One article I read (no link) said it cost $32,000 per bird.

[www.spiegel.de]

Maybe we should charge the owner and operator of the oil a cleaning fee?

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San Antonio, TX (in the old city)

"All that is required for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing."
-- Edmund Burke
"To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public." Theodore Roosevelt (1918)

Makes perfect sense. It's stupid to clean birds that have such a high probability of dying due to the cleaning process. Better to charge the oil companies $32,000 per bird put down and put that money into habitat restoration.

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"So be proud to be a decent American instead of just a w'anker whipping up fear!" - Michael D. Higgins, President of Ireland

[magblog.audubon.org]

How much does it cost to rehabilitate oiled birds?
The cost for wildlife rehabilitation will differ from spill to spill. For example the cost per bird during the "Exxon Valdez" oil spill was extremely high due to the costs per day for the many rescue vessels and the extended period of time we spent in Alaska. The modification of facilities on each spill adds to cost as well. Determining the cost per bird is difficult. It is unrealistic to take the over all cost of the rehabilitation program during a spill and divide it by the amount of birds in a spill to get the cost per bird. This is a common mistake that has been done with many oil spills that gives the impression of very high costs "per bird". You must take all the variables in each situation that effect the cost and separate them out in order to gain an actual amount per bird. There is really no average amount.

What is your survival rate?
The survival rate will differ with each oil spill because of all the factors that effect it. Some of those factors are the toxicity of the oil, how rapidly the birds are collected and stabilized, what condition the bird was in before it was oiled, and the species involved. We have had release rates as high as 100% and as low as 25% in the early years. We now average about 50% to 80%. Again, it depends on many variables and cannot be predicted.

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Chakravartin
[magblog.audubon.org]

How much does it cost to rehabilitate oiled birds?
The cost for wildlife rehabilitation will differ from spill to spill. For example the cost per bird during the "Exxon Valdez" oil spill was extremely high due to the costs per day for the many rescue vessels and the extended period of time we spent in Alaska. The modification of facilities on each spill adds to cost as well. Determining the cost per bird is difficult. It is unrealistic to take the over all cost of the rehabilitation program during a spill and divide it by the amount of birds in a spill to get the cost per bird. This is a common mistake that has been done with many oil spills that gives the impression of very high costs "per bird". You must take all the variables in each situation that effect the cost and separate them out in order to gain an actual amount per bird. There is really no average amount.

What is your survival rate?
The survival rate will differ with each oil spill because of all the factors that effect it. Some of those factors are the toxicity of the oil, how rapidly the birds are collected and stabilized, what condition the bird was in before it was oiled, and the species involved. We have had release rates as high as 100% and as low as 25% in the early years. We now average about 50% to 80%. Again, it depends on many variables and cannot be predicted.

Thanks, good link, and good comments too.

What a beautiful leak. I
On December 13th, 2010 tommy96 says:

What a beautiful leak. I love the oily mass that bulges outwards from a bent pipe. A brown Rorschach blot of the automobile culture.

My most fervent hope is that all efforts to stop and mitigate this masterwork are failures. The incontinent flow of hydrocarbons shall continue for the decay of all.

I would love to see a sea of greasy Devil’s blood flowing into the ocean forever more. The spew that flew right on through.

Then the World can move on into its next phase, the Dark Phase of death, decline and destruction. Soon, all the works of humans will decay and so too will themselves be brought to the altar of slaughter, to account for their crimes of existence.

Tommy Jamess
special Education Lecturer
RH202 | 642-446
Oxford College
642-873 | 642-504
USA

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Tommy Jamess

man, his songs were always so uplifting. I wonder what happened.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/04/2012 09:41PM by mrbigstuff.

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davester
Makes perfect sense. It's stupid to clean birds that have such a high probability of dying due to the cleaning process. Better to charge the oil companies $32,000 per bird put down and put that money into habitat restoration.

While it may be logical, it then moves the issue from the front page to the financial page. Allowing polluters to simply pay a fine is unlikely to generate regulatory legislation that might actually lead to a solution.

If all oil tankers were required to be double or even triple hulled, we'd probably not be having this discussion.

it's always been quite clear that the 'deoiling birds' is a PR thing. Makes the volunteers feel better, but the birdies die anyway. Alas.

Rg... US laws now require double hulled tankers in our waters.. since 1992. Insurance companies tend to not insure single hulled tankers any more either. However....in the third world ? Not so much.

Rules avoiding spills from offshore drilling platforms are more the issue in CA and the gulf. CA had more advanced rules after a 1972 spill. LA had rules, but stuff happens and even worse stuff happened.

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cbelt3
it's always been quite clear that the 'deoiling birds' is a PR thing. Makes the volunteers feel better, but the birdies die anyway. Alas.

Did you follow Chaka's links? The information on the Audobon site is wrong?

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"
How many of them live after they are released?
We don't know. "

However, in Deutschland (The OP was about GERMANY) the success rates are much lower. Hence they believe their time is wasted.

Q.E.D.

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cbelt3
"
How many of them live after they are released?
We don't know. "

However, in Deutschland (The OP was about GERMANY) the success rates are much lower. Hence they believe their time is wasted.

Q.E.D.

If you read the article about the German scientist, she goes as far as to state that there's no point in trying to save the birds because they'll eventually die. I'm afraid to ask what said German Scientist's preferred method of euthanization is . . . . (or to find out who's funding her, for that matter.)
In any event, there's info out there that's much more optimistic. You should follow Chaka's links.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/05/2012 02:40PM by Black.

Black-
Yup. I read Chaka's link. It was quite hopeful. And I used to belong to the Audobon Society as a teen. Lost my bird list years ago, and now I don't remember what a boid is called any more. Did see a big honkin' woodpecker the other day beating heck out of a stump. Sucker was the size of a small hawk or a large crow.

Cool.
I've seen more cardinals flitting about my house in the past two weeks than in all my life. I put up a bird house a few weeks ago but no sign of interest so far.

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