TRAVERSE CITY -- Local researchers and state wildlife officials are making plans for what's expected to be a third consecutive year with scores of dead birds on area beaches.
Various state agencies and Michigan Sea Grant now have guidelines for beach-walkers who likely will find bird carcasses this summer and autumn, evidence of anticipated botulism poisoning in Lake Michigan. The prediction follows two years of mass bird die-offs -- about 3,600 in 2006 and 7,500 last year -- in the northwest Lower Peninsula and along the southern coast of the Upper Peninsula.
Affected species include cormorants, grebes, gulls, loons, mergansers, terns, ducks and piping plovers.
State officials want to test two specimens of each species per county to confirm a recurrence of Type E botulism this year. Dead birds subsequently found should be disposed of, said Tom Cooley, wildlife biologist with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.
Guidelines for the removal of dead birds from the beach include using rubber gloves or garbage bags and either sending the carcasses to a landfill or burying them two feet deep. Pets should not be allowed near dead birds to prevent ingestion of the botulism toxin, Cooley said.
Some local researchers want more data collected about the dead birds before the carcasses are removed or buried.
"You can lose a lot of valuable information that way," said Peg Comfort, coordinator of the Grand Traverse Bay botulism network.
The multi-agency group intends to monitor area beaches this summer and autumn and keep a hotline number for reports of dead birds. Volunteers will make site visits, determine the age of any dead loons and check for banded birds, Comfort said.
"Don't jump the gun and bury them until it's reported and recorded," she said.
Workshops will be held around the region in June or July to train shoreline property owners and volunteers how to record the desired data on what amounts to about 45 miles of shoreline in Leelanau, Grand Traverse and Antrim counties, Comfort said.
Anyone who finds dead birds is encouraged to call the hotline at the Watershed Center Grand Traverse Bay in Traverse City at (231) 935-1514.
Experts believe the bird deaths are a chain reaction from invasive species, including zebra and quagga mussels and round gobies.Mussels filter the water, allowing more light to grow more cladophora algae, which increases chances for botulism outbreaks. Birds can be poisoned and die by eating infected fish and mussels, also by scavenging carcasses and maggots on the beach.
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