#43: Aircraft noise impacts on wildlife

60 Reasons to Protest: Reason #43 – Aircraft noise impacts on wildlife

We highly recommend to you the new ABC documentary, The Secret Lives of Our Urban Birds. Episode 2 features Brisbane including an interview with ornithologist Dr Dominique Potvin at UniSC who studies the impact of urban noise on songbirds.  Did you know that urban noise including flight path noise pollution has a range of negative effects and severe impacts on songbirds? They include:

1. Decreased song quality: Urban noise can interfere with the ability of songbirds to produce high-quality songs. The background noise can mask or distort the bird’s song, making it difficult for other birds to hear and respond to.
2. Reduced reproductive success: Urban noise can disrupt the breeding behaviour of songbirds, leading to reduced reproductive success. Noise can interfere with brain development, courtship displays, nesting, and incubation, and can also cause birds to abandon their nests.
3. Increased stress levels: Urban noise can increase the stress levels of songbirds, which can have a negative impact on their health and well-being. Chronic stress can lead to reduced immune function, increased risk of disease, and decreased lifespan.
4. Reduced territory quality: Urban noise can reduce the quality of the habitat available to songbirds. High levels of noise can deter birds from using certain areas for foraging, nesting, or singing, which can lead to reduced territory quality and population decline.
5. Altered migration patterns: Urban noise can also disrupt the migratory behaviour of songbirds. Birds may avoid areas with high levels of noise or alter their migration routes to avoid noisy areas, which can have negative impacts on their survival and breeding success.

Aircraft noise pollution can have various negative effects on other animals, wildlife, and fauna. The most common effect is the disruption of natural behaviour, including communication, feeding, mating, and migration. This disruption can cause chronic stress and lead to physical and physiological changes in the animals, affecting their survival and reproduction. Additionally, aircraft noise pollution can cause hearing damage, masking of important auditory cues, and habitat loss.

Bats are another example. 🦇 They are highly sensitive to noise pollution and are easily disturbed by aircraft noise. This disturbance can cause bats to change their feeding patterns, which can affect their health and survival. This in turn has negative consequences on the pollination and seed dispersal services they provide for many species of flora.

For those who want to read more, we have added relevant peer-reviewed research papers to the BFPCA Library.

To protect both humans and more-than-humans alike, we need net reductions of flight path noise pollution.