In Memory of the Sparrows
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 03. 7.08
Royal College of Art student Cathrine Kramer says "studies have shown that sparrow populations are decreasing in areas that are affected by electromagnetic communication." She has designed an EMF-powered radio that will play sparrow songs.
She writes: "Imagine on a stroll through Hyde Park you are met with an eerie silence. All the twittering birds have disappeared. By harnessing the very force that drove them away, and transforming it into subtle, obscured bird-like sounds, my object is a monument to the sparrows. It acts as a comfort to those who want to remember the sparrows, but also as a poignant reminder of why they are gone."
click for video (takes forever to load but worth it)
The artist tells Regine of WMNA how it works. "In the exhibition the bird sound was orchestrated, because to work the radio would have to be grounded and this was not possible within the exhibition space," she explained. "However, in the future scenario I envisioned, these memorials would be mounted to trees and tuned to pick up bird sounds transmitted on an AM frequency bandwidth. The antenna would be a long wire spiraling up the tree to pick up the radio waves." ::RCA
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Wouldnt it be more effective to put signs up that say "birds driven away by wi-fi and cell phone signals"
Instead faking the bird sounds will probably just make most people think birds are still there but just can't see them in the trees.
Why not spend some time making EMF-reducing sheilds or jammers or something?
This thing seems so counter-productive.
Sparrows have been declining in the UK since the late 70's per this study: http://www.defra.gov.uk/wildlife-countryside/resprog/findings/sparrow/
It looks like the mobile phone market didn't reach 5% until the mid 90s. http://www.mobilemastinfo.com/information/history.htm
I have to agree with Chris.
However, I think if you were to combine the memorials and signs it would be more effective than signs alone. Maybe memorials could be placed in obvious places where people generally walk by and have a sign obnoxious enough for people to notice and stop to read.
I think it's important to point out that while House Sparrows (aka English Sparrows) are sadly declining in their native UK, they are an introduced species in the US and are a nuisance. They frequently take over the nests of other birds like Bluebirds, Wrens, Chickadees, and Tree Swallows.
maybe a poster or sign would be effective for raising the issue. one could imaging though that on an average journey to hyde park by the average person will have passed around a 1000 posters and signs already. I don't really think the designer will manage too build that many EMF-reducing sheilds or jammers or something? Interesting though the project appears to have made it on a number of blogs, and sparked some discussion - even from yourself?