Radar ornithology is the use of

radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance (''ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, w ...

technology in studies of bird migration and in approaches to prevent

bird strike A bird strike—sometimes called birdstrike, bird ingestion (for an engine), bird hit, or bird aircraft strike hazard (BASH)—is a collision between an airborne animal (usually a bird or bat) and a moving vehicle, usually an aircraft. The term ...

s particularly to aircraft. The technique was developed from the observations of pale wisps seen moving on radar during the Second World War. These were termed as "angels", "ghosts", or "phantoms" in Britain and were later identified as being caused by migrating birds. Over time, the technology has been vastly improved with Doppler

weather radar Weather radar, also called weather surveillance radar (WSR) and Doppler weather radar, is a type of radar used to locate precipitation, calculate its motion, and estimate its type (rain, snow, hail etc.). Modern weather radars are mostly puls ...

s that allow the detection of birds, bats, as well as insects with resolution and sensitivity that is sufficient to quantify the speed of flaps that can sometimes aid in the identification of species.

History

According to

David Lack David Lambert Lack FRS (16 July 1910 – 12 March 1973) was a British evolutionary biologist who made contributions to ornithology, ecology, and ethology. His 1947 book, ''Darwin's Finches'', on the finches of the Galapagos Islands was a landm ...

, the earliest recorded use of radar in detecting birds came in 1940. The movements of gulls, herons and lapwings that caused some of the detentions was visually confirmed. It was however only in the 1950s through the work of Ernst Sutter at Zurich airport that more elusive "angels" were confirmed to be caused by small passerines. David Lack was one of the pioneers of radar ornithology in England.

Applications

Early radar ornithology mainly focused, due to limitations of the equipment, on the seasonality, timing, intensity, and direction of flocks of birds in migration. Modern weather radars can detect the wing area of the flying, the speed of flight, the frequency of wing beat, the direction, distance and altitude. The sensitivity and modern analytical techniques now allows detection of flying insects as well. Radar has been used to study seasonal variations in starling roosting behaviour. It has also been used to identify risks to aircraft operations at airports. The technique has been in conservation applications such as being used to assess the risk to birds by proposed wind energy installations, to quantify the number of birds at roost or nesting sites.

References

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External links

Radar ornithology

Radar entomology
Biological techniques and tools