It is not likely that all the birds in the park will leave. Some may leave. And some bird species may even increase in numbers. As the park vicinity becomes more urbanized, the risk is that there will be fewer bird species that remain resulting in a loss of biodiversity.
We know that development can have adverse impacts on bird habitats. That’s why the US Fish and Wildlife Service advises: “The best way to avoid habitat impacts is to avoid placing development in or near important bird habitat.”
Therefore, we recommend the city purchase the parking area and establish a buffer zone between the park and the proposed apartment complex. Doing so may help preserve the existing natural environment and biodiversity of the park. The Denver Post has also recommended establishing such a buffer zone.
We know that the proposed project at 777 S Yarrow St will result both in habitat loss of the collective tree canopy and habitat degradation due to the immediate proximity of the construction site to the park and the ponds. An example of habitat degradation is the shedding of noise from construction activity and eventual human occupation, and ongoing apartment complex activity.
The Impact of Noise: Ben Goldfarb – High Country News
“Wild animals inhabit an aural milieu that is sensitive beyond our imagining. Human conversation occurs at around 60 decibels, and sounds that barely register to us — gentle breathing, the rustle of leaves — produce around 10 decibels. The most acute predators, meanwhile, can detect negative-20 decibels. Bats seize upon the crunch of insect feet; foxes triangulate snow-buried voles.
In 2000, Richard Forman demonstrated that meadowlarks, bobolinks and other birds gave highways a wide berth, at least two football fields, and hypothesized that traffic noise was the primary cause for avian community changes.
For animals that survive by the grace of their hearing, traffic’s “masking effect” can be fatal. Ambient road noise drowns out songbirds’ alarm calls and prevents owls from detecting rodents. A mere three-decibel increase in background noise halves the “listening area,” the space in which an animal can pick up a signal. By disturbing animals, noise also disrupts the ecological processes they catalyze, among them seed dispersal, pollination and pest control.
Songbirds survive by listening ceaselessly for the whir of falcons, the rustle of martens, and the alarm calls of their neighbors: “the chipmunk next door that sees the goshawk before you do,” as Carlisle put it.
When road noise drowns out sonic cues, birds must look for predators rather than listen for them. This “foraging-vigilance trade-off” gradually depletes them: Every moment you’re scanning for hawks is one you’re not gobbling beetles.” end quotes
If we don’t protect vulnerable bird habitats like Belmar Park in Lakewood, Colorado and the nearby collective tree canopy habitat at 777 S Yarrow Street, their bird populations are at high risk of declining and/or becoming less diverse.
“The overall abundance and biomass of birds often increase from rural to urban settings, with just a few species contributing to the majority of individuals.”
Unfortunately, having fewer bird species means declining biodiversity. And biodiversity is our best natural defense against climate change.
The following condensed from The Race to Save America’s Birds
Recovery missions for individual species can cost between $1 million a year to 10 or 20 times that.
The state and federal wildlife agencies that watch over troubled species also remain hampered by antiquated policies. Too much of the focus is on the final stages of a bird’s existence – as in the case with the grasshopper sparrow – when costs are highest, challenges are greatest and there’s little room for error.
The country’s once-impressive federal bird research firepower has gradually been abandoned, leaving much of the scientific work up to nonprofits struggling for funding. The country’s Endangered Species system, the world’s gold standard for saving species from extinction reaching its 50th anniversary, is being swamped by the rising number of species in need and funding that hasn’t kept up with that demand. It can take years, sometimes decades, for candidate species simply to get an assessment, records show.
“We’ve got to rethink conservation from soup to nuts,’’ said Pete Marra, dean of Georgetown University’s Earth Commons Institute and leader of a new initiative pushing for research aimed at species before they approach extinction. “What we’re doing is not working.’’
We’ve taken birds for granted for generations even though they play essential roles as nature’s workhorses. They spread seeds, pollinate plants, eat insects by the tons, fertilize the land and seas and, of course, provide the soundtrack of the outdoors. Today, they also play a role as living barometers of the health of the environment that we share.
“I would say we have a decade to get this right,’’ said Elizabeth Gray, chief executive officer of the National Audubon Society, one of many leaders in the field we talked to who stressed that the next 10 years will be decisive for North America’s bird populations.
