We have been watching with much interest for several years now the ongoing effort to minimize avian (bird) mortalities that result from those unfortunate instances when migrating birds happens to misjudge and, er, fly into a communications tower or guy wires. This is a meaningful issue as evidenced by the substantial amount of time, energy and money that is being invested to come to some sort of reasonable resolution for both those that represent tower owners and users, which includes such heavyweights as PCIA, CTIA, NATE and NAB who have combined their efforts under an “Infrastructure Coalition”, and those that are representing the birds. With the growth of wireless communications, the demand for more structures supporting transmitting equipment will only increase in time. And with all of the FCC’s broadband at all costs initiatives, something seems amiss since any restrictions on towers would seem to work against that objective.

But just to show how crazy things can get here in Washington, D.C., I was reviewing some documentation that is being examined by the FCC as it seeks to prepare a “Programmatic Environmental Assessment” for its evolving Antenna Structure Registration Program. All this time, I had mistakenly assumed that communication towers were a major contributor to avian deaths. I was wrong. You know what the research indicates? That together, communication towers, planes and wind turbines (where a bird has no chance) contributes less than 1% to overall bird mortality. Less than 1% and the industry and the FCC are jumping through hoops of fire to arrive at a registration program palatable to bird representatives? Are you kidding me?

Do you know what the number one killer of birds is other than natural causes? Buildings and windows at 59%. That makes sense, and we as humans need buildings and windows. The number two contributor to bird mortality are power lines at 14%, and we need those, although it would be better if more of them were underground. Number four contributor to bird mortality are automobiles at 9%, and we need those unless we are going to revert to horses. It is my personal experience that it’s far better to run into a bird than a deer. The number five contributor is pesticides at 7%, and we need that capability so that quality food production is maximized. Fruit and vegetable sales would plummet without pesticide applications. Ever notice that there aren’t any worms in the apples you buy at the store? At this point, you are supposed to be asking yourself what makes up the missing 11% contribution towards bird deaths? The answer is cats! Cats! All this time, money, and hand wringing and it turns out that reliable research reveals that cats contribute 11 times more towards avian deaths than communication towers and wind turbines. Have the bird and cat lovers ever convened a meeting to reduce bird deaths? That would be interesting. One would think that flying into a tower would be a quick demise as opposed to being eaten by a cat. But this whole exercise belies logic and has from the beginning. Cats? You can’t make this stuff up. Incredible.