Whereas in Arkansas it’s raining blackbirds, in Emilia Romagna it’s raining turtle doves. Let’s go back a week in time. During the New Year festivities, thousands of red-winged blackbirds die in the small town of Beebe. They fell from the sky into the gardens, the roads, and onto the roofs as though they had been struck by lightning. The causes of the mass deaths are still not known. The hypotheses up until now are high altitude hail, poisoning in the air and even the shock resulting from New Year fireworks. The only verified fact is that the blackbirds lost their lives as a result of blood clots caused by internal injuries. The strange fact is that no other type of bird has been hit and that the inhabitants of the place have not suffered any malaise. The strange episode at Beebe is however not the end of the matter. Three days later, hundreds of blackbirds were found at Baton Rouge and Organza in Louisiana. Four days later a hundred jackdaws died in Falkoeping in Sweden, with the same injuries found in the blackbirds. Five days later hundreds of blackbirds died in Murray in Kentucky. On 6 January it’s the turtle doves, eight thousand in their death throes on the state road of Faenza and its surroundings.
In science fiction films the danger of a catastrophe is announced by gigantic flocks of birds that rise up into the sky and fly far away. If instead of flying away they fall right on top of our heads, what does it mean?
“The bodies of hundreds and hundreds of "Collared Doves" have been found in Faenza’s industrial zone, in the area of the property of Tampieri SpA. Since Sunday, the WWF wildlife rangers have been collecting dozens of dead birds every day, and it’s not even as though they were the Arkansas blackbirds, sent out from the channel carrying the waste water. For the last few days, people of the neighbourhood have been complaining of a particularly sharp smell, like burnt meat. Many of them have been gathering up dozens of dead birds and disposing of them in the rubbish bins. It’s a danger to public hygiene, but on the other hand, no one is dealing with them… A lad from the Ravenna 5 Star MoVement has gathered up three dead turtle doves. We are getting organised to take them to a laboratory and we as a council group, will pay to have analyses carried out on them. The Tampieri company is famous for producing that incredible odour that you can smell when you a going along the A14 motorway as you pass Faenza. Its owner is the president of the Ravenna Confindustria. No administrator in these twenty years has ever intervened in a concrete way to put a stop to these terrible miasmas. We believe that action should be taken by the cabinet members for Health (Lusenti) and for the Environment (Freda). And for this reason today we will present a formal question in the Region.” Giovanni Favia, regional councillor in Emilia Romagna with the 5 Star MoVement