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> To better document this fowl play, Taylor Barnes, a biologist at EDM International, an engineering consultancy firm in Colorado, collected data on wildfires a

> To better document this fowl play, Taylor Barnes, a biologist at EDM International, an engineering consultancy firm in Colorado, collected data on wildfires across the United States. He and his colleagues used Google Alerts to monitor fires started by birds between 2014 and 2018, using keyword pairs: “fire” and “eagle,” for example. So their "research" consisted of casual Googling? They didn't even cross-check any Fire Service, insurance, or other sources about the causes of wildfires? > says Antoni Margalida, a conservation biologist at the Pyrenean Institute of Ecology who has studied the impacts of wildfires caused by birds and other fauna in Spain but who was not involved with the work. and then they quote a guy who "has studied" it in Spain but wasn't involved with this. Then they quote two other studies from four years ago. What was Sabine Hossenfelder saying just the other day about science journalism and why it's so bad?

dredmorbius 4y ago
In the paragraph immediately following the one you quote: The scientists then discounted any speculative reports, only keeping those with evidence of a bird as the cause. These could include a photograph of a burned bird carcass at the fire’s ignition site, or a statement made by an expert, such as a firefighter, detailing the presumed cause of the fire. Finally, they checked to see whether any particular environment was especially susceptible to these fires. From TFA.
- UIUC_06 4y ago
  Your point is, they were careful to winnow down the data? Yes, but they started with a faulty data collection method, so if anything, they were probably understating the problem. Also not comparing their results to those from other methods of fire investigation, which surely are also being practiced. Kind of like looking for your lost keys under the street lamp, because the light is better there.
  - openknot 4y ago
    >"they were probably understating the problem" The authors' claim wasn't to give a comprehensive figure of the number of electrocuted birds that caused wildfires, in a specific region over a specific time. Instead, their goal was to establish that electrocuted birds is a significant reason for wildfires, rather than very rare events. This is useful because, even without a comprehensive figure, the article still provides convincing evidence for companies that may consider upgrading systems to prevent bird electrocution. For example, from the article: "Electric utility companies can insulate wires and install spikes to discourage perching; they could also build structures that allow for safer perching on transformers."
    - dredmorbius 4y ago
      Exactly.
    - pvaldes 4y ago
      To a bird being able to start a fire, there must be a minimum of flammable material under the lines (typically placed in a firebreak or a road). Firebreaks are maintained and often de-soiled until bare rock or mineral soil, and asphalt is not flammable by default. Thus, even if eagles can be a problem, there must be more factors involved here. Are we neglecting the firebreaks? It feels (again) like hunting for excuses to blame nature. Local politicians said just today, to the furious people complaining for the low number of firefighters movilised in Zamora, that "nature is the problem". This is not an acceptable answer anymore, specially not by the same people saying publicly a few days ago that "environmental laws are unfair and we refuse to obey them". And a few days later a wildfire eats a beautiful area with a large reservoir of water in the middle, a fair amount of wild herbivores eating flammable material, oak forests, and that has not burned in decades. Now the problem of culling wolves to appease greedy tools is solved. By fire. God answered our prayers. How lucky we are. Politicians wave the racing flag of "environmental laws are a joke and now all is allowed" and wildfires answer the call. Every-single-time. Burning millions of euro. Curious. Really curious.
      - dredmorbius 4y ago
        "Blaming nature" isn't my read of this. It's simply tracing a source of ignition events. We already know that much of the Western US is an absolute tinder-box. Absolutely massive historic blazes have been initiated by mowing grass, by catalytic converters on automobiles, by vehicles suffering blowouts and sparks thrown off by the rim, by broken glass. And by many, many lightning strikes. We're also aware that other power-line related issues have sparked massive wildfires. That birds are also a concern gives clarity on the problem. This may mean that further monitoring (detecting surge transients and launching rapid fire response or powerline management), or redesigning or retrofiting transmission equipment to reduce risks, is to be considered. Science moves in very small increments. This increments is "yes, birds do spark some fires". NB: brush clearing at the scale of remote powerline equipment is all but certainly not viable. Utilities are barely able to keep up with lesser operations such as tree-trimming near lines, and even that with equipment that looks like it came from Dr. Evil's laboratory: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=Pla06PO6Odk https://yewtu.be/watch?v=Pla06PO6Odk
openknot 4y ago
There is nothing wrong at all with the segments of the article you quoted. The main premise presented in the article is that electrocuted birds are a plausible cause of wildfires, in addition to human activity (the article specifically reports that human activity is the primary cause of wildfires). The authors' methodology to find online reports was valid. They used alerts to collect online published reports of electrocuted birds, and then manually checked each report to discard any that were speculative or lacked hard evidence. After this, the authors found 44 reports of electrocuted birds causing wildfires. At most, your strongest critique is that the methods could have been more comprehensive to find additional reports. That is technically correct, but it doesn't invalidate the main premise that wildfires caused by birds do happen, and are not one-off phenomena (via the 44 reports from the described method). >"and then they quote a guy who "has studied" it in Spain but wasn't involved with this." It is responsible and encouraged behavior to quote someone who wasn't involved with the study. This avoids bias where the only interviewed people are affiliated with the study, and are more likely to talk it up. Interviewing uninvolved experts in the field opens the door to possible critiques. >"Then they quote two other studies from four years ago." Four years isn't inherently long ago enough to be irrelevant. This is especially true when the premise is that electrocuted birds have been a significant cause of wildfires, not just one-off occurrences.
- UIUC_06 4y ago
  Oh, come off it. This might be respectable as a high school science project. "What percentage of forest fires were caused by birds?" would be one question I'd expect to see answered. Their reports were from five years ago and covered a four-year period. They did some half-hearted Google searching, and ignored, say, [1] and [2], from agencies with a vested interest in investigating the causes of fires, or the Audobon Society [3], which of course is interested in birds and transmission lines. [1] https://www.fs.usda.gov/search?k=fires https://www.fs.usda.gov/search?k=fires [2] https://www.pge.com/en_US/search/search-results.page?%26query%3Dfires%26usearch%3Dtrue%26pageType%3Dsearch%26exactMatchFlag%3Dfalse%26webPagesFlag%3Dfalse https://www.pge.com/en_US/search/search-results.page?%26quer... [3] https://www.audubon.org/news/transmission-lines-and-birds https://www.audubon.org/news/transmission-lines-and-birds

dredmorbius 4y ago

In the paragraph immediately following the one you quote: The scientists then discounted any speculative reports, only keeping those with evidence of a bird as the cause. These could include a photograph of a burned bird carcass at the fire’s ignition site, or a statement made by an expert, such as a firefighter, detailing the presumed cause of the fire. Finally, they checked to see whether any particular environment was especially susceptible to these fires. From TFA.

UIUC_06 4y ago
Your point is, they were careful to winnow down the data? Yes, but they started with a faulty data collection method, so if anything, they were probably understating the problem. Also not comparing their results to those from other methods of fire investigation, which surely are also being practiced. Kind of like looking for your lost keys under the street lamp, because the light is better there.
- openknot 4y ago
  >"they were probably understating the problem" The authors' claim wasn't to give a comprehensive figure of the number of electrocuted birds that caused wildfires, in a specific region over a specific time. Instead, their goal was to establish that electrocuted birds is a significant reason for wildfires, rather than very rare events. This is useful because, even without a comprehensive figure, the article still provides convincing evidence for companies that may consider upgrading systems to prevent bird electrocution. For example, from the article: "Electric utility companies can insulate wires and install spikes to discourage perching; they could also build structures that allow for safer perching on transformers."
  - dredmorbius 4y ago
    Exactly.
  - pvaldes 4y ago
    To a bird being able to start a fire, there must be a minimum of flammable material under the lines (typically placed in a firebreak or a road). Firebreaks are maintained and often de-soiled until bare rock or mineral soil, and asphalt is not flammable by default. Thus, even if eagles can be a problem, there must be more factors involved here. Are we neglecting the firebreaks? It feels (again) like hunting for excuses to blame nature. Local politicians said just today, to the furious people complaining for the low number of firefighters movilised in Zamora, that "nature is the problem". This is not an acceptable answer anymore, specially not by the same people saying publicly a few days ago that "environmental laws are unfair and we refuse to obey them". And a few days later a wildfire eats a beautiful area with a large reservoir of water in the middle, a fair amount of wild herbivores eating flammable material, oak forests, and that has not burned in decades. Now the problem of culling wolves to appease greedy tools is solved. By fire. God answered our prayers. How lucky we are. Politicians wave the racing flag of "environmental laws are a joke and now all is allowed" and wildfires answer the call. Every-single-time. Burning millions of euro. Curious. Really curious.
    - dredmorbius 4y ago
      "Blaming nature" isn't my read of this. It's simply tracing a source of ignition events. We already know that much of the Western US is an absolute tinder-box. Absolutely massive historic blazes have been initiated by mowing grass, by catalytic converters on automobiles, by vehicles suffering blowouts and sparks thrown off by the rim, by broken glass. And by many, many lightning strikes. We're also aware that other power-line related issues have sparked massive wildfires. That birds are also a concern gives clarity on the problem. This may mean that further monitoring (detecting surge transients and launching rapid fire response or powerline management), or redesigning or retrofiting transmission equipment to reduce risks, is to be considered. Science moves in very small increments. This increments is "yes, birds do spark some fires". NB: brush clearing at the scale of remote powerline equipment is all but certainly not viable. Utilities are barely able to keep up with lesser operations such as tree-trimming near lines, and even that with equipment that looks like it came from Dr. Evil's laboratory: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=Pla06PO6Odk https://yewtu.be/watch?v=Pla06PO6Odk

openknot 4y ago

There is nothing wrong at all with the segments of the article you quoted. The main premise presented in the article is that electrocuted birds are a plausible cause of wildfires, in addition to human activity (the article specifically reports that human activity is the primary cause of wildfires). The authors' methodology to find online reports was valid. They used alerts to collect online published reports of electrocuted birds, and then manually checked each report to discard any that were speculative or lacked hard evidence. After this, the authors found 44 reports of electrocuted birds causing wildfires. At most, your strongest critique is that the methods could have been more comprehensive to find additional reports. That is technically correct, but it doesn't invalidate the main premise that wildfires caused by birds do happen, and are not one-off phenomena (via the 44 reports from the described method). >"and then they quote a guy who "has studied" it in Spain but wasn't involved with this." It is responsible and encouraged behavior to quote someone who wasn't involved with the study. This avoids bias where the only interviewed people are affiliated with the study, and are more likely to talk it up. Interviewing uninvolved experts in the field opens the door to possible critiques. >"Then they quote two other studies from four years ago." Four years isn't inherently long ago enough to be irrelevant. This is especially true when the premise is that electrocuted birds have been a significant cause of wildfires, not just one-off occurrences.

UIUC_06 4y ago
Oh, come off it. This might be respectable as a high school science project. "What percentage of forest fires were caused by birds?" would be one question I'd expect to see answered. Their reports were from five years ago and covered a four-year period. They did some half-hearted Google searching, and ignored, say, [1] and [2], from agencies with a vested interest in investigating the causes of fires, or the Audobon Society [3], which of course is interested in birds and transmission lines. [1] https://www.fs.usda.gov/search?k=fires https://www.fs.usda.gov/search?k=fires [2] https://www.pge.com/en_US/search/search-results.page?%26query%3Dfires%26usearch%3Dtrue%26pageType%3Dsearch%26exactMatchFlag%3Dfalse%26webPagesFlag%3Dfalse https://www.pge.com/en_US/search/search-results.page?%26quer... [3] https://www.audubon.org/news/transmission-lines-and-birds https://www.audubon.org/news/transmission-lines-and-birds