Study says oilpatch causes songbirds to change chirps

Noisy oilpatch equipment is causing songbirds to change their tune, concludes research from the University of Manitoba.

“It’s something that is really picking up, the idea of noise pollution,” said Miya Warrington, coauthor of a new paper in Condor, the journal of the American Ornithological Society. “We want to see, what is that doing for the birds?”

Warrington looked at savannah sparrows, a small, common, thick beaked sparrow with a splash of yellow over the eye. Its complex song has up to nine different “syllables” that convey a lot of information.

Some parts of the song deliver a territorial warning. Others advertise for mates. Others just say, “I am here.” All are crucial messages for the sparrow’s survival.

Oil and gas infrastructure is common on the plains and Warrington wanted to see how birdsong competes with it.

She looked at 26 sites around Brooks in southern Alberta. The sites contained four types of energy infrastructure: natural gas compressors, pumpjacks, screw pumps powered by the electrical grid and screw pumps powered by generators.

She recorded and analyzed the songs of 73 male sparrows between the months of May and July, and compared them with the songs of sparrows where there were no oilpatch facilities.

The analysis showed all pumps and compressors made sounds on the same frequencies as at least part of the sparrow’s song. Recordings revealed the birds were adjusting parts of their songs, depending on the source of the background noise.

Of the four types of infrastructure, generator-powered screw pumps had the most effect, while natural gas compressors had the least.

Warrington suggests the birds made changes in efforts to be heard over the sound of the equipment.