Neither wind, nor rain, nor tall buildings, nor radio towers keep bird species from their appointed rounds with migratory destiny. Untold numbers of birds, however, pay a significant toll — their lives — while moving north and south along their air routes across the hemispheres. Skyscrapers and signal towers each year claim the lives of millions of birds.

Just as troublesome is loss of habitat to agriculture and development. Because long journeys are physiologically stressful to birds, the migrants require resting places to recharge and are having a tougher time finding them.

The Nature Conservancy, aligned with Ducks Unlimited and other conservation groups, is in the process of trying to identify stopover sites along the western shore of Lake Erie. The goal is to set aside as much important bird habitat as is economically feasible.

Hundreds of thousands of travel-weary, neotropical birds typically cross western Lake Erie in the spring and fall, making the Magee Marsh/Crane Creek area in Ohio and Point Pelee in Ontario two of North America’s premier birding destinations. It’s also estimated that as many as 75 percent of North America’s migrating black ducks stop for a breather in the area.

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