Mystery of mass animal death epidemic deepens after 8,000 turtle doves fall dead in Italy with strange blue stain on their beaks

[WestVirginiaRebel]

UK Daily Mail:

Thousands of dead turtle doves rained down on roofs and cars in an Italian town in the latest in a growing spate of mass animal deaths across the globe.

Residents in Faenza described the birds falling to the ground like 'little Christmas balls' with strange blue stains on their beaks.

Initial tests on up to 8,000 of the doves indicated that the blue stain could have been caused by poisoning or hypoxia.

A witness told www.examiner.com: 'We have no idea why this happened all of a sudden.

'The doves just started falling one-by-one then in groups of 10s and 20s.'

Hypoxia, a lack of oxygen, is known to cause confusion and illness in animals. It is also a common precursor to altitude sickness.

Experts said results from tests on the doves will not be available for at least a week.

They said that cold weather could have caused the birds' deaths as the flock was swept into a high-altitude wind storm before falling to the earth.
________

I know Christmas is over, but...no partridges falling from pear trees?

[pollyannaish]

If you overlay the record cold temperatures map with a map of the big fish/bird kills...they correspond. I think the weather theories are accurate.

[clearvision]

Thousands of dead crabs have washed up along the Kent coast, with environmental experts believing the cold weather in Britain is to blame.

 

The Velvet swimming crabs - also called devil crabs - are thought to be victims of Britain's coldest December in 120 years, which left sea temperatures much lower than average.

 

More than 40,000 of the crabs - Britain's largest swimming crab - are littering beaches around Thanet, along with smaller numbers of whelks, sponges and anemones.

UK Daily Mail

[Rokke]

When I read the headline, my first thought was that maybe they had voted in a turtle dove election. Blue beaks instead of purple fingers.

 

I'm waiting for turkeys to fall out of the sky around our house. Or maybe some cows. Nice, tender cows. We never have anything cool like that happen around here.