News and sports in the Whitewater Valley

By John Estridge

Social distancing is now being applied to songbirds.

Some songbirds are inexplicably dying across a band of states from Indiana to New Jersey, Delaware and Virginia, and officials in every affected state want people to no longer use bird feeders and bird baths until the dying ends. The reason is officials do not want the birds to congregate at the feeders and possibly spread the disease. Instead, they want the birds to engage in social distancing.

To date, dead songbirds with symptoms associated with this unknown disease have been found in 53 Hoosier counties including Fayette and Union counties. At this point, there has been up to 1,000 deaths in Indiana, according to Allisyn Gillet ornithologist with the Indiana Department of Natural Resources. DNR held a Zoom news conference Friday afternoon, July 2 featuring Gillet. She read from a prepared statement and then answered questions from journalists and local bluebird enthusiast Tom Cooney.

The 10 states where dead songbirds have been found displaying the same symptoms include: Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Washington, Delaware and New Jersey as well as the District of Columbia.

According to most of the different state sites and reiterated by Gillet at the news conference, symptoms include: Eye swelling, crusty/gummy/closed eyes, head swelling along with neurological signs such as tremors, stumbling, weakness and lethargy.

According to Indiana’s DNR, those species of songbirds include: blue jay, American robin, common grackle, starling, northern cardinal and brown-headed cowbird. Pennsylvania’s Game Commission has some different species with: Blue Jay, European Starling, Common Grackle, American Robin, Northern Cardinal, House Finch, House Sparrow, Eastern Bluebird, Red-bellied Woodpecker, Carolina Chickadee, and Carolina Wren. Ohio added sparrows to the list.

Gillet said the state knows of 285 confirmed dead birds from the disease, but believes the number may be north of 1,000. Kentucky’s site that monitors the situation said there has been 1,400 reports of dead or sick birds and of those 250 are believed to be connected to the unknown disease. Delaware reported at least 50 dead birds according to the Cape Gazette in Delaware. Other states and the District of Columbia have not published how many songbirds have been affected by the fatal disease.

Gillet said Indiana has determined the mysterious disease is not avian flu or West Nile virus. Kentucky has apparently crossed off more diseases. What the Kentucky state knows it isn’t includes: Salmonella and Chlamydia (bacterial pathogens); avian influenza virus, West Nile virus and other flaviviruses, Newcastle disease virus and other paramyxoviruses, herpesviruses and poxviruses; and Trichomonas parasites. All states are continuing to try to find the cause through sending samples to different labs. Kentucky names what tests are being done including: transmission electron microscopy and additional diagnostic tests, including microbiology, virology, parasitology, and toxicology are ongoing.

While there are no answers to what are killing the birds, officials want to take a page out of the pandemic game plan by asking for birds to social distance. As mentioned before all states are asking for people to bring in their feeders and bird baths. Homeowners should also wash the feeders and birdbaths in a 10 percent bleach mixture, rinse with water and allow to air dry.

Gillet said birds will not be negatively affected by the lack of bird feeders as this is the time of the year there is abundant bird food in the wild.

Indiana and some other state recommend people should discontinue using hummingbird feeders even though hummingbirds have not been negatively affected to this point. However, other states said hummingbird feeders can remain in use.

In an answer to one question, Gillet said there have not been any commercial poultry operations affected by the mysterious disease. If anyone suspects problems with commercial poultry, they should contact the Indiana Board of Animal Health (BOAH).

Also, she said there has not been any correlation found between the recent cicada emergence and the disease.

When pressed about the lack of information regarding what the disease is, Gilet reiterated it will take time for the results of the various tests to come back. She also likened the process to the proverbial search for a needle in a haystack; however, this time no one knows what the needle looks like. She said the different states are pooling resources and acting together. Also, non profits such as the Smithsonian are involved.

Cooney, who has placed many bluebird houses around the Whitewater Valley and organized volunteers to monitor bluebirds and maintain their houses, asked about the bluebirds and if his volunteers should take extra precautions. Gillet advised Cooney to have his volunteers wear disposable gloves when working around the birds. At the very least, the volunteers should wear baggies on their hands so they can turn them inside out when taking them off.

She said anyone finding a dead bird should handle it with disposable gloves and keep it away from pets. If people suspect a bird died from the disease or is suffering from the disease, they should contact https://www.in.gov/dnr/fish-and-wildlife/wildlife-resources/wildlife-diseases-in-indiana/songbird-deaths/ People can take photos and/or videos of the birds when submitting their reports. Also, they should double bag them and freeze them until someone from DNR can pick up the specimen.