Hurricane Rita Affecting Bird Migration

[jpak]

http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/tech/2005/sep/23/092303058.html

For millennia, fall's Gulf of Mexico hurricanes have butted gale-force winds against the southbound journeys of migrating birds. Somehow, the birds have been able to sense storm paths and survive.

"This is not new to birds," Cliff Shackelford, an ornithologist with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, said Friday as Hurricane Rita began lashing the central Gulf Coast. "Birds can detect things like barometric pressure, changes in wind. ... With a storm like Rita, so big it's covering the whole ... Gulf, they're not going to take that first step."

The Texas coast acts as a funnel for birds migrating from North American summer grounds to wintering havens in Central and South America. Bird watchers from around the world come to the region for glimpses of hundreds of species of birds.

Rita's northern trek countered peak migration for hawks, and her direction earlier in the week prompted an evacuation order that canceled Corpus Christi's annual Celebration of Flight.

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