Meta‐Analysis of the Effectiveness of Marked Wire in Reducing Avian Collisions with Power Lines |
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Authors: | RAFAEL BARRIENTOS JUAN CARLOS ALONSO CARLOS PONCE CARLOS PALACÍN |
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Affiliation: | Departamento de Ecología Evolutiva, Museo Nacional de Ciencias Naturales (CSIC), José Gutiérrez Abascal, 2, E‐28006 Madrid, Spain |
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Abstract: | Abstract: Collisions of birds with power transmission and distribution lines have been documented for many species, and cause millions of casualties worldwide. Attempts to reduce mortality from such collisions include placing bird flight diverters (i.e., wire markers in the form of, e.g., spirals, swivels, plates, or spheres) on static and some electrified wires to increase their visibility. Although studies of the effectiveness of such devices have yielded contradictory results, the implementation of flight diverters is increasing rapidly. We reviewed the results of studies in which transmission or distribution wires were marked and conducted a meta‐analysis to examine the effectiveness of flight diverters in reducing bird mortality. We included in our meta‐analysis all studies in which researchers searched for carcasses of birds killed by a collision with wires. In those studies that also included data on flight frequency, we examined 8 covariates of effectiveness: source of data, study design, alternate design (if marked and unmarked spans were alternated in the same line), periodicity of searches for carcasses, width of the search transect, and number of species, lines, and stretches of wire searched. The presence of flight diverters was associated with a decrease in bird collisions. At unmarked lines, there were 0.21 deaths/1000 birds (n =339,830) that flew among lines or over lines. At marked lines, the mortality rate was 78% lower (n =1,060,746). Only the number of species studied had a significant influence on effect size; this was larger in studies that addressed more species. When comparing mortality at marked and unmarked lines, we recommend use of the same time intervals and habitats and standardizing the periodicity of carcass searches. |
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Keywords: | bird collision bird flight diverter flight frequency ground‐wire marking power line colisió n de aves dispositivo anticolisió n frecuencia de vuelo señ alizació n del cable de tierra tendido elé ctrico |
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