A Mystery Illness Is Killing Mid-Atlantic Songbirds

https://www.npr.org/2021/07/02/ [login to see] /a-mystery-illness-is-killing-mid-atlantic-songbirds
Federal and state wildlife officials in the Mid-Atlantic region are asking people to stop feeding birds and providing water in bird baths amid dozens of reports of mysterious songbird deaths.

Reports first emerged in the Washington, D.C., area in late May. Now wildlife agencies throughout the Mid-Atlantic and into the Southeast and Midwest are receiving similar reports.

"We did see really large numbers of grackles and blue jays, in particular, and they were all younger," says Belinda Burwell, a veterinarian who founded the group Wildlife Veterinary Care in Virginia.