Itâs the leading cause of death for all birds of prey in Europe too. Partly because hunters leave killed animals or their guts lying around, where the birds find them. Itâs not just vultures who eat already dead prey. But birds who only eat freshly killed prey (live falcons) are dying at the same rates. Why? Because their prey often has lead embedded in their bodies. They mistakenly eat it too, but also one in three living ducks and geese in Europe has been shot before and has lead permanently embedded inside their body.
Littering đŻ
Submitted â¨â¨9⊠â¨hours⊠ago⊠by â¨fossilesque@mander.xyz⊠to â¨science_memes@mander.xyzâŠ
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Comments
woodenghost@hexbear.net â¨4⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Formfiller@lemmy.world â¨7⊠â¨hours⊠ago
You can use steel shot
SillyDude@lemmy.zip â¨4⊠â¨hours⊠ago
The US banned lead birdshot in 1991. Are they eating squirrels?
NoDignity@lemmy.world â¨4⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Eagles will eat just about anything they physically can so probably lots of squirrels, rabbits, smaller possums and raccoons but also eagles will sometimes eat carrion so I could certainly imagine they sometimes get this off something like a deer carcass.
Formfiller@lemmy.world â¨2⊠â¨hours⊠ago
People still use lead target shells all the time
HiobsTriops@lemmy.world â¨7⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Unfortunately, this most American thing is also strongly affecting white-tailed sea eagles and other raptors in Germany and neighboringcountries. Choose lead free ammo, folks. www.bund.net/themen/naturschutz/âŚ/bleimunition/
stoy@lemmy.zip â¨7⊠â¨hours⊠ago
This is partly why I havenât got into air rifles, I have wanted to for a long time, but there is no good place to shoot it nearby.
Some may say that I should just go out in the woods and shoot there, but I donât want to spread lead in nature.
I know there are lead free pellets, but I have heard mixed opinions about them.
Why an air rifle specifically?
Because I can get a low power one (10J muzzle energy) without a license, and I canât be arsed to get a license for a proper firearm as it requires a fair commitment here.
Not_mikey@lemmy.dbzer0.com â¨8⊠â¨minutes⊠ago
I canât be asked to get a license for a proper firearm
My god, what tyranny you live under, please tell me what authoritarian country you live in so uncle sam can come free you.
SillyDude@lemmy.zip â¨4⊠â¨hours⊠ago
If you just want to plink in your backyard then just get a BB gun that shoots steel BBs. And only use iron sights which will teach you instinctive aiming. Iâd say thatâs actually way more fun than a scoped air rifle. If youâre not going to be head shorting squirrels then you donât really need the accuracy of a dialed in air rifle. Looking in a scope at a piece of paper and shooting the same hole looses its appeal pretty quickly.
zxqwas@lemmy.world â¨7⊠â¨hours⊠ago
For Air rifles you can have a bullet catcher that is basically a funny shaped tin can you put your paper target in front of. It will collect the lead if you hit the target.
stoy@lemmy.zip â¨6⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Yeah, I just know I am bound to miss and donât want to contaminate anything.
Solumbran@lemmy.world â¨9⊠â¨hours⊠ago
âChoose lead free ammunitionâ
No?
Just stop shooting guns and murdering things like a crazy ape?
Cethin@lemmy.zip â¨1⊠â¨hour⊠ago
OK, I think this is an incredibly stupid argument.
From the ethical perspective of anti-meat, hunting animals is so much better. They get to live natural lives, and they die in a similar manner to they do in nature (maybe a little faster, which is good).
From an environmental perspective, hunting keeps pray populations in naturally healthy levels, since most of their predators are driven out of populated areas, because people donât like to be attacked by wild animals. It also doesnât consume many resources, as theyâre just living their lives in nature.
I donât think thereâs any valid argument against hunting honestly, besides just being grossed out by it. Thatâs fine, and you can just not do it. Iâve never hunted in my life, and I suspect I never will. Itâs not really something I want to do. I canât construct a good argument against it though, and I suspect you canât either. If you can, give it a shot, and remember animals dying and being eaten is natural, and frequently necessary to maintain an equilibrium that was evolved to be maintained by external factors. Deer, for example, will die horrible deaths of starvation, and do damage to the environment, if they arenât hunted by humans.
Senal@programming.dev â¨36⊠â¨minutes⊠ago
Crazy ape comment aside (iâd put it closer to apes with delusions of grandeur but thatâs just me), not shooting guns and allowing hunting arenât mutually exclusive.
Especially given all the hunting that happened pre-gun.
I donât know if itâs on purpose but your answer seems to be ignoring a lot of the realities of how the things you are proposing would work (or not work, as the case may be).
Damarus@feddit.org â¨8⊠â¨hours⊠ago
The American mind cannot comprehend this
Pirat@lemmy.org â¨6⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Not sure if youâre American or not but hereâs a question for you. These bald eagles are allegedly dying from lead poisoning from eating creatures shot by lead bullets/pellets. This must mean they are scavenging. Yes, I know bald eagles do that a lot but they also kill their own prey. So why arenât vultures dying of this lead poisoning. Vultures only scavenge so it should happen much more often.
Hereâs another thought. 80% of eagles brought into a clinic may be dying of lead poisoning but that 80% is part of a small number overall. Notice they never say how many eagles are brought in.
Hereâs another thought for you: When someone says such and such is the fastest growing demographic for such and such a thing, it could just mean that there were very few such incidences. 2 such incidences occurred when there used to be just one. WOW! Hundred percent increase? Such incidences have DOUBLED!
Donât let Rita Skeeter twist your thoughts. Get the whole story.
captainlezbian@lemmy.world â¨4⊠â¨hours⊠ago
We killed the predators on a lot of our continent. Deer hunting is ecologically necessary here. And thats before we get into the boar problem
ArgentRaven@lemmy.world â¨8⊠â¨hours⊠ago
The overwhelming majority of bullets are used against paper or steel targets. Most hunters take the entire carcass for butchering, so the eagles arenât eating lead from animals shot and left in the wilderness. And given the volume needed, I wouldnât be surprised that theyâre eating fragments fired at steel targets that they mistake for rocks to keep in their stomach to grind up food.
Catoblepas@piefed.blahaj.zone â¨2⊠â¨hours⊠ago
This is untrue, gastroliths are associated only with birds that eat plants. They grind up food, which isnât necessary for meat. Eagles eat bullets from animals that have either been shot and abandoned, lost, or had parts of them discarded as zqxwas pointed out.
zxqwas@lemmy.world â¨7⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Donât know what they do over there, but we usually get the lungs and guts out as soon as possible in order to keep the meat from spoiling. Long lived predators that likes to scavenge can develop lead poisoning from those remains if itâs their main source of food.
If confusing with rocks was the main source youâd expect it to be just as common in other birds.
Solumbran@lemmy.world â¨8⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Thatâs why I also mentioned to stop shooting guns. If you are shooting in such an unsafe way that fragments fly around and get lost, then you shouldnât be allowed to shoot in the first place.
IchNichtenLichten@lemmy.wtf â¨8⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Plenty of people hunt for food. Lead ammo should be avoided though.
Gullible@sh.itjust.works â¨9⊠â¨hours⊠ago
I think you might have some ontologically incongruous standards. We are crazy apes. You can take the guns away, but the murder will persist for millennia, if not gene edited out. Banning the guns and lead bullets is more likely to work than expecting humanity to spontaneously diverge from its evolutionary roots of the bang bus murder ape
Solumbran@lemmy.world â¨8⊠â¨hours⊠ago
I donât know, humans are good at diverging from their instincts when it comes to letting sick people die, but when it comes to killing less, they cannot anymore?
I think that low-ass standards are what prevent humans from getting any better, if you start justifying mindless murders as âjust instinctâ then of course people will be fine with it. And funnily enough, thatâs one of the main arguments that hunters use, saying that theyâre just doing something ânaturalâ.
SinningStromgald@lemmy.world â¨8⊠â¨hours⊠ago
Adding that into my book of wonderful phrases.