San Gabriel River becomes a deathbed for ducks
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The deaths of at least 50 ducklings in the San Gabriel River that occurred because regulating the waterflow sometimes dries up the waterway, have raised questions about how to protect nature in an urban water system. The Times’ Louis Sahagun reports:
What had been for the last six months a vibrant stream teeming with migrating waterfowls and shorebirds early last week became a dry San Gabriel River channel where vultures gorged themselves on ducklings that died when the flows dried up. The discovery prompted calls for an investigation into the deaths of at least 20 cinnamon teal ducklings, 10 mallard ducklings and 20 adult mallards that had sought refuge in a shrinking pool of water in a concrete basin just south of Valley Boulevard in the city of Industry.
Civil engineers for the Los Angeles County Department of Public Works -- Adam Walden, above right, and Sterling Klippel -- ‘expressed regret that the birds died but pointed out that their mission is to maintain a complex water system for millions of people county-wide, not to protect ducklings.’
-- Tony Barboza
