Visit Wales Now

Visit Wales and see some dramatic changes to the landscape

The soaring red kite, the national bird of Wales .

Birdwatching in Wales

Birdwatchers travel to Wales to see the abundant and varied bird life. 

Of particular interest is the magnificent red kite, a symbol of Welsh resurgence. By the beginning of the twentieth century the red kite population was reduced to just a few breeding pairs that managed to survive in mid Wales. But thanks to conservation efforts the red kite population was rescued from extinction and there are now about 400 breeding pairs in mid Wales.

Today, the famous red kite is facing a new threat: wind turbines.

Red kite killed by the blades of a wind turbine in Germany

Birds and wind turbines

There is considerable evidence from around world that spinning blades have killed huge numbers of birds. This seems inevitable when one considers that turbine blades weigh in the region of 1.5 tonnes and their tips can travel at speeds of over 180 mph.

  According to the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, birds may be scared away from their usual locations during construction and/or operation of wind turbines. Access roads and buildings may destroy feeding, breeding and roosting sites. Birds may fly into the towers or the blades, especially during storms and conditions of poor visibility.

    Turbines have caused the deaths of four white-tailed eagles on the isolated islands of Smola six miles off the Norwegian coast where 68 turbines are now in action. Thirty other eagles have failed to return to their nesting sites within the wind farm area according to wildlife campaigners. The dead birds were found between August and December last year. Two had been sliced in half, apparently by a turbine blade. Only a single youngster is due to be raised by just one pair this summer. The population has been falling since the first twenty turbines began turning in the autumn of 2002.

  A major study into bird kills, carried out in northern Spain, found that about 6,000 birds and of bats were killed by turbines in one year.

In 2008, the Regional government of Valencia, Spain, ordered 2 wind farms to be shut down after they butchered 200 griffon vultures and 100 more birds (official figures, possibly still shy of reality, especially the 100 birds..). The owning company won't comply, and will appeal the decision.

To see pictures of windfarm bird kills in Spain, click here.    

  The turbines at Altamount Pass in California, the largest wind-farm area in the world, have on average killed 200–300 red-tail hawks and 40–60 golden eagles each year. At other wind turbine sites in southern California, an estimated 7,000 migrating birds are killed each year.

  To find our more about wind turbines and bird kills, see the articles in English on the iberica2000 website.

Wind turbines and bat kills

Bats kills at wind farm sites are a growing concern. It seems that bats are killed by the spinning blades as well as by wake turbulence. In a study of two wind farms sites in the USA, scientists found that the 66 turbines at the two sites killed as many as 2,900 bats during the six-week period of the study. They concluded that this was not a sustainable kill rate.  

 
A new study by the University of Calgary in Canada suggests that 'exploding lungs' may be the reason for the large numbers of dead, but apparently unharmed, bats found around wind turbines. The moving blades cause a drop in pressure that makes the delicate lungs of bats suddenly expand, bursting the tissue's blood vessels. This is known as a barotrauma, and is well-known to scuba divers. 

Click here to read the full article in the New Scientist.

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