AlaskaDenise
In Memoriam
This is the testing guidelines including # of each species, etc.
From what I've learned about our migratory birds, it looks good,, except I don't know why there is so little emphasis on the Northern Wheatear.
The Arctic Warbler, which is in my backyard, winters not only in the Hong Kong, Thailand, etc. area but also Indonesia. It, along with the Yellow Wagtail, have spent the winter in the H5N1-infected Indonesian areas and are both high on the target list.
AS a rural Alaskan resident, I want to comment that these birds who have been wintering in the BF endemic area since 1997, have yet to bring an identifiable amount of this disease to Alaska. Kevin Winker, UAF, has said they're not sure why this occured. He says that during migration, some birds shut down part of their immune system and this may account for the lack of infected birds showing up here (they died). Perhaps this extensive testing will answer these mysteries.
Protocol site:
.pdf: http://alaska.fws.gov/media/avian_influenza/AK%20interagency%20sampling%20plan.pdf.
HTML:
http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:RRgVdSIdAoAJ:alaska.fws.gov/media/avian_influenza/AK%2520interagency%2520sampling%2520plan.pdf+susitna+%22arctic+warbler%22&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=15
.
From what I've learned about our migratory birds, it looks good,, except I don't know why there is so little emphasis on the Northern Wheatear.
The Arctic Warbler, which is in my backyard, winters not only in the Hong Kong, Thailand, etc. area but also Indonesia. It, along with the Yellow Wagtail, have spent the winter in the H5N1-infected Indonesian areas and are both high on the target list.
AS a rural Alaskan resident, I want to comment that these birds who have been wintering in the BF endemic area since 1997, have yet to bring an identifiable amount of this disease to Alaska. Kevin Winker, UAF, has said they're not sure why this occured. He says that during migration, some birds shut down part of their immune system and this may account for the lack of infected birds showing up here (they died). Perhaps this extensive testing will answer these mysteries.
Protocol site:
.pdf: http://alaska.fws.gov/media/avian_influenza/AK%20interagency%20sampling%20plan.pdf.
HTML:
http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:RRgVdSIdAoAJ:alaska.fws.gov/media/avian_influenza/AK%2520interagency%2520sampling%2520plan.pdf+susitna+%22arctic+warbler%22&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=15
.