Bird ‘recovering’ after being covered in oil

Bird ‘recovering’ after being covered in oil

The bird was taken to the JSPCA centre, and media manager Barbara Keywood said it was now recovering and vets intended to bathe it to try to remove the oil.

Miss Keywood said the bird, which was found by a dog walker, was underweight and weak but had been eating well.

Several users of the Jersey Wildlife Facebook page have suggested that the migrating bird could have been affected by the spillage from the 214-metre tanker which sank in the Bay of Biscay last week while carrying 2,200 tonnes of so-called heavy fuel, viscous petroleum products such as marine diesel.

However, Miss Keywood said five birds covered in oil had been treated over the last month, long before the recent spill and it was not known how they had been exposed.

Affected seabirds are meticulously washed using washing-up liquid to remove the oil-based pollutants.

They are also tube-fed with charcoal to
absorb any dangerous substances which may been ingested.

Three oil slicks have been spotted in the Bay of Biscay since the Grande America tanker sank and there are fears the wreck is still releasing ‘heavy fuel’, according to the French media.

Dr Glyn Young, Durrell’s head of birds, said: ‘Our seabirds are under extraordinary stresses through climate change (such as changing sea temperatures), overfishing (loss of food for chicks etc) and loss of safe nesting habitat through actions of man and accompanying mammals like rats, mice and cats.

‘Every time there are extreme weather events like storms at sea or
man-made catastrophes like oil or chemical spills, already threatened seabird populations will be hit further.’

He said that seabirds were in gradual decline as a result of these threats.

‘Seabirds like guillemots and puffins spend the winter many miles from their breeding sites, often in areas like shipping channels or near coasts,’ Dr Young said, adding that this meant they were regularly exposed to pollution.

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