Cities Take Aim at Roosting Crows

  • Crows are roosting in huge groups in cities all over the country. The USDA is trying to find ways to get them to go back to their natural habitat. (Photo by Paige Foster)

Flocks of crows are nothing new in most cities. In the fall and winter months, crows forage for food during the day and roost in city trees at night. The birds like cities because they’re safe and comfortable. The residents generally don’t like the crows, though. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde
reports:

Transcript

Flocks of crows are nothing new in most cities. In the fall and winter months, crows forage for food during the day and roost in city trees at night. The birds like cities because they’re safe and comfortable. The residents generally don’t like the crows, though. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde reports:


(sound of crows)


There are a lot of crows here. About 63,000 of them are in the city. The trees are thick with them. At dawn and dusk, so is the sky. Bird feces coats city sidewalks and parked cars. Amy Emedon lives in town. She’s used to the crows.


“They make a lot of noise at night, or in the morning they kind of wake you up. But other than that, they don’t really bother me that much. They’re kind of gross, because their poop’s all over the place and they’re so loud and there’s so many of them. Like sometimes you can’t even see, like, the sky. It reminds me of that movie ‘The Birds.'”


Crows have been wintering in Auburn, New York for more than 100 years. Written records from as early as 1911 describe a very large roost downtown. Auburn has the largest crow roost in the state. This winter, city officials hired the U.S. Department of Agriculture to haze the crows.


(sound of distress calls and pyrotechnics)


Hazing means the eight USDA scientists drive around town using recorded crow distress calls, pyrotechnics and laser pointers – anything that will upset the birds and drive them out. Sometimes this includes shooting the birds, but not in New York state. Richard Chipman is the New York state director of the USDA’s wildlife services project. He says the idea is to move the birds to a more “natural” habitat.


“The goal is not to just relocate these birds and cause somebody else problems. The goal is to try to relocate them to a low-impact area to improve the quality of life of folks here in the city.”


The only problem with this plan is that the crows really like being in cities. The birds are smart. They’re communal. They recognize that they’re safer downtown than out-of-town. Kevin Mcgowan is an ornithologist at Cornell University who has studied crows for 16 years. He’s heard of large crow roosts in cities across the nation, ranging from 100 birds to two million. Mcgowan says it’s usually warmer in cities. Crows like that. And they like the big trees and streetlights.


“I think the lights is a big deal. Crows are scared of things that go bump in the night because those things eat them. And that’s pretty much great horned owls, okay? Great horned owl is probably the single scariest thing to a crow, because they come in at night when crows can’t see and owls can. And owls eat a lot of crows.”


Mcgowan says crows started settling in U.S. cities in much larger numbers in the 1970s and 1980s, after a change to the Federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act.


“In – I believe it was 1972 – there was an amendment to the act that afforded crows protection for the first time. What that meant was now you couldn’t just shoot crows anytime you wanted to. You had to do it under the direction of a state hunting season, which had regulations.”


As a result, people changed their behavior. They didn’t shoot crows as much, so the crows became less scared of them and moved closer. In other words, crows have realized that cities are safer habitats than their “natural” environment. Mcgowan says he’s seen it before.


“You have a big predator that scares away the smaller predator that’s the one that really bothers you, then it behooves you to hang around the big predator. Happens all the time around people. There are lots of things that come in to be around people because they’re relatively safe there.”


Whether the USDA can break that pattern in cities like Auburn remains to be seen. Scientists have surveyed this city and harrassed the remaining crows. But they might have to return next winter to do the same thing again. And Auburn officials, like those in other crow-filled cities, might need to consider changing those things that attract crows in the first place, rather than just focusing on scaring the birds away.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Skye Rohde.

Related Links

Recent Deer Hunts Help Feed the Poor

  • Overpopulation of deer is causing problems for forest understory, farmers, and increased car/deer accidents. Some programs are encouraging hunters to take an extra deer and donating the meat to charity. (Photo by Lester Graham)

The hunting season for deer has ended or is about to end in most states. But the deer are still plentiful. Overpopulation of deer has led to an increase in deer-and-car crashes. Too many deer also damage the understory of forests. In some states, though, the deer overpopulation also means more deer meat is made available to low-income people. That’s because hunters, meat processors and food banks are working together to get venison to the poor. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde
reports:

Transcript

The hunting season for deer has ended or is about to end in most states. But the deer are
still plentiful. Overpopulation of deer has led to an increase in deer and car crashes. Too
many deer also damage the understory of forests. In some states, though, the deer
overpopulation also means more deer meat is made available to low-income people.
That’s because hunters, meat processors and food banks are working together to get
venison to the poor. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde reports:


It’s only been in the last decade or so that states have begun allowing hunters to donate
wild game to charitable organizations. In New York, meat processors and hunters started
the Venison Donation Coalition in 1998. Starting out, they gave a thousand pounds of
deer meat to food pantries in two counties.


Kathy Balbierer handles the coalition’s public relations. She says since that first thousand
pound donation, the program has grown…


“Last year, we had 108,000 pounds of venison donated, which on the average is, you
know – a deer is 40 pounds. It was approximately 27,000 deer. This year we have 119
participating processors throughout the state serving 52 counties.”


It’s an idea that hunters and meat processors across the nation are embracing. There are
venison donation programs in almost every state. Some, such as those in New York and
Illinois, are administered by state government. Others, like Michigan’s and Minnesota’s,
are run by private organizations.


Here’s how it works. First, a hunter who wants to donate meat takes it to a participating
processor. Ed Tanguey operates a meat processing facility in Kirkville, New York. He
says it’s a pretty simple process.


“Once the hunters show up to the building, we’ll have them come into our skinning room.
We’ll have them fill out some paperwork and once it’s brought in, we’ll start to skin the
deer, remove the hide and trim off any meat that’s not edible. We’ll bring the deer into
our cutting room.”


Butchers section the deer into shoulder, torso and hindquarters.


(sound of grinder starting up)


Then Tanguey sets up the grinder and grabs the meat from the cooler.


He packs the ground meat into five-pound black-and-white tubes and slaps a label on
with his name and the hunter’s license number on it.


Tanguey has processed 250 deer so far this season, 44 of them for the Venison Donation
Coalition. The coalition pays him a reduced rate, about a dollar a pound. Once there’s
enough meat in Tanguey’s cooler, he calls the Food Bank of Central New York to pick it
up.


Tanguey says this is his way of giving back to his community.


“When I see a hunter bringing in his son or grandson and they’re giving a second deer or
a third deer to the food bank, I think it’s going to pass it on to them. And years from now
we’ll keep the coalition supplied with some more food for the food bank.”


Jim Giacando is operations manager at the Food Bank of Central New York. He says
200 of the 600 agencies he works with ask for venison.


“In our freezer, we have almost 1,000 lbs ready to distribute, and it’s already committed
to a number of agencies throughout our 11-county area. And we’ll be distributing it this
week and next week, and then hopefully we’ll receive more in and fill more orders.”


The food bank will receive venison up until January. But Giacando says the greatest
challenge is keeping up with the demand for deer meat. A lot of people want it.


“I think we actually may have to get to a point where we might have to say ‘you know,
you can’t order that much. We have to keep it for all the other programs.'”


(ambient sound in church)


One of the food pantries asking for the deer meat is the University United Methodist
Church in Syracuse, New York. Norma Goel ordered venison from Giacando’s food
bank. The church’s food pantry feeds about 150 people every week.


Goel says she can’t buy as much food for the pantry as she’d like to because of the
church’s limited budget and an increase in the number of poor people asking for food.
She says farm-raised meat is a high-priced commodity…


“We’re always looking for a way to provide meat to participants in the pantry. And it’s
become increasingly difficult to buy frozen meat that the food bank has. By and large,
we’re not purchasing frozen meat from the food bank because we can’t afford it.”


So the deer meat is a cheaper alternative. Last year, Goel ordered venison too late to
receive any. This year she got all she could for the pantry: 60 pounds. She only has to
pay the handling costs – the coalition covers processing.


Goel says she’ll encourage people to use the deer meat in place of ground beef because
it’s high in protein and low in fat. She says the 60 pounds will feed a lot of hungry people
in her community.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Skye Rohde.

Related Links

AIR CLEANERS EFFECTIVE AT REMOVING VOCs?

Home air cleaners are good at getting rid of dust and dander, and some manufacturers claim they remove harmful gasses too. Now researchers are taking a closer look at that claim. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde reports:

Transcript

Home air cleaners are good at getting rid of dust and dander from the air, and some
manufacturers claim they remove harmful gasses too. Now researchers are taking a
closer look at that claim. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde reports:


Researchers at Syracuse University evaluated 15 different types of air-cleaning units in
their two-year-long study. They tested the units’ ability to remove 16 types of volatile
organic compounds, or VOCs. VOCs are chemicals that can cause eye and skin
irritation, and others are considered carcinogens.


The researchers found that none of the air-cleaning units removed all the VOCs they
tested. Jianshun Zhang was the lead researcher on the project. He says VOCs are
everywhere:


“Building materials, household products such as cleaning agents, wax, printers, copiers
and computers… there are many sources of volatile organic compounds.”


Zhang is calling for an established procedure to evaluate air cleaners’ effectiveness. He
says that until air-cleaning units improve, the best way to get rid of VOCs is to open
windows and use fans in your home.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Skye Rohde.

New Life for Old Running Shoes

Runners often wonder what to do with their shoes once the treads have worn too low to give enough foot support. People who have donated old shoes to charities or thrown them away have a new option now… a “sneaker recycling program.” As part of an ongoing series called “Your Choice; Your Planet,” the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde reports:

Transcript

Runners often wonder what to do with their shoes once the treads have worn too low to
give enough foot support. People who have donated old shoes to charities or thrown
them away have a new option now… a “sneaker recycling program.” As part of an
ongoing series called, “Your Choice; Your Planet,” the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Skye Rohde reports:


David Lupinski wants old running shoes, no matter how smelly they are. They just need
to be clean.


Lupinski is the recycling director at the Oneida-Herkimer Solid Waste Management
authority in Utica, in upstate New York. He’s collecting used athletic shoes as part of the
Nike Reuse-A-Shoe program.


Now, this got my attention. I’ve been running for 11 years. I’m a one-pair-a-year girl.
I’ve sent way too many worn-out shoes to the Salvation Army… just because I didn’t
know what else to do with them. I wanted to find out what this is all about.


Nike picks up the shoes from participants like Lupinski and sends them to a facility in
Oregon where they’re ground up. David Lupinski explains it best.


“The upper area, that’s material that is more cloth and things like that. And that’s what
they make into padding for carpeting. The middle sole has a little bit more plastic, a little
bit more rubber in it. They grind that up and they make it into a material that they use for
things like tennis courts, basketball courts. The bottom of the sneaker or athletic shoe is
pretty much all rubber. They grind that up and they actually make a product that they call
“Nike grind.” And that material is what they use for tracks. It’s nice and soft and
pliable.”


The shoe program is a good fit for Utica. That’s because of the city’s ties to running. The
National Distance Running Hall of Fame is located here, and the country’s biggest 15-
kilometer road race – the Boilermaker – is held here every July.


But Utica is not alone. There are 33 organizations from 20 states participating in Reuse-
A-Shoe. Each of them is expected to collect at least 5,000 pairs of shoes this year.


This all started in 1993, when a couple of Nike employees asked if there was anything
they could do with defective shoes instead of throwing them out.


Nike joined up with the National Recycling Coalition in 2002 to expand the program to
all 50 states. Kate Krebs is Executive Director of the coalition.


“I liked it for a number of reasons. It was a company that was taking back their product
at its end of life and turning it into something that was really productive and really cool.”


Krebs has helped almost 60 organizations try to team up with Nike, and there’s already a
waiting list to participate. She says the participants are creative about collecting shoes
too.


“We just had a girl scout troop in Los Angeles on Earth Day collect more than 5,000
pairs of shoes in one day. Some zoos have set it up. Some marathons have set up
collection. Junior high/high school track programs are collecting. So everyone’s doing it
a little different… and that’s the part that’s so magic about it.”


Back in Utica, Dorothy Cornell is dropping off a few pairs of shoes at the National
Distance Running Hall of Fame.


“I just put in three sneakers that I found in my basement that are no good to me or my
family. And they’re doing a recycling here, so we’re bringing them down here. It’s, you
know, a great idea. I wish more people would, you know, be aware of it.”


(ambient sound)


A little later, the Solid Waste Management Authority’s David Lupinski peers inside the
donation box at the Hall of Fame.


(rustling sound… “Geez, this is a bag of athletic shoes…”)


He finds six pairs of shoes, including two fluorescent orange track shoes that are almost
brand new. He says he picks up about 40 pairs of shoes a week from this box. There are
seven other donation boxes around the area.


Lupinski has almost 800 pairs of shoes now, but he still has a long way to go before he
gets his 5,000 pairs and Nike sends a truck to pick them up. People have called him from
across upstate New York to see how they can get their old shoes to him.


Reuse-A-Shoe participants are all hoping for lots of shoes. But they also want to spread
the word and get people as excited as they are about giving old shoes new life.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Skye Rohde.

Related Links

Historic Lighthouse Lives On

  • The Selkirk Lighthouse circa 1860-1870. (Photo courtesy of Jim Walker)

Lighthouses often hold a special place in people’s hearts. They’re viewed as symbols of America’s maritime history. The beacons guiding sailors back to safe harbor are metaphors for guiding lights in our lives too. That might be why the idea of spending a little time living in one of the historic structures is so appealing to many people. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde talked with the owners of a lighthouse that’s now operated as a place to vacation:

Transcript

Lighthouses often hold a special place in people’s hearts. They’re viewed as symbols of
America’s maritime history. The beacons guiding sailors back to safe harbor are metaphors for
guiding lights in our lives too. That might be why the idea of spending a little time living in one
of the historic structures is so appealing to many people. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Skye Rohde talked with the owners of a lighthouse that’s now operated as a place to vacation:


The Selkirk lighthouse sits at the mouth of the Salmon River on Lake Ontario. It’s scenic,
although the area is not very well known – except to salmon fishers. But some people, once they
visit find they keep coming back. Jim walker was one of those people.


“I didn’t move to Pulaski to buy the lighthouse at all. I was living and working quite comfortably
with a family in a lovely location in Maine and came out here on a fishing trip. A friend of mine
got ahold of me and said, ‘We have to go to a place called Pulaski, New York.’ I said, ‘Pulaski,
New York. Now what’s a good reason for going there?'”


Walker came to Pulaski on Veteran’s Day weekend in 1986 with 10 friends. But when the time
came for them to leave, half the group didn’t want to go.


“They were just having such a great time. We were fishing in the snow in the river, catching
steelhead, having a ball. And none of us had had the chance to experience anything like this
before.”


A couple of the men started talking about investing in the area’s hospitality industry. They
looked at some properties over the winter, and when the Selkirk lighthouse came up for sale in
1987, walker made an offer.


Sixteen years later, walker has turned the old lighthouse into short-term rental housing. It’s
become a popular stop with a 98-percent occupancy rate and visitors from over 100 countries.


Since then the lighthouse has operated as a lifesaving station, private residence, resort and
“designated historic landmark.” In 1989, the coast guard reactivated the Selkirk lighthouse
lantern.


The lighthouse itself is a 3-story rectangular stone building with an octagonal glass lantern house
on top. Wayne Wheeler is President of the San Francisco-based U.S. lighthouse society.
Wheeler says the Selkirk lighthouse is one of a dying breed.


“It’s a unique structure in that it has the old-style lantern on the tower. There are only three or
four of those remaining in the country.”


Only 20 of the 600 lighthouses across the nation offer some kind of lodging, either in the actual
working lighthouse or in keepers’ quarters nearby.


Richard Moehl is President of the Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association, which
encourages lighthouse preservation and restoration on the Great Lakes. Moehl says people
appreciate the uniqueness of spending the night in a lighthouse.


“People just love to be able to say ‘I did this, and at a historic lighthouse,’ versus a walk-through,
one-time light station. You have an opportunity to work there and live there, eat there, cook
there.”


And people will pay for the chance to do just that.


Nicole Paternaster is Manager of the Selkirk lighthouse and has worked there off and on for 15
years. Walking in through the kitchen door, she points out the building’s attributes.


Bathroom, stand-up shower and the kitchen area are mainly what make up the addition part of the
lighthouse. And here’s the stone wall that I just absolutely love. And all the amenities of home
away from home… (fades under)


It’s homey and relaxed. The floorboards in the first-floor bedroom are original. Paternaster and
walker are working to replace the windows with original-style ones, whenever the lighthouse isn’t
occupied.


The staircase to the third floor is blocked off right now, since a couple of stairs up to the
lighthouse are too rickety to use. But you can get to the top. Nicole Paternaster led me, creeping
past the roof rafters and around the spiral staircase, through a wooden portal and then up a metal
ladder leaned against the wall. At the top we popped up in the lantern room itself.


“You can see the river, you can see the lake, you can see what’s called Deer Creek Marsh. But it
is absolutely gorgeous. And of course, today it’s a windy day, so you can see all the waves
breaking out there. I just love it.”


The guests love it too. New Jersey resident Len Levonaitis and his family have fished in the area
for 15 years.


“When I go on vacation, I don’t want to be in the midst of the craziness, you know, downtown
Pulaski, where the salmon fishing is hot and heavy and there are hundreds of guys there. It’s nice
to be able to go out and find a place like the lighthouse. What’s nice about it is that it’s right
there, you know, on the lake. You can see the fish coming in.”


Like Levonaitis, many guests find themselves visiting again. Some have already booked their
stays for 2004 and even 2005.


Jim Walker says owning the lighthouse has been a valuable experience, but after 16 years he’s
ready to pass the torch on to somebody else and focus on other business.


“I’ve reached the hard conclusion of trying to recruit a replacement. No, that’s not just put a
piece of property on the market for sale, but it’s to recruit someone who basically has a younger
body, a lot of motivation and similar ideals to try to pick up and carry the ball from here.”


Walker has advertised the property in different lighthouse publications. It’s listed at one-and-a-
quarter million dollars. So far, there have been a few inquiries.


“It’s a very, very unusual place, one of the last of its kind. That’s, that’s the type of thing we
need to polish up and pass along to the best of our ability.”


Walker says he’s sure the right person will emerge to keep the light shining and the door open to
future guests at the Selkirk lighthouse.


For the great lakes radio consortium, I’m Skye Rohde.

Related Links

Alpaca Farming Becoming Next Livestock Trend

  • Sienna Sue, an alpaca on A.L. Paca Farms. Photo by Doug Caldwell.

There’s an up-and-coming livestock trend in the region. Alpacas are common in the high plains of Peru, Chile and Bolivia, where people have used their fleece for clothes and their dung as fuel for centuries. They haven’t even been in the U.S. 20 years, but their low environmental impact, cold weather tolerance and high-priced fleece make them an increasingly popular choice for farmers. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde reports:

Transcript

There’s an up-and-coming livestock trend in the Great Lakes region.
Alpacas are
common in the high plains of Peru, Chile and Bolivia, where people have
used their
fleece for clothes and their dung as fuel for centuries. They haven’t
even been in the U.S.
20 years, but their low environmental impact, cold weather tolerance
and high-priced
fleece make them an increasingly popular choice for farmers. The Great
Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Skye Rohde reports:


(ambient sound of barn)


Alpacas stand about five feet from head-to-toe. Fluffier and smaller
than their llama
cousins, they have long thin necks, big eyes and four bottom teeth.
Pack animals with
their own pecking orders, they communicate by humming.


(sound of alpacas humming)


Bob and Ellen Chamberlain have eight animals at River Bend Alpacas,
their farm in
Croghan, New York. They’ve done a lot of research into alpacas, but
it’s a side business
for them right now. He teaches physics at the local school and she
substitute teaches, in
addition to raising three kids.


Ellen Chamberlain coos at Jambalaya, one of the three original alpacas,
who took a year
to warm up to her.


“Just gorgeous…”


She scratches Cyrus’ neck as he leans into her shoulder. She kisses
Valentine, whose cria
– or baby alpaca – should be born any day.


“People say they have bad breath, but I don’t think so.”


Skye Rohde, to Bob Chamberlain: “Do you agree?”


Bob Chamberlain, laughing, “Bad breath.”


Ellen Chamberlain: “Oh, Cyrus, you’ve got a bug bite on your eye
though.”


Breeders and owners love alpacas’ curiosity and easygoing
personalities. They say it
doesn’t cost much more to care for an alpaca than a dog. An acre of
land can easily
support seven to 10 of them, and alpacas’ hooves are padded, so they
don’t dig up the
ground as much as other livestock.


Marilyn Otteson is a veterinarian who treats alpacas in Auburn, New
York.


“They’re easy to take care of. They don’t require a lot of special
things in the way of
feed, for instance. And right now, this time of year, a lot of them
are out on pasture.
They get supplemented with a small amount of grain. They’re also very
neat animals. As
a group, they usually choose one or two spots in the barn or outside to
use as their dung
pile, they call it. You worm them periodically. You trim their nails
and watch their
teeth, and that’s about it.”


There are around 45,000 alpacas in the U.S. right now. Ohio has more
alpaca farms than
any other state, and there are more than 800 farms in the Great Lakes
region.


Right now, alpaca owners make most of their money selling animals to
other owners and
breeders. A pregnant female sells for around $15,000. A stud male
goes for between $15
and $30,000.


Alpacas are shorn every spring. Their fleece – said to be warmer than
wool and as soft as
cashmere – sells for 3 to 5 dollars per ounce. Some owners sell it to
the Alpaca Fiber
Cooperative of North America. Others spin it into yarn themselves to
knit hats and
gloves.


Skeptics say alpaca farming is still a bit of a risky proposition
because it’s so new. They
worry that fleece prices may fall if production exceeds demand. They
say with three
million alpacas worldwide, the U.S. can’t compete with South American
countries in a
limited market.


Duncan Hilchey, of Cornell University’s Department of Rural Sociology,
says potential
buyers must keep tabs on the market for alternative livestock products
before jumping
into the business.


“It’s possible to get those prices. But in a very narrow market, you
know, if it’s a niche,
suddenly you get a lot of people producing the product and the value
goes down –
dramatically – and it’s not profitable at all.”


This isn’t the first time exotic livestock have become popular, but in
the past they’ve
fizzled. Hilchey says the ostrich and emu fads failed because owners
didn’t promote the
animals’ meat, feathers and oil enough to shift from a breeders’ market
to a viable
commercial market.


Alpaca owners say the industry is still growing, since alpacas have
only been in the U.S.
since 1984. They like the relaxing lifestyle and collaboration that
come with raising
alpacas.


But Ellen Chamberlain says the learning curve has been sort of steep.


“It was just a real learning experience for me. Because I had had dogs
and cats and that
sort of thing, but never any major kind of livestock before, and
certainly had never filled
a syringe, let alone given a shot to anybody. Maybe my dad once with
his insulin, but
besides that… so that was all really new.”


And the Chamberlains say they’ve had a little “bad luck” – although
they’ve been hoping
for females, five of the six crias born to their alpacas have been
males. They say they
don’t want more than 20 animals – the most their pastures can hold.
Only now are they
ready to sell their alpacas.


Sorting fleeces in her barn, Ellen Chamberlain says even with the risk,
she’s excited about
raising alpacas.


“I think everybody knows that the future success of this whole thing is
in learning and
growing and that. And the more people you get involved in it with, and
work together,
the stronger it’s going to be.”


The next big challenge for the Chamberlains might be shearing the
alpacas themselves
next spring, something Ellen has a little experience doing. But first
they’ll focus on
taking care of their three new crias.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Skye Rohde.

Related Links