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Thursday, September 02, 2010
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| 10/26/2009 9:41:00 AM | Email this article • Print this article
Comment on this article | Coast Guard set to pick up sickened birds from wildlife center
Trip to the International Bird Rescue Research Center is the second in three days
By NANCY McCARTHY
For the Observer
The U.S. Coast Guard will come to the rescue of over 300 seabirds threatened by an algae bloom that has spread over the Long Beach Peninsula and parts of the North Oregon Coast.
Today's rescue is the second time that birds have been transported from the Wildlife Center of the North Coast in Olney to the International Bird Rescue Research Center in Fairfield, Calif.
Volunteers from the research center flew to Astoria on Saturday, rented a moving van and drove 150 loons, murres and grebes to the northern California facility that specializes in rehabilitating birds debilitated by oil spills and natural disasters.
For the past week, hundreds of birds have been housed at the Wildlife Center of the North Coast. They are covered by slimy foam from an algae bloom that broke down in the ocean after a storm in Alaska.
The foam washes off the weatherproofing on the birds' feathers, causing the birds to become hypothermic and unable to fly or feed themselves.
The algae are a foreign species that hasn't been seen in this area before.
The Coast Guard planned Monday to arrive in Astoria at about 10 a.m. and load the birds from a U-Haul trailer into the guard's HC-130 cargo plane. The birds will be taken to the Fairfield research center.
Paul Kelway, manager of the center's southern California facility who is acting as spokesman during the crisis, said the research center is specially designed to wash the birds and reintegrate them into water so they can regain the waterproofing on their feathers.
How long that takes, however, depends on how long the foam was on their feathers, Kelway said.
"The longer a bird is incapacitated, the less chance it has for survival," he said. "Time is of the essence."
He called the rehabilitation process "quite complex" that could take a few weeks.
The foam, he said, flattens the feathers that normally interlock to create their own waterproofing. Once the foam is washed off, the feathers begin to realign themselves.
Birds are placed in large pools of clear water for the birds and fresh water is constantly pumped into the pools, allowing the feathers to be continually washed and realigned.
Eventually, the birds will be released off the California coast, Kelway said.
It could cost more than $50,000 to rehabilitate the birds, he said. Expenses include medications, fish for the birds, supplies, equipment and refreshments for the volunteers.
"Usually, in an oil slick, there's a responsible party to pay for the cost, but in this case there is no responsible party," he said.
Donations can be made through the center's Web site, www.ibrrc.org
Over 1,000 birds on the Long Beach peninsula became debilitated by the foam, according to some estimates. Birds also were rescued on Sunset Beach and Cannon Beach.
Beachgoers picked up the birds and brought them to the Wildlife Center of the North Coast, and by Friday, the center had more than 400 birds, about 250 more than the center's capacity.
"We're still doing intakes," Sharnelle Fee, center director, said Monday.
Donations of cash to pay for fish and utilities are needed, as well as large towels to dry the birds and to use as bedding, Fee said.
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