On October 3, the Society for the Protection and Study of Birds of Serbia (DZPPS) organized a meeting “Presentation of implemented measures for the protection of birds on the Danube migration corridor” on the bank of the Danube in the Belgrade restaurant Amfora as part of the LIFE Danube free sky project. On that occasion, the results of a three-year study of birds suffering from electrocution and collisions with power lines along the Danube in Serbia were presented, where 1,194 dead birds were recorded. In order to stop further suffering, in cooperation with Electric distribution of Serbia 40 km of transmission lines were protected with diverters (flight diverters), and 576 poles were isolated.
Electric poles, wires and facilities for voltage transformation have long since become part of the natural habitat that birds they use it for resting, observing prey during hunting or nesting. These structures pose a serious threat to birds: electrocution (electric shock) and collision (collision with power lines) claim tens of millions of lives worldwide every year.
That is why the “LIFE Danube Free Sky” project was launched in 2020, co-financed by the LIFE program of the European Union in which 15 partners from seven Danube countries (Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria and Serbia) participate with the aim of investigating and preventing the suffering of birds from electrocution and collision along Danube which many birds use as a migratory corridor during migration. In Serbia, the project is being implemented by the Society for the Protection and Study of Birds of Serbia and Elektrodistribucija Srbije within 9 Internationally Important Bird Areas located in the area of the Danube.
In the first phase of the project, it was necessary to determine which routes and poles are the most dangerous: with the help of 22 external collaborators, 484 km of medium-voltage transmission lines and 6,094 medium-voltage poles were visited. During the next 15 months, those routes were visited, the flights of birds were observed, i.e. the ways in which birds interact with power lines, information was collected on the types of poles and consoles in order to develop ways of later protection, and all the time data on the suffering of birds was collected.
“During the fieldwork, a total of 1,194 dead individuals of 57 different bird species were found. Birds from the crow family suffer the most: magpies, gray crows, jays, ravens, followed by buzzards, kestrels, starlings, swans… The causes of suffering in most cases were beyond doubt. If the bird has burns on its legs, beak, head or feathers, it is electrocution, and if a broken neck or wing and blood from the beak are observed, it is a collision,” explains Mirjana Rankov, ornithologist of the Society for the Protection and Study of Birds of Serbia.
After the most deadly sections were established, Elektrodistribucija Srbije installed 3,340 diverters on 40 km of transmission lines. These diverters have the function of flight diverters, they move and reflect light during the day and light up in the dark, thus signaling to the birds that there is an obstacle in the flight direction so that they can divert their flight in time. In addition, 1,454 insulating caps have been placed on 576 of the most dangerous poles, which will allow the birds to land safely, without the possibility of making a short circuit with their bodies and suffering from an electric shock.
In addition to working to prevent suffering, the project implemented certain active protection measures. 101 nesting boxes were placed along the Danube blue crowone of the most beautiful birds in Serbia. This species numbered only about 15 pairs in the north of Vojvodina at the beginning of the 21st century, when the installation of numerous nesting boxes began, which blue crows accept due to the lack of natural hollows in trees. The majority of the blue crow population, which is now estimated at 500 breeding pairs, finds its home precisely in the aforementioned boxes.
“In the first year, blue crows occupied 6 boxes, in the second as many as 15. So far, we have marked a total of 49 blue crow chicks that hatched in these boxes. But they are also occupied by other species: field sparrows, budgies, starlings, cuckoos…” Mirjana points out.
As part of the project, satellite transmitters were installed on two young individuals of the Steppe a falcon whose number in Serbia is estimated at only 22 to 32 breeding pairs. These falcons live almost exclusively in Vojvodina, where they nest on the poles of high-voltage transmission lines in metal boxes installed for this purpose. With the help of data obtained through satellite transmitters, ornithologists will be able to learn more about the lifestyle and ecological needs of this extremely endangered predator.
Source: Society for the Protection and Study of Birds of Serbia
Source: energetskiportal.rs
