Moscow pigeons die in startling quantities

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Published time: September 23, 2010 15:14
Edited time: September 24, 2010 10:21

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Animals, Health, Russia, Weather

Moscow citizens have noticed an unusual number of pigeons dying on the streets of the city, “Komsomolskaya Pravda” newspaper reports.

According to municipal service workers, the death of the pigeons always appears to be normal: a bird starts to turn around quickly and then falls to the ground. Moscow vets explain that such symptoms indicate vessel thrombosis. They believe that such problems may be caused by kidney and liver diseases, being the result of this summer’s abnormal heat wave in Moscow. Part of the pigeon population already died back then.

However, not only pigeons suffered from the heat. In July and August of 2010, Moscow was suffocating due to the unusual heat: all the previous temperature records were broken, with the highest temperature reaching the mark of 38-39C. In addition, the city was covered with toxic smog from the burning forests to the south of Moscow. Not surprising then, that the daily human death rate during these two months doubled.

Comments (1)

Norman 23.09.2010 23:48

Viruses have killed large quantities of crows, pigeons and other birds in Washington DC too. All bird collected were examined by the Health Department. It was a known disease that killed the birds, that could have been passed on to humans.

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