One of the several dozen dead cranes found near Highway 50.
(Devan Ridgway/WTIU News)
Dozens of sandhill cranes have been found dead along Highway 50 near Seymour and Brownstown.
Cincinnati resident Catherine Greenwood was passing through the area Sunday when she shared photos on Facebook of nearly 35 dead birds in a pond. That post later went viral.
WFIU/WTIU News confirmed the sighting on Tuesday afternoon. The numbers have risen since Greenwood’s post.
Previous testing in Jackson County showed that other sandhill cranes and waterfowl tested positive for bird flu. Though the specific birds spotted in the ponds have yet to be tested, a representative with the Indiana Department of Natural Resources said in a statement that it is likely they died of bird flu.
Reports of the dead birds in Jackson County have been going to Eli Fleace with Indiana’s DNR since early January. Those early reports were also confirmed to have been caused by bird flu.
“Throughout January, we just started to see those mortalities rise to the point where there were hundreds of them that have died,” he said. “Right now we're estimating 605 to 600 based on reports. I'm pretty confident that there's more than that at this point.”
So far this year, about 1500 sandhills were reported dead across the state.
Similarly, over 1000 Canada geese and 1000 snow geese were also reported dead due to bird flu.
It can be difficult to track how many wild birds carry bird flu because the primary way of testing is through collected carcasses that have been reported to the agency. Fleace said there are other challenges as well.
“Sometimes there'll be some carcasses that I think are really high value, and I would like to get them collected, but I can't get a hold of the property owner, and so I can't go collect those or sample them,” he said.
Other times. logistics become an issue, as a limited number of staff makes it difficult to get samples from all over the state to the lab in a timely manner.
Avian influenza’s grasp on the state’s wild bird population is becoming more visible. Goose Pond Fish and Wildlife Area put up signs recently warning visitors not to approach sick and dying birds that have been spotted on-site.
“They had roughly 200 that died around that area, and all 200 of those birds died like a week before they had a large outreach event there, and so there were a lot of birders, a lot of members of the public, there were a lot of folks going to Goose Pond, and there were all those dead carcasses around,” he said. “And so we put out some information to let folks know what was going on.”
David Rupp, a bird watcher based out of Bloomington, said he’s heartbroken to see the sick birds at the park and is worried about it spreading to others.
“One of my big concerns is that it spreads to the whooping cranes,” he said. “They’re an endangered species out here, the whooping crane. And hope that none of them get it.”
Fleace said that bird flu still poses only a small risk to humans, especially in the open air. While 70 cases of humans with bird flu have been confirmed nationwide, roughly 68 of them were working in a confined space, directly with sick flocks.
“I think they largely were breathing in that virus, but they certainly had considerably more exposure than your average person,” he said.
Goose Pond is still open to visitors. Bird flu poses only a small risk to humans, but the DNR is asking people not to touch sick or dead birds.
Dead or sick birds can be reported to the Indiana DNR tip page at on.in.gov/sickwildlife.
