Published: February 07, 2008 09:45 am         

Few options for bird die-offs

ROSCOMMON -- It's a sobering topic for wildlife and fishery scientists and conservationists who gathered in Roscommon:

Outbreaks of Type E botulism in Lake Michigan are killing thousands of birds, and apparently there's little that can be done but monitor the deaths and collect the bodies for study.

"We're stuck with this. It hasn't gone away on Lakes Erie and Ontario. We are going to see it year after year," Thomas Cooley, a biologist at the Michigan Department of Natural Resources wildlife disease lab said Wednesday. "There is no reason to think we won't get over the hump and have it get into Lake Huron."

As many as 10,000 native and migrating birds died last year from the toxin in the near-shore areas across northern Lake Michigan, a significant spike above the couple of thousand birds that died in 2006 at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.

Wildlife and fishery experts predict the problem will spread again this year and nonprofit agencies are lining up to help with needed field work.

Affected areas jumped from just about a dozen miles at the national park in 2006 to the entire lakeshore in 2007 from the Straits of Mackinac and across the southern coast of the Upper Peninsula. Consistent procedures to count and collect carcasses are a priority for accurate data and later analysis, officials said.

"We need protocol to take to our chapters and volunteers," said Thomas Funke, director of conservation for the Michigan Audubon Society.

Several representatives from nonprofit agencies attended the botulism coordination meeting Wednesday and said they intend to recruit volunteers to help monitor bird die-offs and possibly collect carcasses. Inland Seas Education Association in Suttons Bay will organize volunteers, said Christine Diana, chief scientist at the agency.

The Tip of the Mitt Watershed Council in Petoskey already has a volunteer program to monitor beds of cladophora algae, which experts believe are linked to botulism outbreaks. Volunteers might also watch for fish and bird die-offs, said Kevin Cronk, the agency's research coordinator.

The phenomenon likely is a chain reaction from invasive species, including zebra and quagga mussels and round gobies, experts say.

Mussels filter the water, allowing more light to shine through and grow more cladophora algae, which creates conditions along the shoreline conducive for outbreaks of botulism toxins. Birds can become poisoned and die by eating infected fish and mussels, as well as scavenging carcasses and maggots on the beach.