pesticide isn’t being monitored in key bird of prey populations - we’re shedding light on that gap<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/497025/original/file-20221123-24-5lmmwa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=612%2C15%2C2328%2C1215&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GettyImages</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It was once regarded as a <a href="https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/ddt--from-miracle-chemical-to-banned-pollutant/3253684">miracle chemical</a> to protect against disease and improve global food production. The man who discovered its properties even won a <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Paul-Hermann-Muller">Nobel Prize for medicine</a>. But today, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/science/DDT">dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane</a> (DDT) is best known for its devastating effects on the environment, as well as on animal and human health. </p>
<p>It was first used in the second world war to protect Allied soldiers against malaria and typhus, which are spread by mosquitoes and body lice. After the war, DDT became a widely available pesticide to kill insect crops pests and insects causing disease in humans. </p>
<p>However, it became clear that DDT was toxic to more than its intended targets. Continued exposure to the chemical <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/biomonitoring/pdf/ddt_factsheet.pdf">can cause</a> neurological damage, endocrine disorders and reproductive failure in both humans and animals. </p>
<p>Awareness of this damage was in no small part due to Rachel Carson’s book <a href="http://www.rachelcarson.org/SilentSpring.aspx">Silent Spring</a>, published in 1962. Silent Spring brought global attention to DDT’s environmental impacts and sparked a public outcry that forced much of the developed world – the “global north” – to ban the use of DDT in the 1970s and 1980s.</p>
<p>In 2004 the <a href="http://www.pops.int/">Stockholm Convention</a> on Persistent Organic Pollutants – those that stay in the environment for a long time after use – was adopted by over 90 nations. DDT was among the most dangerous pesticides, industrial chemicals and by-products placed on the convention’s “dirty dozen” list, and was banned in most parts of the world.</p>
<p>Two years later the World Health Organization <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1570869/">recommended</a> the restricted use of DDT to control malaria. It <a href="http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/ddtgen.pdf">remains in use</a> for this purpose in various tropical countries in Asia, Africa, and South and Central America. Its use here doesn’t just put human health at risk: top predators, among them <a href="https://www.britannica.com/animal/bird-of-prey">birds of prey</a> (also referred to as raptors), are threatened too.</p>
<h2>Birds of prey as sentinels</h2>
<p>Birds of prey or raptors are often apex predators, sitting at the top of the food chain. As such, they can act as an “ecological barometer”, helping us gauge the health of the environment. In addition to their value as indicator species, they provide valuable ecosystem services, controlling pest animals such as rodents and removing carrion from the environment, potentially reducing the spread of disease. </p>
<p>Because DDT accumulates in wildlife and magnifies up the food chain many raptor populations have been nearly <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/2401613#metadata_info_tab_contents">wiped out</a> by its use. However, this <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.org/activity/biomagnification-and-bioaccumulation/">bio-accumulation</a> also means they have the potential to serve as a useful indicator to monitor levels of DDT in the environment. Thus, raptors can be regarded as sentinels for DDT.</p>
<p>There has been extensive monitoring of DDT in raptors by conservation agencies and academics across the globe for the last 60 years. But no study has looked at the patterns emerging from these monitoring programmes, nor compared these patterns through space and time. Our <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969722068346">new study</a> fills that gap. </p>
<h2>A global north bias</h2>
<p>We found that DDT monitoring in raptors is heavily biased toward the global north. Europe and North America account for 95% of samples. This is a concern because most DDT use is currently in the global south, as are most raptor species. </p>
<p>We found that DDT has been measured in over 27,000 raptors across more than 100 species. The numbers of birds sampled peaked in the 1960s and 1970s, an increase that coincided with international concern surrounding DDT.</p>
<p>However, just three species account for half of all raptor samples collected: bald eagle, Eurasian sparrowhawk and peregrine falcon. Only the peregrine falcon occurs on all continents, but have been sampled far less in Africa, Asia, Central and South America than Europe and North America. The Eurasian sparrowhawk is also found in Asia but similar to the peregrine has been sampled far less frequently there than in Europe.</p>
<p>The geographical one-sidedness <a href="https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/bitstream/1807/71107/1/Tackling%20Inequities%20in%20Global%20Scientific%20Power%20Structures.pdf">we’ve identified</a> can likely be linked to a dearth of available funding, appropriate infrastructure and the necessary training in global south nations.</p>
<p>And it’s worrying for three reasons. </p>
<p>First, <a href="https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S0006320718305871?token=BE5B91A7D1D04D803F09245532FF85F05E7C3CC99FD685A3963349EE2107B039AB93376274699582A842DCBC230F5AAE&originRegion=us-east-1&originCreation=20221115162212">most current DDT use</a> is in the global south because of the chemical’s role in malaria control. </p>
<p>Second, the region is <a href="https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/pii/S0006320718305871?token=BE5B91A7D1D04D803F09245532FF85F05E7C3CC99FD685A3963349EE2107B039AB93376274699582A842DCBC230F5AAE&originRegion=us-east-1&originCreation=20221115162212">home to most</a> of the world’s raptors. Most raptor species <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/epdf/10.1073/pnas.2018203118">come from</a> South and Southeast Asia, followed by sub-Saharan Africa and South America. The tropics in particular (mostly in the global south) display the <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/epdf/10.1073/pnas.2018203118">highest</a> raptor diversity. There are also many declines of species in these <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0006320718300934">regions</a>.</p>
<p>Third, many countries in the global south are notoriously <a href="https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/514476/adbi-wp980.pdf">poor enforcers</a> of environmental legislation.</p>
<h2>More gaps to fill</h2>
<p>Even with better enforcement, global north countries are not always good at protecting their environments. It was only when peregrine falcons were wiped out from many regions of the <a href="https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/wildlife-guides/bird-a-z/peregrine/population-numbers-and-trends/">UK</a> and the <a href="https://kids.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frym.2022.714834">US</a> – in the late 1950s to mid 1960s – that their governments finally acted by banning DDT.</p>
<p>As more data are being gathered and collated to develop a clearer picture of DDT levels among <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2017.09.059">raptors</a> in the global south, countries in the region might learn from the US and UK measures and prepare similar programmes to start monitoring DDT levels in their raptor populations in a more systematic manner.</p>
<p>Our research is a critical first step in consolidating the uneven information on the global monitoring of DDT. The next step will be to compare how DDT levels in raptors from tropical regions still using DDT compare to levels in raptors from more temperate regions where DDT has long been banned. We are currently working on that research. </p>
<p>As more data becomes available and a clearer picture is created, we hope governments will feel compelled to act to ensure we do not face a second “silent spring”.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194175/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kailen Padayachee received funding from the National Research Foundation and Carnegie Corporation of New York. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Arjun Amar receives funding from the South African National Research Foundation (NRF) . </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Chevonne Reynolds does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>DDT accumulates in wildlife and magnifies up the food chain. Birds of prey occupy the top of these food chains in various ecosystems.Kailen Padayachee, PhD Candidate, FitzPatrick Institute, University of Cape Town and Research Fellow, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of the WitwatersrandArjun Amar, Associate Professor , FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology, University of Cape TownChevonne Reynolds, Senior Lecturer, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1922322022-10-11T12:20:17Z2022-10-11T12:20:17Z‘Silent Spring’ 60 years on: 4 essential reads on pesticides and the environment<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/489065/original/file-20221010-16-58644.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=38%2C0%2C5153%2C3470&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Spraying from either a ground-based vehicle or an airplane is a common method for applying pesticides.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/aerial-of-spray-application-in-green-agricultural-field-on-news-photo/687564922">Edwin Remsburg/VW Pics via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 1962 environmental scientist Rachel Carson published “<a href="http://www.rachelcarson.org/SilentSpring.aspx">Silent Spring</a>,” a bestselling book that asserted that overuse of pesticides was harming the environment and threatening human health. Carson did not call for banning DDT, the most widely used pesticide at that time, but she argued for using it and similar products much more selectively and paying attention to their effects on nontargeted species. </p>
<p>“Silent Spring” is widely viewed as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/23/magazine/how-silent-spring-ignited-the-environmental-movement.html">an inspiration for the modern environmental movement</a>. These articles from The Conversation’s archive spotlight ongoing questions about pesticides and their effects.</p>
<h2>1. Against absolutes</h2>
<p>Although the chemical industry attacked “Silent Spring” as <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/170448/on-a-farther-shore-by-william-souder/">anti-science and anti-progress</a>, Carson believed that chemicals had their place in agriculture. She “favored <a href="https://theconversation.com/would-rachel-carson-eat-organic-94967">a restrained use of pesticides, but not a complete elimination</a>, and did not oppose judicious use of manufactured fertilizers,” writes Harvard University sustainability scholar <a href="https://wcfia.harvard.edu/people/robert-l-paarlberg">Robert Paarlberg</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/489066/original/file-20221010-12-j4yhcg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A woman seated at a microphone delivers a statement to a Congressional committee." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/489066/original/file-20221010-12-j4yhcg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/489066/original/file-20221010-12-j4yhcg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489066/original/file-20221010-12-j4yhcg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489066/original/file-20221010-12-j4yhcg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489066/original/file-20221010-12-j4yhcg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489066/original/file-20221010-12-j4yhcg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/489066/original/file-20221010-12-j4yhcg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=543&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Activist and author Rachel Carson, whose book ‘Silent Spring’ triggered a reassessment of pesticide use, testifies before a Senate Government Operations Subcommittee in Washington, D.C., June 4, 1963.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/SilentSpringAuthorTestifies/7b45b46735fb4021b0c2e4c9f882fa34/photo">AP Photo/Charles Gorry</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This approach put Carson at odds with the fledgling organic movement, which totally rejected synthetic pesticides and fertilizers. Early organic advocates claimed Carson as a supporter nonetheless, but Carson kept them at arm’s length. “The organic farming movement was suspect in Carson’s eyes because most of its early leaders were not scientists,” Paarlberg observes. </p>
<p>This divergence has echoes today in debates about whether organic production or steady improvements in conventional farming have more potential to feed a growing world population.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/would-rachel-carson-eat-organic-94967">Would Rachel Carson eat organic?</a>
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</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>2. Concerned cropdusters</h2>
<p>Well before “Silent Spring” was published, a crop-dusting industry developed on the Great Plains in the years after World War II to apply newly commercialized pesticides. “Chemical companies made broad promises about these ‘miracle’ products, with little discussion of risks. But pilots and scientists took <a href="https://theconversation.com/farmers-and-cropdusting-pilots-on-the-great-plains-worried-about-pesticide-risks-before-silent-spring-91976">a much more cautious approach</a>,” recounts University of Nebraska-Kearney historian <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=37kbK3MAAAAJ&hl=en">David Vail</a>. </p>
<p>As Vail’s research shows, many crop-dusting pilots and university agricultural scientists were well aware of how little they knew about how these new tools actually worked. They attended conferences, debated practices for applying pesticides and organized flight schools that taught agricultural science along with spraying techniques. When “Silent Spring” was published, many of these practitioners pushed back, arguing that they had developed strategies for managing pesticide risks.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Archival footage of crop-dusters spraying in California in the 1950s.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Today aerial spraying is still practiced on the Great Plains, but it’s also clear that insects and weeds rapidly evolve resistance to every new generation of pesticides, trapping farmers on what Vail calls “a chemical-pest treadmill.” Carson anticipated this effect in “Silent Spring,” and called for more research into alternative pest control methods – an approach that <a href="https://www.usda.gov/oce/pest/integrated-pest-management">has become mainstream today</a>.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/farmers-and-cropdusting-pilots-on-the-great-plains-worried-about-pesticide-risks-before-silent-spring-91976">Farmers and cropdusting pilots on the Great Plains worried about pesticide risks before 'Silent Spring'</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>3. The osprey’s crash and recovery</h2>
<p>In “Silent Spring,” Carson described in detail how chlorinated hydrocarbon pesticides persisted in the environment long after they were sprayed, rising through the food chain and building up in the bodies of predators. Populations of fish-eating <a href="https://raptor.umn.edu/about-raptors/learn-about-raptors">raptors</a>, such as bald eagles and ospreys, were ravaged by these chemicals, which thinned the shells of the birds’ eggs so that they broke in the nest before they could hatch. </p>
<p>“Up to 1950, ospreys were one of the most widespread and abundant hawks in North America,” writes Cornell University research associate <a href="https://academy.allaboutbirds.org/person/alan-poole/">Alan Poole</a>. “By the mid-1960s, the number of ospreys breeding along the Atlantic coast between New York City and Boston <a href="https://theconversation.com/ospreys-recovery-from-pollution-and-shooting-is-a-global-conservation-success-story-111907">had fallen by 90%</a>.”</p>
<p>Bans on DDT and other highly persistent pesticides opened the door to recovery. But by the 1970s, many former osprey nesting sites had been developed. To compensate, concerned naturalists built nesting poles along shorelines. Ospreys also learned to colonize light posts, cell towers and other human-made structures.</p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Wildlife monitors band young ospreys in New York City’s Jamaica Bay to monitor their lives and movements.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Today, “Along the shores of the Chesapeake Bay, nearly 20,000 ospreys now arrive to nest each spring – the largest concentration of breeding pairs in the world. Two-thirds of them nest on buoys and channel markers maintained by the U.S. Coast Guard, who have become de facto osprey guardians,” writes Poole. “To have robust numbers of this species back again is a reward for all who value wild animals, and a reminder of how nature can rebound if we address the key threats.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ospreys-recovery-from-pollution-and-shooting-is-a-global-conservation-success-story-111907">Ospreys' recovery from pollution and shooting is a global conservation success story</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>4. New concerns</h2>
<p>Pesticide application techniques have become much more targeted in the 60 years since “Silent Spring” was published. One prominent example: crop seeds coated with neonicotinoids, the world’s most widely used class of insecticides. Coating the seeds makes it possible to introduce pesticides into the environment at the point where they are needed, without spraying a drop. </p>
<p>But a growing body of research indicates that even though coated seeds are highly targeted, much of their pesticide load washes off into nearby streams and lakes. “Studies show that neonicotinoids are <a href="https://theconversation.com/farmers-are-overusing-insecticide-coated-seeds-with-mounting-harmful-effects-on-nature-176109">poisoning and killing aquatic invertebrates</a> that are vital food sources for fish, birds and other wildlife,” writes Penn State entomologist <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=AAdZM1UAAAAJ&hl=en">John Tooker</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1577682621278085121"}"></div></p>
<p>In multiple studies, Tooker and colleagues have found that using coated seeds reduces populations of beneficial insects that prey on crop-destroying pests like slugs. </p>
<p>“As I see it, neonicotinoids can provide good value in controlling critical pest species, particularly in vegetable and fruit production, and managing invasive species like the spotted lanternfly. However, I believe the time has come to rein in their use as seed coatings in field crops like corn and soybeans, where they are providing little benefit and where the scale of their use is causing the most critical environmental problems,” Tooker writes.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/farmers-are-overusing-insecticide-coated-seeds-with-mounting-harmful-effects-on-nature-176109">Farmers are overusing insecticide-coated seeds, with mounting harmful effects on nature</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archive.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/192232/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Published in 1962, ‘Silent Spring’ called attention to collateral damage from widespread use of synthetic pesticides. Many problems the book anticipated persist today in new forms.Jennifer Weeks, Senior Environment + Cities Editor, The ConversationLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1912262022-09-27T15:26:01Z2022-09-27T15:26:01ZPeril ahead for red kite chicks born during times of drought<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/486759/original/file-20220927-24-pbqng9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2673%2C1780&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/portrait-red-kite-milvus-spread-wings-1504693928">Werner Baumgarten/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Take a drive down England’s M40 motorway and chances are you’ll see a large bird with a forked tail overhead searching for roadkill: the red kite.</p>
<p>The conservation status of this species has looked promising in recent years. Assessments made between 2005 and 2019 classified red kites as “near threatened” on the <a href="https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/22695072/181651010">IUCN Red List</a>, a global system for classifying each species’ extinction risk. Population growth throughout large swathes of the red kite’s range meant that the species was bumped up to “least concern” in 2020. </p>
<p>The UK’s growing population of red kites is largely a result of their <a href="https://www.rspb.org.uk/our-work/conservation/conservation-and-sustainability/safeguarding-species/case-studies/red-kite/">reintroduction</a> to parts of England and Scotland beginning in 1989. This is often hailed as a <a href="https://naturalengland.blog.gov.uk/2020/07/21/a-conservation-success-story-the-reintroduction-of-red-kites-30-years-ago/">conservation success story</a>. And rightly so. The number of red kites has soared (pun intended) by a whopping <a href="https://www.bto.org/sites/default/files/publications/bbs_report_2021.pdf">1,935%</a> between 1995 and 2020 across the UK.</p>
<p>While things are generally looking up for the species at a global level, populations in some countries, including Spain, France, Portugal and Slovakia are <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/conservation/wildbirds/action_plans/docs/milvus_milvus.pdf">declining</a>. Some of the causes of these declines have existed for centuries, such as hunting. </p>
<p>But <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-33011-7">a new study</a> has revealed how climate change poses a hidden threat by permanently damaging the development of chicks born during droughts. This could undermine the recovery of the species and is a sobering reminder of the challenges that a warming world will confront species with, even those which seem to be doing well for the time being.</p>
<h2>A hidden threat</h2>
<p>Some of the effects of drought on wildlife are predictable. Drought conditions restrict water and food and hence, nutrition, forcing animals to work harder to meet their basic needs and remain healthy. Other effects can take years to become apparent.</p>
<p>In the new study, researchers used data from as far back as 1970 to assess how red kites hatched during a drought fared in later life. The authors tagged nestlings with a unique leg ring and monitored their survival over many years. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Three young birds of prey surrounded by twigs." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/486768/original/file-20220927-14-f4rvnu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/486768/original/file-20220927-14-f4rvnu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486768/original/file-20220927-14-f4rvnu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486768/original/file-20220927-14-f4rvnu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486768/original/file-20220927-14-f4rvnu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486768/original/file-20220927-14-f4rvnu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486768/original/file-20220927-14-f4rvnu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Young red kites hunker down in a Berlin nest.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_kite#/media/File:Milmil_njg_980613.jpg">Accipiter/Wikipedia</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The authors concluded that some chicks born during a drought year, like 2022 in <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-62298430">England and Wales</a>, continued to face the consequences as adults. This might be because their development is permanently impaired due to a failure to meet their nutritional needs in early life; potentially making them smaller, more vulnerable to disease, and less capable of hunting.</p>
<p>Mounting threats put pressure on populations over time. As these populations begin to shrink due to the death rate exceeding the number of births, they can eventually enter a vortex: the population continues to decline until it goes extinct. This has happened once before with the British population. </p>
<p>Beginning in the 16th century, legal and illegal killings reduced red kite numbers. The bird’s increasing rarity made it a prime target for taxidermists and <a href="https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/advice/wildlife-and-the-law/wild-bird-crime/egg-collecting/">egg collectors</a>, particularly in the Victorian era. By the late 1980s, red kites were extinct in England and Scotland. This highlights how older threats may conspire with new ones to reverse recent progress.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two beige eggs with brown speckles." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/486769/original/file-20220927-18-a0mn8r.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/486769/original/file-20220927-18-a0mn8r.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486769/original/file-20220927-18-a0mn8r.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486769/original/file-20220927-18-a0mn8r.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486769/original/file-20220927-18-a0mn8r.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486769/original/file-20220927-18-a0mn8r.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/486769/original/file-20220927-18-a0mn8r.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Red kite eggs in a German natural history museum collection.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_kite#/media/File:Milvus_milvus_MWNH_0750.JPG">Klaus Rassinger & Gerhard Cammerer/Museum Wiesbaden</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Helping species adapt</h2>
<p>Red kites were considered vermin across Britain and Ireland during the 16th century and their numbers were <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/20764411#metadata_info_tab_contents">rigorously controlled</a>. While public perceptions have changed, gamekeepers and farmers still illegally shoot, poison and trap red kites for the perceived harm they cause to livestock and game. In 2020 alone, 20 red kites were confirmed to have been <a href="https://www.rspb.org.uk/about-the-rspb/about-us/media-centre/press-releases/birdcrime-2020/">killed this way</a> in the UK (and those are just the ones we know about).</p>
<p>As well as being efficient hunters, red kites feed on animal carcasses. This leaves them vulnerable to <a href="https://pbms.ceh.ac.uk/sites/default/files/PBMS_Rodenticide_Red_Kite_2016_FINAL.pdf">secondary poisoning</a>: they may scavenge an animal killed using toxic substances, such as a mouse or rat, which pass to the predator.</p>
<p>Like other birds of prey, red kites have been known to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S000632071200290X?casa_token=oiLHhY3WxdcAAAAA:ArPfTVdg6qL82wSC3WuL8pQJnwo6N0up2rMb9RxaNUbqTgU9Dnzf3gLaEAnsXR-N53ajHmK5iHU">fatally collide</a> with wind turbines, which may affect populations on a local level. As large-bodied birds that glide while scouring the ground for prey, red kites may fail to spot the blades before it is too late. </p>
<p>As the climate changes, new threats are emerging that scientists are only beginning to understand, such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/human-disruption-to-earths-freshwater-cycle-has-exceeded-the-safe-limit-our-research-shows-182562">more frequent and severe droughts</a>. The findings of this study highlight the importance of being proactive when approaching a species’ conservation. </p>
<p>But <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320722000775">there is hope</a> that some measures, such as <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1365-2486.2011.02532.x">providing shade over nests</a> to protect young from severe heat and providing <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1474-919X.2008.00844.x">extra water</a> when rain is scarce can help life partially adapt to the upheaval wrought by climate change.</p>
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<img alt="Imagine weekly climate newsletter" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/434988/original/file-20211201-21-13avx6y.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Esther Kettel does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>New research traces the effect of drought on red kite chicks born during particularly dry years.Esther Kettel, Senior Lecturer in Ecology and Conservation, Nottingham Trent UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1682492021-09-27T20:11:55Z2021-09-27T20:11:55ZMeet the prehistoric eagle that ruled Australian forests 25 million years ago<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422300/original/file-20210921-15-ol6q2d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=34%2C0%2C3274%2C2308&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jacob Blokland/Flinders University</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The parched deserts of the South Australian outback were once a rainforest filled with a rich variety of birds and animals. Now, thanks to a new fossil discovery, we know the apex predator of this lush ecosystem was a newly discovered eagle that lived 25 million years ago.</p>
<p>We discovered the fossil remains of this species, named <em>Archaehierax sylvestris</em>, in prehistoric sediments at Lake Pinpa, 400 kilometres north of Adelaide. </p>
<p>The fossil, unearthed in March 2016, is described in a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/08912963.2021.1966777">newly published paper in the journal Historical Biology</a>.</p>
<p>It is one of the most complete raptor fossils from this time period found anywhere in the world. It comprises 63 bones, which is truly exceptional; most fossil birds are named on the basis of just a single bone. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422019/original/file-20210920-19-pmxb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Silhouette of bird skeleton with bones highlighted" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422019/original/file-20210920-19-pmxb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422019/original/file-20210920-19-pmxb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=799&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422019/original/file-20210920-19-pmxb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=799&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422019/original/file-20210920-19-pmxb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=799&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422019/original/file-20210920-19-pmxb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422019/original/file-20210920-19-pmxb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422019/original/file-20210920-19-pmxb8u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Silhouette of an osprey skeleton with shading to show the bones preserved in the new fossil raptor, <em>Archaehierax sylvestris</em></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ellen Mather</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We have named it <em>Archaehierax sylvestris</em>, meaning “ancient hawk belonging to the forest”. It was slightly smaller than a <a href="https://www.beautyofbirds.com/wedgetailedeagles.html">wedge-tailed eagle</a>, with talons spanning 15 centimetres that allowed it to grab prey the size of a koala or possum. And it had short, robust wings adapted to fly within the cluttered confines of a forest, rather than to soar through the skies.</p>
<p>With its relatively short wings and long legs, this eagle was likely an ambush hunter, waiting for unwary prey to approach, rather than a soaring forager. In the forest, it probably preyed on medium-sized marsupials. But from a high perch, it would also have made forays over the lake where it could catch ducks and flamingos.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ancient-bilby-and-bandicoot-fossils-shed-light-on-the-mystery-of-marsupial-evolution-159437">Ancient bilby and bandicoot fossils shed light on the mystery of marsupial evolution</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<h2>Fossil treasure trove</h2>
<p>Since the 1970s, the barren, salt-crusted sediments in South Australia’s arid north have yielded a range of bone fragments, teeth, and other fossils of the animals that lived there — many of which would have been prey for <em>Archaehierax</em>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Excavation team working at Lake Pinpa" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422014/original/file-20210920-27-1pa9ug7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422014/original/file-20210920-27-1pa9ug7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422014/original/file-20210920-27-1pa9ug7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422014/original/file-20210920-27-1pa9ug7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422014/original/file-20210920-27-1pa9ug7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422014/original/file-20210920-27-1pa9ug7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422014/original/file-20210920-27-1pa9ug7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The authors working on the excavation site at Lake Pinpa. Left to right: Aaron Camens, Amy Tschirn, Jacob Blokland, Kailah Thorn.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Trevor H. Worthy</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These fossils include a host of mammals, ranging from <a href="https://theconversation.com/meet-the-giant-wombat-relative-that-scratched-out-a-living-in-australia-25-million-years-ago-141296">wombat ancestors the size of a small cow</a>, through a range of tree-dwelling herbivores such as possums and koalas, to small terrestrial carnivores no bigger than a mouse.</p>
<p>These animals lived around a large lake where crocodiles and turtles abounded, and freshwater dolphins played.</p>
<p>Waterbirds were abundant, including cormorants, several types of flamingo, four species of duck, and <em><a href="https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.150635">Presbyornis</a></em>, a bizarre long-legged fowl that went extinct elsewhere in the world 20 million years earlier. Many smaller forest birds such as songbirds, parrots and rails are also known, but most are not yet described.</p>
<h2>Global eagle family</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422296/original/file-20210921-17-1106lz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Fossil raptor bones" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422296/original/file-20210921-17-1106lz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/422296/original/file-20210921-17-1106lz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1079&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422296/original/file-20210921-17-1106lz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1079&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422296/original/file-20210921-17-1106lz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1079&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422296/original/file-20210921-17-1106lz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1356&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422296/original/file-20210921-17-1106lz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1356&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/422296/original/file-20210921-17-1106lz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1356&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Left tarsometatarsus (lower leg bone) of the fossil raptor <em>Archaehierax sylvestris</em>, beside <em>Aquila audax</em> (Wedge-tailed Eagle). The fossil was distorted during burial so the top half is rotated 90 degrees to the lower half. Silhouettes show relative sizes of these birds. Scale bar represents 10 millimetres.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ellen Mather</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><em>Archaehierax</em> was clearly a member of the <a href="https://www.australiaswonderfulbirds.com.au/raptors">raptor family</a>, which includes most hawks and eagles. But its bones differed in many ways from all other raptors, including similar-aged ones from elsewhere in the world.</p>
<p><em>Archaehierax sylvestris</em> was not the only raptor we found at Lake Pinpa. Isolated bones show a smaller eagle also lived in these forests, but the fossils are too fragmentary to give this species a name.</p>
<p>There is another fossil raptor known from deposits at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riversleigh_World_Heritage_Area">Riversleigh World Heritage Area</a> in northwest Queensland. <em>Pengana robertbolesi</em> is a few million years younger than <em>Archaehierax</em>, and not closely related to the Pinpa bird. It was adapted to <a href="https://australian.museum/learn/australia-over-time/extinct-animals/pengana-robertbolesi/">capture prey in holes in trees</a>. </p>
<p>Our analysis suggests <em>Archaehierax</em> was probably not closely related to any living raptor. Rather, it represented an ancient lineage that split off near the base of the raptor family tree. This is consistent with previous genetic analysis suggesting most living groups of hawks and eagles evolved only in the past 20 million years — roughly 5 million years after <em>Archaehierax</em> lived and died.</p>
<p>Previously, raptor fossils as ancient as 25 million years old were only known from Europe and North America. <em>Archaehierax sylvestris</em> and its smaller contemporary show that Australia was an important geographic location in the early global evolution of raptors. </p>
<p>Australia is already widely understood to be a <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/where-birdsong-began/11015700">cradle of evolution of songbirds</a>, and our island continent doubtless played a similar role in the evolution of other types of birds too.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/meet-the-giant-wombat-relative-that-scratched-out-a-living-in-australia-25-million-years-ago-141296">Meet the giant wombat relative that scratched out a living in Australia 25 million years ago</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>These raptors and the earliest songbirds lived in temperate rainforests. Back then, the area around what is now Lake Pinpa was located more than 1,100km south of where Adelaide is today, at a latitude equivalent to present-day Fiordland at the southwestern tip of New Zealand. </p>
<p>In the 25 million years since, <a href="https://www.earthbyte.org/absolute-plate-motions-and-age-of-the-ocean-crust-around-australia-since-150-million-years-ago/">continental drift</a> has carried Australia and the fossils north at 6 centimetres per year (the speed at which your fingernails grow), travelling more than 1,500km. </p>
<p>The rainforest where these birds lived is now the arid outback. And there are almost certainly many fossils awaiting discovery there that will tell us more about how Australia’s unique birds evolved.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/168249/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Trevor H. Worthy receives funding from The Australian Research Council and the Sir Mark Mitchell Research Foundation </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Aaron Camens receives funding from Sir Mark Mitchell Foundation . </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Lee receives funding from the Australian Research Council</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ellen K. Mather and Jacob C. Blokland do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Archaehierax sylvestris, whose remains have been unearthed in the arid South Australian outback, was the apex predator in a lush prehistoric forest filled with marsupials and waterfowl.Trevor H. Worthy, Associate Professor, Vertebrate Palaeontology Group, Flinders UniversityAaron Camens, Lecturer in Palaeontology, Flinders UniversityEllen K. Mather, PhD Candidate, Flinders UniversityJacob C. Blokland, Vertebrate Palaeontology PhD Candidate and Casual Academic, Flinders UniversityMike Lee, Professor in Evolutionary Biology (jointly appointed with South Australian Museum), Flinders UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1518852021-01-06T14:55:06Z2021-01-06T14:55:06ZFinding space for both wind farms and eagles in South Africa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374857/original/file-20201214-13-qzb7gw.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Verreaux's Black Eagle flying high.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author supplied/Megan Murgatroyd</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Energy generation around the world is shifting towards renewable sources in response to the <a href="https://www.unenvironment.org/explore-topics/climate-change/facts-about-climate-emergency">climate emergency</a>. The aim is that future energy will be clean, green and sustainable. Many developing countries are also simultaneously trying to increase <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/wcc.118">energy security</a> and expand energy access to rapidly growing populations. Wind energy is playing a leading role in delivering these objectives.</p>
<p>In South Africa there are at least 23 fully operational wind farms producing almost <a href="https://sawea.org.za/wind-energy-industry-set-to-grow-in-next-decade/">2 gigawatts</a>, and several more are about to come online. The country aims to produce around <a href="https://sawea.org.za/sa-wind-industry-gears-up-to-deliver-14-4gw-over-the-next-decade/">14.4 gigawatts</a> a year from wind by 2030, which would be around 20% of the country’s energy demand. This is good news in the battle to reduce carbon emissions and ensure a more consistent power supply. But these developments can have other less positive impacts which also need to be addressed.</p>
<p>One of these impacts is that wind turbines can kill birds when they collide with the moving blades. This problem is known <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0006320713003522">worldwide</a>, and some types of bird are more vulnerable to this threat than others. Birds of prey, such as eagles, buzzards and vultures, use the same wind resources that turbines need to operate. These large soaring birds use the wind to help power their own flight, using updraughts and thermals to gain height. This can make them particularly <a href="https://bioone.org/journals/journal-of-raptor-research/volume-52/issue-1/JRR-16-100.1/Raptor-Interactions-With-Wind-Energy--Case-Studies-From-Around/10.3356/JRR-16-100.1.full">vulnerable</a> to collisions with wind turbine blades, which can travel at speeds of up to 290km/hour and either eagles don’t see them or don’t perceive them as a threat until it is too late.</p>
<p>In South Africa, recent research found that <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.2989/00306525.2020.1770889">36%</a> of birds killed by wind turbines were birds of prey. These birds have long lifespans and produce relatively few young each year, which means that even a small increase in deaths can cause their populations to decline. This wind-wildlife conflict has been termed a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352484720306466">green-green dilemma</a>: more clean energy and healthy bird populations are both desirable environmental goals, yet with detrimental counter effects.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374233/original/file-20201210-23-ezubpy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Bird lying dead on the ground." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374233/original/file-20201210-23-ezubpy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374233/original/file-20201210-23-ezubpy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=775&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374233/original/file-20201210-23-ezubpy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=775&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374233/original/file-20201210-23-ezubpy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=775&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374233/original/file-20201210-23-ezubpy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=974&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374233/original/file-20201210-23-ezubpy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=974&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374233/original/file-20201210-23-ezubpy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=974&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Verreaux’s eagle found dead during monitoring at a wind farm in South Africa.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author supplied</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Verreaux’s eagles are found in many of the mountainous regions of sub-Saharan Africa. Their range overlaps considerably with the locations of existing and proposed wind energy developments. In South Africa, the raptor is the most commonly reported sensitive species in environmental impact assessments, being mentioned in <a href="https://www.birdlife.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/BLSA-Guidelines-Verreauxs-Eagle-and-Wind.pdf">65%</a> of reports. Between 2015 and 2019, 14 adult and five juvenile Verreaux’s eagles were reported killed by wind turbines <a href="https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1365-2664.13799">in South Africa</a>. These deaths have occurred during a period when the country had relatively few operational turbines. Without a solution a sharp rise in collision mortalities in the coming years can be expected. </p>
<p>We wanted to produce a tool that would reduce the risk of the eagles colliding with wind turbines, while also helping the energy industry to build wind farms in an efficient and sustainable manner. Our new <a href="https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1365-2664.13799">paper</a> presents a predictive tool which does precisely that.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374234/original/file-20201210-13-z5jtph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Eagle flying in the sky" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374234/original/file-20201210-13-z5jtph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374234/original/file-20201210-13-z5jtph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374234/original/file-20201210-13-z5jtph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374234/original/file-20201210-13-z5jtph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374234/original/file-20201210-13-z5jtph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374234/original/file-20201210-13-z5jtph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374234/original/file-20201210-13-z5jtph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Verreaux’s Eagle in the Karoo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Gareth Tate</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Protecting eagles’ space</h2>
<p>The best way to reduce the threat to eagles is to locate turbines away from areas that are most often used by the birds. Until now this has typically been done crudely by excluding development from a circular area around eagle nests. But these circles aren’t always big enough to protect resident eagles. And eagles rarely stick to a circle in the way they use the landscape around their nest site. </p>
<p>We therefore investigated how eagles actually use the landscape around their nests, and specifically where they fly at heights that would put them at risk of turbine collisions. To do this we attached small global positioning system (GPS) transmitters to the eagles’ backs. Over eight years, we tracked 15 adult eagles and collected 13.6 bird-years of tracking data. This gave us over 55,000 3D locations to analyse.</p>
<p>Using our tracking data, we examined which landscape features were associated with eagle flight at a height where collisions could occur. We found that eagles flew most near particular slopes, elevations and closer to their nest. </p>
<p>Our tool showed where wind turbines could be placed without harming eagles. Eagles don’t use all the areas within a circular buffer. Because of this, our model can free up around 20% more land to be developed for wind energy while providing the same level of eagle protection. This is positive for both eagle conservation and wind energy development.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374859/original/file-20201214-13-1auxmbx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Women holding a tagged eagle for research." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374859/original/file-20201214-13-1auxmbx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/374859/original/file-20201214-13-1auxmbx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374859/original/file-20201214-13-1auxmbx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374859/original/file-20201214-13-1auxmbx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374859/original/file-20201214-13-1auxmbx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374859/original/file-20201214-13-1auxmbx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/374859/original/file-20201214-13-1auxmbx.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tagged eagle.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author supplied/Megan Murgatroyd</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The model can assess the risk to eagles early on in the planning stage of new developments. This can save costly investment in long-term monitoring at sites which might only later turn out to be unsuitable for development. The model also provides an objective assessment of sites when environmental consultants have contrasting recommendations.</p>
<h2>Other locations and species</h2>
<p>Our predictive tool was built using data from Verreaux’s eagles tracked only in South Africa. We are now eager to explore whether these models will be useful in other areas of their range where wind energy is also increasing, for example in Ethiopia and Kenya.</p>
<p>Verreaux’s eagles are not the only species threatened by wind farms. Our work built on similar work already completed on <a href="https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1365-2664.12468">bearded vultures</a>. In South Africa there are also concerns for other raptors; <a href="https://www.birdlife.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/BLSA-Guidelines-Cape-Vulture.pdf">Cape vultures</a>, <a href="https://www.birdlife.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Wind-Energy-and-Birds-Impacts.pdf">martial eagles</a> and <a href="https://www.birdlife.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Black-Harriers-Wind-Energy-Final-1.pdf">black harriers</a> are all threatened species which have incurred deaths from wind turbines. We are working towards building similar tools for all these species.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/151885/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Megan Murgatroyd received funding from ABAX Investments, Tygerberg Bird Club, BirdLife South Africa, Hawk Mountain Sanctuary and the National Research Foundation - South Africa for this research.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Arjun Amar receives funding from ABAX Investments, National Research Foundation - South Africa. </span></em></p>The best way to reduce the threat to eagles is to locate turbines away from areas that are most often used by the birds.Megan Murgatroyd, Biologist, University of Cape TownArjun Amar, Associate Professor , FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1189422019-06-17T22:00:39Z2019-06-17T22:00:39ZRaptors victory: Feel-good multiculturalism masks reality of anti-Black racism in Canada<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/279928/original/file-20190618-118510-1as8cn5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Carding and racial profiling continues unabated - even as the multicultural unity of Canada seems to be at an all time high after the Raptors' NBA victory as seen here at the victory parade on June 17. </span> </figcaption></figure><p>During what was probably one of the most exciting and gratifying moments of his professional life, moments after the Raptors’ NBA finals victory on Thursday, a California sheriff’s deputy stopped Raptors president Masai Ujiri <a href="https://www.thestar.com/sports/raptors/2019/06/14/raptors-president-masai-ujiri-being-investigated-over-possible-altercation-after-game-6-victory-reports-say.html">from walking onto the court for the Raptors’ trophy presentation</a>. The deputy carded him and asked him for his credentials.</p>
<p>Even though he is the president of the Toronto Raptors’ basketball team and even though it was his own team’s victory ceremony, as a Black executive, he was treated with suspicion, as if he was trespassing.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/279889/original/file-20190617-118505-jugkpe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/279889/original/file-20190617-118505-jugkpe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279889/original/file-20190617-118505-jugkpe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279889/original/file-20190617-118505-jugkpe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279889/original/file-20190617-118505-jugkpe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279889/original/file-20190617-118505-jugkpe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279889/original/file-20190617-118505-jugkpe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Toronto Raptors president Masai Ujiri, centre left, with guard Kyle Lowry after the Raptors defeated the Golden State Warriors in Game 6 of the NBA Finals. Authorities are investigating an incident between Ujiri and a sheriff’s deputy.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Tony Avelar)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>That same day, a conflict studies and human rights student at the University of Ottawa and vice-president of academic affairs for the program’s student association, <a href="https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/humiliating-black-uottawa-student-cuffed-in-campus-carding-incident">Jamal Koulmiye-Boyce, was also racially profiled, carded and harassed by security on his own campus</a>. According to Koulmiye-Boyce, as well as bystander accounts with audio and video recordings, he was skateboarding on campus when security asked him to stop. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/living-and-breathing-while-black-racial-profiling-and-other-acts-of-violence-118437">Living and breathing while Black: Racial profiling and other acts of violence</a>
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<p>Security guards then demanded he show ID. When he explained that he left his wallet with his ID in his on-campus student office, the guards accused him of trespassing, and aggressively handcuffed and detained him. They then called the police. </p>
<p>Koulmiye-Boyce was held for several hours in the back of a police car before he was allowed to leave. The only reason guards held him? Skateboarding without a wallet. Even though Jamal is like many other students on campus, he was treated as a security threat because he is a Black student. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1139281306771238912"}"></div></p>
<p>For too many Black Canadians, this type of scrutiny is a reality.</p>
<p>How do we reconcile the daily racism that Black people face in our country with our public expressions of multicultural pride? </p>
<p>Canadians loved watching the Raptors achieve their dream of becoming NBA champions for many reasons: the tough losses and inspired comebacks; the “business trip” attitude the players maintained under extreme pressure; the giant parties emulating Jurassic Park popping up all over the county. </p>
<p>But I believe that for many Canadians, one of the most exciting aspects of the Raptors’ playoff victory was its feel-good multiculturalism.</p>
<h2>Multiculturalism and anti-Black racism</h2>
<p>Many Raptors’ fans are proud that Ujiri is the first African GM in the NBA. Ujiri often praises Canadian multiculturalism and makes jokes about how much better Canada is than the United States when it comes to welcoming immigrants, thanking “<a href="https://www.sportsnet.ca/basketball/nba/raptors-president-ujiri-highlights-team-represents-toronto-canada/">Donald Trump for making Toronto an unbelievable sports destination</a>.” </p>
<p>The sight of <a href="https://www.instagram.com/navbhatiasuperfan/?hl=en">superfan Nav Bhatia</a> leading what he calls a “beautiful rainbow” of Canadian fans after a Raptors’ win in the land of Trump sure feels good. And media stories about fans like <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/toronto-raptors-inspiring-city-and-country-1.5149411">15-year-old Yasmin Said help as well.</a> Said matches her red hijab to the Raptors’ logo when she plays basketball with the Hijabi Ballers, a group that encourages young Muslim women to get involved in sports. As a nation, we seem delighted by these beautiful multicultural moments.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/ByrVBbDhz0n/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>Many Canadians were also incensed when <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/kyle-lowry-mark-stevens-shove-tensions-nba-1.5162567">Mark Stevens, a white co-owner of the Golden State Warriors, shoved Raptors’ Kyle Lowry in Game 3 when he bumped into courtside fans</a>. Canadian outrage about American racism feels good. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/dear-white-people-wake-up-canada-is-racist-83124">Dear white people, wake up: Canada is racist</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>But as journalist <a href="https://muslimlink.ca/component/k2/author/1967-chelbydaigle">Chelby Daigle</a> argues, sometimes Canadians prefer to talk about “<a href="http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/views-expressed/2016/09/unlearning-anti-black-racism-101-stop-canadiansplaining">the multicultural wonderland of Canada as opposed to the evil U.S …</a>” as a way to minimize the trauma of anti-Black racism in Canada and as a way to deflect blame and responsibility. Our multicultural pride also “<a href="http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/views-expressed/2016/09/unlearning-anti-black-racism-101-stop-canadiansplaining">reduces the Black experience in the U.S. to just being victims of racist violence, while ignoring the agency, creativity, ingenuity and resiliency of Black Americans.”</a></p>
<p>Canadians, Daigle contends, are letting themselves and the entire nation off the hook because Canada doesn’t suck as badly as <a href="http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/views-expressed/2016/09/unlearning-anti-black-racism-101-stop-canadiansplaining">“the nation could possibly suck.</a>” </p>
<p>Canadians may cherish the idea that we are more open, more multicultural and more benevolent than Americans, but the realities of systemic racism in Canada are real and well-documented. White Canadians are <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=2YWtRn0l7a4C&printsec=frontcover&dq=where+the+waters+divide&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj5kuqEmqTcAhUlw1kKHZFHAJAQ6AEIKTAA#v=onepage&q=where%20the%20waters%20divide&f=false">less burdened by pollution than other racial groups</a>. They have <a href="https://journals.library.ualberta.ca/jcie/index.php/jcie/article/view/4575">longer life expectancies, higher incomes and better educational opportunities</a>. White Canadians are <a href="http://diversityhealthcare.imedpub.com/the-impact-of-inequality-on-health-in-canada-a-multidimensional-framework.php?aid=1943">more likely to receive better health care</a>. They are <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/29768333?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">less likely to be incarcerated</a>, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10439463.2011.610198">to be stopped and searched by police</a> and <a href="http://johnhoward.ca/blog/race-crime-justice-canada/">to face bias in the Canadian criminal justice system</a>.</p>
<p>These issues are not isolated or random events, but are part of <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3874373?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">long historical, structural and ongoing acts</a> of <a href="https://fernwoodpublishing.ca/book/policing-black-lives">“state-sanctioned violence and concerted neglect of Black people.</a>” </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/quiet-canadian-ugly-american-does-racism-differ-north-of-the-border-81388">Quiet Canadian, ugly American: Does racism differ north of the border?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Carding has been banned but continues anyway</h2>
<p>What happened to Koulmiye-Boyce also raises questions about security policies and the abuse of power by campus protection services. According to the University of Ottawa’s security regulations, “<a href="https://www.uottawa.ca/administration-and-governance/policy-33-security">members of the protection services are authorized to request proof of identity from persons on campus</a>.” </p>
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<p>New rules banning random carding by police came into effect in Ontario in 2017. These regulations are supposed to <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/laws/regulation/160058">ban police from collecting identifying information arbitrarily or based on a person’s race</a>. However, <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/opinion/ontario-carding-ban-1.3939558">many community groups don’t think these changes go far enough</a>. Why are security guards allowed to randomly ID people on campus while police officers are, in theory, not allowed to infringe on people’s rights in this way?</p>
<p>At the University of Ottawa campus, we need resources, events and supports specifically dedicated to combating anti-Black racism and supporting Black students, staff and faculty as well as recruitment and retention related to Black students, staff and faculty. And white campus members need to learn about anti-Black racism and do the work of sharing this knowledge with other white people as well.</p>
<p>If the purpose of university protection services, according to the university’s regulations, is “<a href="https://www.uottawa.ca/administration-and-governance/policy-33-security">to enhance the security of persons and their property, to ensure that their rights are protected</a>,” then we have to ask, whose security and rights is the university safeguarding? Certainly not Jamal’s.</p>
<p>While displays of Canadian multicultural unity may feel good, including expressions of Raptors fandom in the form of parades and jerseys, as long as Black Canadians are singled out for greater scrutiny in Canadian society, multiculturalism acts as a facade that allows anti-Black racism to continue.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/118942/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Corrie Scott does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>How do we reconcile the daily racism that Black people face in our country with our public expressions of multicultural pride?Corrie Scott, Associate Professor at the Institute of Feminist and Gender Studies, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of OttawaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1188732019-06-14T17:16:28Z2019-06-14T17:16:28ZWhat the Toronto Raptors have taught us about resilience<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/279594/original/file-20190614-158931-1fbripe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4108%2C2159&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Toronto Raptors' Kawhi Leonard raises his fist following a basket as Golden State Warriors' Steph Curry walks away during Game 6 of the NBA finals.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Toronto Raptors have won their first NBA title in franchise history, and their star player, Kawhi Leonard, <a href="https://www.nba.com/article/2019/06/13/finals-mvps-more-one-team">was crowned the most valuable player</a> in the finals.</p>
<p>But just a year ago, Leonard’s career was <a href="https://www.si.com/nba/2018/04/19/kawhi-leonard-injury-timeline-news-spurs">plagued by injuries</a> that caused him to miss almost the entire basketball season. </p>
<p>So when the Raptors acquired him in the summer of 2018, they put him on a regimen of what’s known as <a href="https://www.sportsnet.ca/basketball/nba/load-management-raptors-use-kawhi-leonard/">load management</a> to ensure he was healthy and capable of performing at his best. </p>
<p>According to the International Olympic Committee, the goal of <a href="https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/50/17/1030">load management</a> is to design loads, such as training and competition, to enhance performance while reducing the risk of injury. Essentially, load management helps athletes stay resilient in the face of the many relentless demands they face. </p>
<p>Each of us can apply load management in our lives to help promote our own resilience and success. </p>
<p>Most of us aren’t elite athletes focused on maximizing physical prowess. We are more likely to be employees, caregivers and students who are mainly focused on ensuring our mental competence. We therefore need to focus on our psychological load more than our physical load.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/50/17/1030">psychological component</a> of load management involves successfully handing the internal loads we face, like stress, that can interfere with our well-being and performance.</p>
<p>One of the ways to manage our psychological load and combat the stress of everyday obligations is to ensure that we enjoy an adequate amount of leisure time that allows for recovery. We also need to make sure that our time spent unwinding is of <a href="https://www.infoagepub.com/products/Boost">sufficient quality</a>. </p>
<p>Ironically, though, it is precisely when our loads are most intense and our stressors most extreme that we are least likely to participate in activities that allow us to recover. This is known as <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191308518300054">the recovery paradox</a>.</p>
<h2>‘Turning off’</h2>
<p>For example, one effective strategy for combating the stressors caused by our everyday experiences is to engage in <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0963721411434979">psychological detachment</a>, which involves mentally “turning off” from our daily obligations in our leisure time.</p>
<p>However, when we experience stressful job situations that involve deadline pressures, conflict at the office or emotional demands, <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28133454">we are less likely to psychologically detach</a> in our leisure time. This adds to our load and prevents recovery.</p>
<p>Sleep is another method for helping us recuperate from our daily hassles. In fact, high-quality sleep is <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13594320500513913">one of the most important recovery mechanisms</a> there is. Unfortunately however, when we experience strain in our jobs due to things such as a lack of control over our work tasks, it <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13594320500513913">interferes with the quality of our sleep</a> and prevents recovery.</p>
<h2>Lessons from Durant’s ordeal</h2>
<p>A failure to engage in proper load management can have disastrous consequences. We saw this in Game 5 of the NBA Finals, when Golden State Warrior Kevin Durant, his team on the verge of elimination, laced up to try to help his squad live to fight another day despite nursing an injury to his right calf. </p>
<p>Tragically, however, in the second quarter of the crucial game, he <a href="https://www.nba.com/article/2019/06/12/warriors-durant-achilles-injury-update">ruptured his Achilles tendon</a> and required surgery that <a href="https://heavy.com/sports/2019/06/kevin-durant-injury-timeline-what-is-ruptured-achilles/">may put him on the sidelines for the entire next season</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/279589/original/file-20190614-158936-l6k236.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/279589/original/file-20190614-158936-l6k236.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=376&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279589/original/file-20190614-158936-l6k236.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=376&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279589/original/file-20190614-158936-l6k236.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=376&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279589/original/file-20190614-158936-l6k236.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279589/original/file-20190614-158936-l6k236.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/279589/original/file-20190614-158936-l6k236.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Golden State Warriors forward Kevin Durant reacts as he leaves the court after sustaining an injury during Game 5 of the NBA Finals.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>For those of us who are not professional athletes, participating in physical activities in our leisure time can be an effective source of unwinding that helps us manage our psychological load. Again, though, research shows that stressful experiences during our work or obligation time <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28358572">can lead us to engage in less exercise and other physical activities</a> in our leisure time. This prevents us from recovering as successfully as we could. </p>
<p>Human beings are not machines. We can’t be on the go nonstop and expect to excel. For us to perform at our best we need to recover successfully from the numerous and persistent demands we face on a daily basis — just as Kawhi Leonard did during his months of load management.</p>
<p>This requires overcoming the recovery paradox and ensuring that we participate in leisure activities that help us recuperate, particularly when we experience high levels of stress. </p>
<p>Managing our psychological loads is an important part of enjoying a good life, ensuring our own resilience and performing at our best. The King in the North is a great example of how implementing load management can keep us physically and psychologically healthy and promote our ultimate success.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1132632478881988609"}"></div></p>
<p>Congratulations to the Toronto Raptors on a historic victory — and on embracing the importance of load management.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/118873/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jamie Gruman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Just as Kawhi Leonard did, each of us can apply load management in our lives to help promote our own resilience and success.Jamie Gruman, Professor of Organizational Behaviour, University of GuelphLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1181412019-06-03T21:28:55Z2019-06-03T21:28:55ZToronto’s multicultural Raptors: Teamwork and individualism<p>The Toronto Raptors have succeeded in establishing themselves as a major cultural and economic player in both the city of Toronto and beyond, with several <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/5327475/mississauga-brampton-raptors-jurassic-park-nba-finals/">offshoots of the outdoor fan zone Jurassic Park</a> popping up in the suburbs and across Canada. The Raptors have cemented themselves into the fabric and psyche of the city, with Raptors gear flying off the shelves. </p>
<p>The Raptors have also succeeded in telling their story from the point of view of individuality and hard work. These are themes I wrote about 15 years ago in my book, <em><a href="https://www.canadianscholars.ca/books/who-da-man">Who Da Man?: Black Masculinities and Sporting Cultures</a></em>, which was based on what is probably the only scholarly article written about the Toronto Raptors, “<a href="https://openlibrary.org/works/OL18938232W/Pop_Can">Who Got Next? Raptor Morality and Black Public Masculinity in Canada.</a>”</p>
<p>In <em>Who Da Man?</em>, I tried to understand sports outside of its own narrative. That means that I didn’t want to look solely at the fan’s perspective on things. Instead I looked at what sports, and the Raptors, meant from a sociological, or let’s say deeper, point of view.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/277429/original/file-20190531-69079-j8gk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/277429/original/file-20190531-69079-j8gk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=840&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277429/original/file-20190531-69079-j8gk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=840&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277429/original/file-20190531-69079-j8gk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=840&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277429/original/file-20190531-69079-j8gk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1056&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277429/original/file-20190531-69079-j8gk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1056&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277429/original/file-20190531-69079-j8gk4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1056&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Book cover for ‘who da man?’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Canadian Scholars</span></span>
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<p>I argued that the arrival of the Raptors in the late 1990s in a hockey town attempted to construct an American version of Black masculinity and individuality, which I called Raptor Morality. Raptor Morality refers to a mentality that puts forth a “determined Black male who is fiercely individualistic and committed to a dream of ‘making it’ through the brutal channels of professional sport.”</p>
<p>To make my argument, I looked at the Raptors from a deeper lens than the one the media usually takes, which is to focus solely on the game. In doing so, I consulted the work of several Black writers, most of whom had nothing to do with sports, including people like <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/James-Baldwin">African American novelist and essayist James Baldwin</a> and <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/dionne-brand">Canadian writer and poet Dionne Brand</a>. These writers gave me a chance to see Black life beyond basketball. </p>
<p>I teach the text in my fourth year class on Sport, Race and Popular Culture. The feedback from my students, most of whom wear Raptors gear and hail from municipalities like Brampton and Scarborough, is that they appreciate the fact that you can examine the Raptors, and sport, from a different (not necessarily better) lens than the one the media takes, which only focuses on the sport itself or the positive effects of the sport on the city.</p>
<h2>Multicultural teamwork</h2>
<p>To some extent, the Raptor Morality I wrote about still exists. Maybe it has to exist. Perhaps high-performance athletes have to be fiercely individualistic to deal with such brutal realities as making it through the channels of high performance sport, something the classical documentary <em><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/04/sport/hoop-dreams-25th-anniversary-spt-intl/index.html">Hoop Dreams</a></em> showed us years ago.</p>
<p>But the morality on display in 2019 is to the Raptors’ credit. For example, the Raptors are an example of both individualism <em>and</em> a kind of multicultural teamwork both on and off the court.</p>
<p>For one, not only have the Raptors succeeded in showcasing the incredible diversity of Toronto, that diversity (while not perfect) has now become a draw for many African American NBA players: Hall-of-Famer Charles Barkley called Toronto “<a href="https://www.thestar.com/sports/2016/02/11/charles-barkley-open-about-his-love-affair-with-toronto-mudhar.html">my favourite city</a>.”</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/277428/original/file-20190531-69063-om9izq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/277428/original/file-20190531-69063-om9izq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277428/original/file-20190531-69063-om9izq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277428/original/file-20190531-69063-om9izq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277428/original/file-20190531-69063-om9izq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277428/original/file-20190531-69063-om9izq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277428/original/file-20190531-69063-om9izq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Toronto Raptors forward Kawhi Leonard drives up court as Golden State Warriors centre Kevon Looney defends during second half basketball action in Game 1 of the NBA Finals.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn</span></span>
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<p>The main players in the Raptors story in 2019 are not only a multicultural tour de force but also represent certain ethics beyond individualism. <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/celtics/2019/06/01/masai-ujiri-big-winner-raptors-reaching-nba-finals/x8SlqUVCDOpm6jLn4GBsYI/story.html">Masai Ujiri, the team president,</a> is a Nigerian-Canadian who runs a charity called <a href="https://giantsofafrica.org/">Giants of Africa</a> and has been central in establishing a presence for the NBA in Africa. The level of Ujiri’s charitable activity is unusual and laudable for someone in his position.</p>
<p>So it’s no accident that two of his best players are from Africa. Serge Ibaka from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Pascal Siakam from Cameroon, who Ujiri personally scouted years ago at a Basketball Without Borders basketball camp. Siakam’s rags-to-riches story, and his level of dedication to Cameroon and Africa more broadly, is also commendable. It is also, understandably, one of the main storylines of this post-season, and exemplifies the new Raptor Morality.</p>
<p>Another multicultural angle is represented by <a href="https://canadianimmigrant.ca/canadas-top-25-immigrants/canadas-top-25-immigrants-2018/nav-bhatia">superfan Nav Bhatia</a>, a Sikh car dealership owner from Mississauga who has attended every home game in the Raptors 24-year history. If that’s not enough of an accomplishment, <a href="https://torontosun.com/sponsored/sponsored-sports/nav-bhatia-launches-the-superfan-foundation">Bhatia has launched the Nav Bhatia Superfan Foundation</a>, to give back to the community through basketball. In addition, he has recently become somewhat of a spokesman for racial tolerance, <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/raptors-superfan-nav-bhatia-racist-tweet_ca_5ce99b87e4b00356fc227179">given the recent racist abuse he received in Milwaukee during the Eastern Conference Finals</a> and his highly commendable decision to confront his abuser with a gesture of peace.</p>
<p>Finally, there is Drake: ambassador for the Raptors and, in the eyes of many, the city. Drake has used his Afro-Jewish heritage to signify his belief that <a href="https://youtu.be/MVX-M0AgUio">Toronto is wonderfully unique and superior to American cities</a>. To this end, Drake’s mission — borne out in the recent documentary <em>The Carter Effect</em> — has been to represent his city. In fact, Drake’s comments in <em>The Carter Effect</em> lauds the Raptors’ first superstar, Vince Carter, as putting basketball and the city of Toronto on the map.</p>
<p>All told, this is the story of Raptor Morality in 2019, almost 25 years after the team first began playing. It’s a truly sentimental time for fans of the team. Many of the team’s icons have embodied hard work and beating the odds, but also a dedication to greater causes than basketball. As much as the on-court success, it’s translated into a groundswell of civic pride previously unseen. It is a marvel to watch.</p>
<p>As Golden State Warriors Coach Steve Kerr said after Game 1 of the NBA Finals: “<a href="https://nba.nbcsports.com/2018/04/26/stephen-curry-back-in-full-practice-mode-for-warriors/">Give Toronto credit</a>.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/118141/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gamal Abdel-Shehid does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Raptors’ success in reaching the NBA final for the first time in the franchise’s history is an opportunity to reflect on the diversity of the team.Gamal Abdel-Shehid, Associate Professor School of Kinesiology and Health Science, York University, CanadaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1179622019-05-31T13:46:50Z2019-05-31T13:46:50ZWe the North: The Toronto Raptors playoff success represents a shift in Canadian identity<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/277381/original/file-20190531-69067-inkv23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Toronto Raptors fans sing the Canadian anthem at what's dubbed "Jurassic Park" before the first game of the NBA Finals.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/ Tijana Martin</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>If you’re not a basketball fan right now, you’re missing out. For the first time since they were founded in 1995, the Toronto Raptors have advanced to the National Basketball Association final <a href="http://media.sportsnet.ca/2019/05/raptors-vs-bucks-game-6-on-sportsnet-reaches-6-8-million-canadians-largest-audience-ever-for-an-nba-game-in-canada/">and excitement</a> for the game in Canada has never been higher.</p>
<p>This outcome was very much <a href="https://nationalpost.com/pmn/sports-pmn/basketball-sports-pmn/trudeau-extremely-excited-about-toronto-raptors-says-son-is-massive-fan">the vision</a> of John Bitove, one of the founders of the Toronto Raptors, who said the ultimate goal of the organization would be to win an NBA championship. But more than that, it would be to recognize basketball as a major national sport in Canada. </p>
<p>Hockey has traditionally been seen by most people — both inside and outside of the country — as <a href="https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/n-16.7/page-1.html">the sport that most defines Canada</a>. Fans have often been sold the idea that hockey players are what a Canadian is or ought to be. For many fans, national pride is attached to this descriptor. </p>
<p>The historical and cultural significance of hockey means it will always be a Canadian sport. But because of the changing demographics of the Canadian population, anecdotal evidence suggests some fans are starting to seek national identity through <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/winnipeg-raptors-nba-finals-1.5155288">basketball</a>. A few reasons underpin this new identification. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/277385/original/file-20190531-69067-1ai1eyu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/277385/original/file-20190531-69067-1ai1eyu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277385/original/file-20190531-69067-1ai1eyu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277385/original/file-20190531-69067-1ai1eyu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277385/original/file-20190531-69067-1ai1eyu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277385/original/file-20190531-69067-1ai1eyu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/277385/original/file-20190531-69067-1ai1eyu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Toronto Raptors forward Kawhi Leonard, shown here during the first game of the NBA Finals, has become a hero across Canada for his phenomenal performance during the playoffs.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn</span></span>
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</figure>
<h2>Changing demographics</h2>
<p>First, Canada is becoming more diverse. According to <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/census-2016-immigration-1.4368970">the latest census data</a>, 21.9 per cent of Canadians reported being or having been an immigrant or permanent resident. Statistics Canada predicts this number to reach 30 per cent by 2036. The Indigenous population is growing at more than four times the rate of the non-Indigenous population.</p>
<p>Also, 7.7 million Canadians check “visible minority” on their census forms, representing 22.3 percent of the population. These numbers are higher in Toronto, which is one of the top sports cities in Canada. The census data showed more than <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/census-visible-minorities-1.4371018">half of Torontonians</a> identify as a “visible minority.” </p>
<p>The changing demographics are impacting Canada’s identity as a nation. From the <a href="https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/year-in-ideas-how-canadian-identity-has-changed-and-what-it-means-for-our-future">1950s to the 1980s</a>, it could be argued that the three major pillars of Canadian identity were the country’s role as UN peacekeepers, its universal health-care system and the threat of Québec separation. Although health care remains a pillar, <a href="https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-canadas-multiculturalism-is-our-identity/">multiculturalism</a> now ranks as a core Canadian identity. </p>
<p>Kawhi Leonard has spoken about being <a href="https://byblacks.com/main-menu-mobile/opinion-mobile/item/2303-dear-toronto-do-you-even-know-who-kawhi-leonard-really-is">inspired by the legacy of Earl Lloyd, the first African-American to play in the NBA</a>, and coaches and teachers have spoken about <a href="https://byblacks.com/main-menu-mobile/opinion-mobile/item/2303-dear-toronto-do-you-even-know-who-kawhi-leonard-really-is">the rise of basketball for youth in the Greater Toronto Area</a>.</p>
<h2>The global expansion of basketball</h2>
<p><a href="https://gazettereview.com/2016/08/top-10-popular-sports-world/">Basketball is a more global game than hockey</a> and therefore more familiar to many new Canadians. </p>
<p>The NBA televises its games in 215 countries and territories and in 50 languages. About <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/18/nba-steps-up-its-global-plans-to-take-basketball-to-new-markets.html">300 million</a> people play basketball in China, and the NBA says 30 per cent of its paid live-streaming subscription service comes from Asia.</p>
<p>Another global expansion of the NBA is in India. There are about seven million Facebook fans in the country who follow the sport. The NBA has <a href="https://in.reuters.com/article/basketball-india-nba/india-can-be-the-next-china-for-nba-says-top-official-idINKBN1860Q0">a partnership</a> with Sony SIX, an Indian sports channel that airs 350 live games on its platform. Roughly six million kids and 5,000 coaches are given the opportunity to learn the sport of basketball through the league’s developmental program.</p>
<p>And the NBA’s recent expansion into United Kingdom has drawn a lot of attention. The league has signed a new partnership with Sky Sports to show games. “We’re also partners in terms of their digital platforms and hugely excited about that … we see an opportunity through the entire Sky system to continue promoting the NBA throughout Europe,” said NBA commissioner <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/patrickmurray/2019/01/20/inside-the-nbas-attempts-to-reach-a-global-audience/#259d146c7dd2">Adam Silver</a>.</p>
<h2>Fans want to watch winners</h2>
<p>The idea that some Canadian fans are starting to seek national identity through basketball is not only limited to the changing demographics and the global expansion of the sport. Fans simply want to watch winners — <a href="https://journals.humankinetics.com/doi/pdf/10.1123/jsep.14.1.28">research</a> shows that winning is a predominate predictor of fan desire for sport. </p>
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<p>The Toronto Raptors have certainly proved to be exciting to watch. They made it to the NBA playoffs in the last <a href="https://basketball.realgm.com/nba/teams/Toronto-Raptors/28/Playoff-History">six years</a>, and are now finally taking centre stage as they face the defending champions, the Golden State Warriors. </p>
<p>Fans revel in a team’s success despite having done nothing tangible to bring the team success, a phenomenon known as <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1977-10287-001">basking in reflected glory</a>. Social psychologists posit that fans use a sport team’s success to enhance their self esteem. </p>
<p>Whether or not the Raptors win the NBA championship, expect expressions of fandom and national pride to continue during the next few months with Canadians wearing a Raptors jersey while on vacation or hosting celebration parties with other fans. These displays of unity and Canadian culture are gratifying to see. </p>
<p>Let’s go Raptors! </p>
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<span class="caption">Toronto Raptors superfan Nav Bhatia checks out the action before Game 1 of the NBA Finals. He has been a constant presence at the team’s games since the Raptors first season in 1995.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn</span></span>
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</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/117962/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ryan Snelgrove receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vinu Selvaratnam does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Hockey is often considered Canada’s national sport, but with the changing demographics of the country and the rising success of the Toronto Raptors, basketball is also seen as a national sport.Ryan Snelgrove, Professor of Sport Business, University of WaterlooVinu Selvaratnam, Master of Arts Candidate, Recreation and Leisure Studies, University of WaterlooLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1153142019-04-15T14:59:33Z2019-04-15T14:59:33ZHow Google images helped us pin down the diet of Africa’s largest eagle<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/268965/original/file-20190412-76862-1w70pg9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Google Images have revealed valuable data on what Africa's largest eagle preys on. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Martial eagles are in <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/EE0EAE90EAEE0F671EEAA89D0BFF732D/S0959270917000314a.pdf/div-class-title-quantifying-the-decline-of-the-martial-eagle-span-class-italic-polemaetus-bellicosus-span-in-south-africa-div.pdf">rapid decline</a> throughout South Africa and many other parts of their range in sub-Saharan Africa. These declines have been so steep, that this species is now considered <a href="https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/22696116/129915349">vulnerable</a> to extinction.</p>
<p>But conservationists still don’t have a very good handle on what could be driving these declines across <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0006320718300934">Africa</a>. Suggestions include: <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-94-017-2031-1_17">habitat loss</a>, deliberate and incidental <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/000632079190088Q">poisoning</a>, <a href="https://journals.co.za/docserver/fulltext/wild/5/1/3106.pdf?expires=1552033718&id=id&accname=57709&checksum=8F858EF4E3DEE45009BF11A39EE41CC0">hunting</a> in response to the fear of <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/D65C068988B1F071613CB0809F22EE45/S003060531500068Xa.pdf/financial_compensation_for_damage_to_livestock_by_lions_panthera_leo_on_community_rangelands_in_kenya.pdf">livestock loss</a>, collisions with <a href="http://www.the-eis.com/data/literature/biological%20and%20conservation%20aspects%20of%20bird%20mortality%20caused%20by%20electricity%20power%20lines%20-%20a%20review.pdf">power lines</a> and <a href="https://journals.co.za/content/wild/5/1/AJA03794369_3091;jsessionid=cgepBf6obkrPHvZpJrzi54h3.sabinetlive">pollution</a>. </p>
<p>A recent concern is a <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/j.1474-919X.2006.00531.x">reduction in available prey</a>. Unfortunately, our knowledge of what this species preys on is relatively poor. We only really have <a href="https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/sabinet/wild/1990/00000020/00000002/art00015">two South African studies</a> from the <a href="https://journals.co.za/content/ATM_Monographs/3/1/AJA090799001_91">1980’s</a>.</p>
<p>Our <a href="https://academic.oup.com/condor/article/121/1/duy015/5318747">research</a> sought to overcome some of these limitations. We explored some alternative options for identifying important prey eaten by this species. </p>
<p>As martial eagles are beautiful, people love to take photographs of them and post these online. We realised that hundreds of photographers, amateurs to professionals, have been collecting data. To help answer some conservation questions we tapped into this resource of photographs taken at multiple locations across the continent over many years. </p>
<h2>What they eat</h2>
<p>Scientists use a range of methods to understand what raptors – birds that feed on smaller animals – eat. These include collecting and identifying <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/jav.00944">prey remains</a> from nest sites, inspecting <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Davorin_Tome/publication/28313071_Changes_in_the_diet_of_long-eared_owl_Asio_otus_seasonal_patterns_of_dependence_on_vole_abundance/links/55129ce70cf20bfdad51941d/Changes-in-the-diet-of-long-eared-owl-Asio-otus-seasonal-patterns-of-dependence-on-vole-abundance.pdf">pellets</a>, which are regurgitated balls of indigestible prey parts, watching from <a href="https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.0021-8901.2004.00890.x">hides</a> set up at nests, or using remote technology such as placing <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11252-015-0500-6">camera traps</a> at nests. Scientists can now even analyse the chemical properties, like <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/ibi.12095">stable isotopes</a> in feathers to describe the types of prey eaten. </p>
<p>These approaches are incredibly valuable in assessing diet. Unfortunately, they present some limitations. Almost all are nest based. This limits them to the breeding season and prey that is brought to – and remains at – the nest. Martial Eagles also nest at really <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0173956">low densities</a>. To get diet data from nests, researchers visit multiple sites in remote places and many times per season. This makes these studies challenging and expensive.</p>
<h2>The research</h2>
<p><a href="https://academic.oup.com/condor/article/121/1/duy015/5318747">Our study</a> used the free web app <a href="https://morphs.io/#/sign-in">MORPHIC</a>, developed at the <a href="https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/2041-210X.12562">University of Cape Town</a> to search Google Images and catalogue photographs of martial eagles with prey. Our sources included websites, social media and photography platforms. </p>
<p>We trawled through 4,872 photos and found 254 images of the species with prey, and recorded data on eagle location, age, feeding position and type of prey. The photos came from many different countries across southern and eastern Africa, including South Africa, Kenya, Namibia, Botswana and Tanzania. </p>
<p>These images revealed that reptiles, birds and mammals each made up about a third of Martial Eagle diet. Prey type proportions varied broadly between different regions. Mammals dominated in eastern Africa but reptiles were more important prey across southern Africa. This was the first research to explore Martial Eagle diet in any detail beyond the borders of South Africa.</p>
<p>Another limitation of previous approaches, was their inability to explore the prey of non-breeding individuals in the population. Unlike adults, non-breeding sub-adults don’t have a central place, like a nest, where prey remains accumulate. Using web-based photographs however, we were able to examine the diet of sub-adult martial eagles and test whether it differed from adults. </p>
<p>We found that sub-adults fed less frequently on bird prey. Birds are agile, so sub-adult eagles may need time to acquire the skills and technique required to tackle this type of prey. To our knowledge, this is the first study describing the prey composition of non-breeding sub-adults for any raptor species. We hope our novel method will allows researchers to undertake similar studies for other raptor species in the future. Differences in diet across ages, populations and raptor species may allow for the implementation of more targeted conservation measures.</p>
<h2>What next</h2>
<p>Our research contributes to conservation by providing key information on the ecological requirements of this threatened species. Our approach might also help inform conservation efforts for other predatory species under threat. Our approach can be used on any species, from raptors to big cats, as long as they are photographed widely enough across their range. </p>
<p>Anyone can tap into this online resource at minimal cost or effort and contribute substantially to global conservation. This powerful take on citizen science could help shape many aspects of future conservation research.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/115314/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vincent Naude receives funding from Panthera and the National Research Foundation - South Africa. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Arjun Amar receives funding from the National Research Foundation - South Africa. </span></em></p>Scientists now have a better understanding of what martial eagles eat. This is valuable for the conservation of this endangered species.Vincent Naude, PhD student, University of Cape TownArjun Amar, Associate Professor , Percy FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology, University of Cape TownLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.