Get Involved or Get Ready for Empty Skies

"More of us must become educated to the threat to wildlife imposed by ecological ignorance and indifference and poorly designed development and get actively involved--or..."



AT LEFT is a common tern looking for a meal in San Leandro Bay, where the marine ecosystem has entered a new era of catastrophic ecological threat due to global warming and other human activity.

Sediment buildup from Alameda's lagoons and dredging of the Oakland-Alameda Estuary have recently combined to shift tidal currents, drawing toxins from street run-off and lagoon chemicals into the feeding grounds of these magnificent aerial acrobats.

The human threat to marine wildlife here took a dramatic turn once before in the early 1900s, when dredging of a marsh turned the Alameda Penninsula into an island. The ecosystem had to adjust to the flooding and scavenging effect of powerful new tidal flows.

Further dredging of the newly-created Oakland-Alaemda Estuary made possible the Port of Oakland, a thriving seaport with hundreds of jobs, but a side-effect was a curse for the marine ecosystem of San Leandro Bay. New ship channel depths allowed larger ships to enter the Port but also increased the strength of tidal currents, drawing toxins from Alameda's lagoon effluent around the eastern tip of Alameda Island through the habitat of thousands of seabirds in San Leandro Bay.

Alameda's Tidal Curse is documented here on my blog: Alameda's Tidal Curse . The Curse is that whatever is carried down the Estuary from San Leandro Bay will be returned there and gets recycled repeatedly, day after day. The Tidal Curse is a prime suspect in the Seabird Massacre of 2015, where three hundred beautiful seabirds died and hundreds more were treated and released. The birds were caked in an oily goo that causes hypothermia a hideous death after hours of shivering from the cold.

The Massacre is still under investigation, but we don't have to wait. Action is already underway by the Regional Water Quality Control Board, who recently issued a new tentative ruling effectively declaring Zero Tolerance for anything but storm water to be released into storm sewers: Regional Water Quality Control Board Action .

This new ruling needs to be extended to include lagoons and all inland waterways feeding the San Francisco Bay. Call or write the Board with your comments. If you can--show up on June 12.

What will we learn from the 2015 Seabird Massacre? Will Alameda wake up? Will the City continue to use chemicals to control algae in their ancient finger lagoons? Will first responders become more responsive? Will the police show more interest in environmental cases? Will people use their cell phone cameras to record and report environmental threats? Will schools expand their ecological awareness curriculum?

Everyone enjoys seeing herons, terns, grebes, ducks, pelicans and egrets in our skies and waters. We share their living quarters. Urban development doesn't have to destroy wildlife. More of us must become educated to the threat to wildlife imposed by ecological ignorance and indifference and poorly designed development and get actively involved--or...

...one day the skies will be empty.

Get involved.

Here's a list of politicians, agencies and organizations you can contact: Who to Contact

Drilling Mud "STP" Questions for Alameda Power

"Did anyone at AMP question why CTI's bid showed a substantially shorter duration than others?"

Suspect #2 in my search for the cause of the 2015 Seabird Massacre is a 2014 horizontal directional drilling (HDD) project to lay power conduit to Coast Guard Island from Alameda under the Estuary downstream from where a plume of greyish-tan sludge was reported prior to the massacre of hundreds of seabirds by a mysterious grey goo clinging to their bodies, causing death by hypothermia.

Laboratory analysis by California Fish and Wildlife of the Mystery Goo matches a type of oily "STP"-like* drilling mud additive that accelerates the rate of penetration (ROP) in earth-boring projects such as this drilling mud nightmare.

Drilling mud nightmare

Following is a list of questions I submitted today to Alameda Power about the 2014 CGI conduit drilling project.

"Previously asked:
1. Dates drilling began and ended.
2. What type drilling mud and drilling mud additives were used.

Additional:
3. Please enumerate if exceptions were made to generally-accepted engineering standards for environmental protection.
4. Were exceptions made to City standards for bidding? If so, how were they justified?
5. What, if any, previous experience did California Trenchless Inc (CTI) have with directional drilling projects of this type and scale?
6. How did CTI control and dispose of waste drilling mud? (The on-line contract documents specified a "mud pit" for retaining waste drilling mud, but there was none observed during the several days I watched the drilling during my daily walks.)
7. What geological data did CTI and AMP use to ensure environmental safety, e.g., the nature and composition of the subterranean geologic formation?
8. Did CTI or AMP do post-project testing for drilling mud leakage? If so, what were the results?
9. What level of on-site supervision did AMP have throughout the project? (The drilling was only yards away from AMP's headquarters.)
10. How otherwise did AMP assure themselves of contract compliance?
11. Did AMP perform on-site testing regarding environmental risks such as frac-out and waste mud leakage and disposal?
12. Do AMP and CTI have insurance coverage for environmental risk?
13. Did anyone at AMP question why CTI's bid showed a substantially shorter duration than others? (The use of a drilling mud additive would have accelerated the ROP [rate of penetration], reducing cost by speeding up the project, but would also increase environmental risk.)

Some of the information may not be readily available and can be provided later, but please provide what you can early next week.

I live nearby and am available should my assistance be needed.

Thanks again for your cooperation."

We will get to the bottom of this.

*STP is a popular additive for motor oil that is advertised to reduce friction.

Continuing Evidence of a Lethal Surfactant

"When I think of the hundreds of birds killed, it is chilling to see this foam entering San Leandro Bay again, exactly six months later."

New Goo, or Remnants of the October Spill?

Either a surfactant is continuing to be released into the waters around Alameda or the foamy stuff in these photos is the remains of the initial plume I observed October 12, six months ago. Either way, the material needs to be sampled and tested. I have reported it but didn't call 911 because the volume wasn't massive. Should I have, given the previous responses to my calls?

Yesterday, April 12, I spotted this clear evidence of a surfactant along the northern (Oakland) shore of the Oakland-Alameda Estuary. Grey foam on saltwater usually indicates the presence of surfactant. For over a mile from the Fruitvale Bridge to San Leandro Bay, this unnatural-looking material (see Site 3 photo) clung to the shoreline and swirled in eddies on the slow incoming tide.

Using a reclaimed plastic pop bottle, I took a sample of several ounces and will hand it over to a  Hazardous Materials Specialist at Alameda County Department of Environmental Health today.

Following are my photos of yesterday's discovery.




Site 1 faces west and is the spot where I first noticed these new dregs of foam Sunday, April 12, six months to the day since the October spill. Here, a hundred or so yards east of the Fruitvale Bridge, a thin trail of greyish-tan foam drifts lazily in an eddy.

Site 2 is a few yards east of Site 1. It faces east and shows another eddy with foam, and a duck heading right for it.

Site 3 is a close-up of the foam in Site 2. All the sites have identical material--bubbles in a matrix of greyish-tan liquid. With few exceptions, the bubbles are strikingly uniform in diameter and highly resilient. They don't burst easily when touched by a solid object. Instead, they attempt to attach.

Ponder what this material would do to feathers. Repeated exposures would create layer upon layer of gummy film as each successive layer dried in the sun.

Site 4 is east of the High Street Bridge, a few hundred yards east of Site 3.

Site 5 is farther east. The control tower at Oakland Airport can be seen just beyond San Leandro Bay.

Site 6 is near the mouth to San Leandro Bay, facing the tip of Alameda Island.

Seabirds can be seen foraging among the foam.

Site 7 is at the mouth of San Leandro Bay.

That pin at about 1 o'clock is the tower at Oakland airport.

When I think of the hundreds of birds killed, it is chilling to see this foam on the shores of San Leandro Bay again, exactly six months later.

How many times has the tide returned, delivering this deadly foam?

Update:
I dropped off my sample at the County Environmental office around 5PM.

Catastrophic Ecological Risk in San Leandro Bay

"...the Seabird Massacre illustrates that greater awareness is needed by everyone."

Clapper rail (c/o Wikipedia)

The Alameda Seabird Massacre of 2015 has revealed the dawning of a new era of catastrophic ecological risk for San Leandro Bay and the birds and marine life that depend upon this habitat for their existence. The endangered clapper rail is among the species that live in this threatened habitat.

My research indicates that the mysterious "Mystery Goo" deaths of three hundred seabirds in January is tied to the plume of greyish-tan sludge I observed the previous October, described elsewhere on this web site (Click here for details), where I present the only plausible theory thus far advanced explaining the cause and source of the so-called "Mystery Bird Goo".

This mass execution of seabirds is under investigation by California's Department of Fish and Wildlife, but it is clear the material that killed them is of human origin. Laboratory analysis shows the gooey grey material matches drilling fluid used in earth-boring municipal projects such as laying conduit and sewer line.

But there is a bigger picture. The Bird Goo deaths are symptomatic of a systemic threat to Bay Area marine habit. Drought, dredging, street run-off and the use of toxic chemicals to control algae in Alameda's lagoons are all involved, but ignorance and indifference also play a role. This blog seeks to shed light on all these elements of threat to Bay Area marine life and habitat, not just "Bird Goo."

Rowers on Oakland-Alameda Estuary

The Role of Ignorance and Indifference
If you are taking a rowing class in the Oakland-Alameda Estuary, do you notice that flock of black birds you've been plowing through? Yes, the ones that make that whistling sound as their wings pump the air, scrambling to get out of your way. Those are  migrating surf scoters.

by Alan D. Wilson - NaturesPicsOnline

Surf scoters come to San Leandro Bay every year to escape the cold and fatten up for their return flight home: See Wikipedia on Surf Scoters. They're not yet endangered, but their numbers have been cut in half, thanks to human disregard and carelessness like the 2007 Coso Busan oil spill. (Click here for details on the Cosco Busan Oil Spill.)

Rowers need to avoid disturbing the waterfowl, but the Alameda Seabird Massacre illustrates how greater awareness is needed by everyone, not just rowing crews.


Tidal Currents
Tidal currents determined where the plume of sludge I observed last October was carried. A review of the currents surrounding Alameda zeroes-in on the magnitude of the problem.

Refer to Image 1fx below. The colored arrows show the direction of currents around Alameda Island. I know this from 13 years of observation during walks around the Island and from my ongoing research using NOAA* tidal charts. The red arrows indicate my observations of the sludge plume on October 12, 2104, from about 3:45PM until about 6:30PM. The blue arrow is the presumed flow of the sludge prior to my first observation, and the green arrows are my prediction of flows after it got dark.

Path of Toxic Plume

Naively, I had initially thought the sludge plume was carried all the way out through the Golden Gate Bridge after I left, but the NOAA charts indicate the tide reversed at 9:21PM. There wasn't enough time for the sludge to make it much farther than the mouth of the Estuary. From the speed of the plume and the distance to San Francisco Bay, not much of it could have cleared the western tip of Alameda Island before the tide reversed.

As indicated by the green arrows, around 9:30 the plume could have gone in three directions: a) south toward San Leandro and Hayward, b) south, then east along Alameda's south shore or c) due east, right back up the Oakland-Alameda Estuary. The strong current where the Estuary meets the San Francisco Bay would have pulled the vast majority of the plume right back where it came from--to San Leandro Bay.

Then, because of the strong Oakland-Alameda ship channel current, the bulk of the sludge kept going back and forth in the Estuary between San Landro Bay and San Francisco Bay, day after day, week after week, until hundreds of birds were saturated with the goo and began to die.

If, as I maintain elsewhere in this blog, the goo is partially a surfactant, it would have taken repeated exposures for the material to accumulate sufficiently to be lethal. The "goo" is not a one-time exposure event, but an accumulation of months of repeated exposuresa, layer upon layer, of some clarifying foming agent, drilling mud and surfactant imbeded with the various dissolved and undissolved solids that is was designed to adsorb**.

Water depth and volume determine the strength of these currents. Several years ago the Oakland ship channel was deepened from 42 feet to 50 feet. As would be expected, the tide in the Oakland-Alameda Estuary rips along much faster than anywhere else along Alameda's shoreline. The unintended consequence: an ecological death trap for endangered species in San Leandro Bay.


Sediment
According to a city engineer, the discharge from Alameda's finger lagoons had always gone due south, toward the Hayward tidal flats. On the day my friend and I saw the plume, that certainly was not the case, and I suspect this is a permanent change in tidal currents because of a build-up of sediment off Alameda's southern shoreline, as illustrated by Images 1w, 1z? and 1zk.

The shallow areas are tan to beige and the deepest areas are dark blue. The shallowest area is just west of the Otis Street Bridge, where the portals for two lagoons empty into the Alameda-Bay Farm Island channel.

Note also the shallow areas in San Leandro Bay, where two deltas have been formed by effluent from the four natural estuaries. Sediment is being delivered to San Lenadro Bay daily from nearby streets and neighborhoods when people water lawns and wash cars. When it rains, the high volume flushes these sediments farther out, into the estuaries and into San Francisco Bay. During drought, this flushing doesn't occur, and sediment accumulates. Deltas grow larger.

As shown in Images 1z? and 1zk, A man-made delta appears to be forming in the Alameda-Bay Farm channel. This delta is man-made because the sediments come primarily from the two nearby lagoon weirs. The lack of spring rains would naturally accelerate this accumulation of sediment, and it is logical that this build-up would play a key role in offshore tidal currents and could help in accounting for the shift that surprised the city engineer.

An Alarming Conclusion
The alarming consequence of this shift in prevailing tidal currents is that toxic effluent from Alameda's finger lagoons is being drawn by the strong Estuary tidal current through San Leandro Bay, causing an unprecedented, potentially catastrophic threat to the marine ecosystem there and particularly to endangered species such as the clapper rail. In a separate post I have enumerated a list of birds I have personally observed in San Leandro Bay. There are many, many more.

The depth of the ship channel isn't going to change, and, short of a series of torrential storms, the sediment build-up isn't going away. So, to prevent catastrophic damage to the marine ecosystem of San Leandro Bay, we must STOP USING CHEMICALS IN ALAMEDA'S FINGER LAGOONS.




*National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
**Merriam-Webster, Definition of ADSORPTION :the adhesion in an extremely thin layer of molecules (as of gases, solutes, or liquids) to the surfaces of solid bodies or liquids with which they are in contact — compare absorption

Meet the Victims of the Mystery Goo Seabird Massacre

Empty Air

Beautiful creatures
caked with sludge,

unable to forage or fly,

shivering among the rocks and reeds

for hours until they die.

In the winter months, San Leandro Bay becomes a haven for thousands of migrating flocks, from Canada, Alaska, wherever the compass needle points north. They come because it's warm and wet and there's food. They must restore body fat for their return in spring.

Imagine these beautiful creatures threatened by careless or uninformed municipal workers whose focus is only on keeping lagoon water clear and safe. "Those birds are really pretty resilient," one recently said.

This is the scenario that I believe led to the toxic spill I and a friend witnessed and tried to report. Week's later hundreds of waterfowl like these were dead or injured. This blog attempts to link these two events and show how it happened, to help guide the efforts of investigative agencies like California Fish and Wildlife, Cal-EPA and the Regional Water Quality Control Board.

Most of the affected birds were surf scoters, buffleheads, coots and grebes, all of the birds pictured frequent the areas where the lethal "grey goo" did its damage--concentrated in the waters surrounding Alameda Island.

We must find out who did this and hold them accountable. For if we don't, it can happen again.

(click photos to enlarge)

Great blue heron (click to enlarge)

Avocet

Bufflehead

Goldeneye

Surf scoter

Greater scaup

Snowy egret

Horned grebe

Western grebe

Night Heron

Loon

Stilts

Snowy plover

Black-bellied plover

Brown pelican

Coot

Common tern

Clapper rail (c/o Wikipedia)

Surf scoter (male)

What is a Surfactant?

"Think laundry detergent, dish soap."

A mysterious Grey Goo killed or injured five hundred beautiful seabirds in early 2015, many of them from the north on their annual migratory stopover .My research suggests the goo is an emulsion or colloidal suspension* created by the use of an industrial surfactant in Alameda's aging finger lagoons to clarify the water after dredging.

SURFace, ACTive and AgeNT
The term "surfactant" comes from the words, SURFace, ACTive and AgeNT. A surfactant is a chemical substance, usually a liquid, that, among other things, changes the surface tension of water. Common examples would be laundry detergent and household dish-washing soap, which emulsify oils and fats so they can be carried away down the drain.

Surfactants are used in some municipal sewage plants to clarify contaminated water. Surfactants can be used in oil spill clean-up. Oil and water do not mix, but oil can be emulsified by adding a surfactant. It's similar to dunking a greasy skillet into soapy dishwater. Emulsification occurs when surfactant molecules break the oil (or grease) into tiny particles by tightly surrounding them.

A foaming industrial surfactant uses a chemical binding process called "ionic attraction" to attach in a similar way to particles suspended in dirty water. The remaining emulsion or colloidal suspension* can then be skimmed off.

Water Treatment Skimmer

Drill-down with Google Maps on a sewage treatment plant. Those open round vessels with arms extending across are skimmers. (See example at left.)

In the photo at right, it looks as if the lagoons have been turned itno a gigantic laundry tub.

The grey areas (see arrows) denote interaction of the foam with targeted particles (contaminants) stirred up by dredging. This grey material, technically an emulsion or colloidal suspension, is what I suspect to be the bird-killing Grey Mystery Goo reported in the news.

If I am right, the Mystery Goo is essentially an emulsion or colloidal suspension* created by interaction between an industrial surfactant and the contaminants (dissolved and undissolved solids) clouding the water due to the mechanical disturbance of dredging.

The contaminants could also include drilling mud (a fluid used in earth-boring), a form of which was found to match the laboratory analysis of the Bird Goo.

Harmless, but Lethal
Most surfactants are normally harmless to humans, but they can be lethal to waterfowl, especially when dosed repeatedly (See "Continuing Evidence of a Lethal Surfactant" ), because they cut through (emulsify) natural body oils that allow feathers to insulate them from the cold.

When those natural oils are stripped away, the birds die of hypothermia. It is a slow, hideous way to die because of the lengthy suffering it entails.

The chemical properties of a surfactant make it the ultimate toxin in a marine environment because surfactant molecules seek always to get between water and on-aqueous matter. Since essentially no marine life or habitat can escape a surfactant, its killing power is incalculable.

The world's favorite emulsion is ice cream. This was not ice cream.


Breaking News:
It is revealed in an April 19 blog post here that the Goo matches a viscous solution used in well-drilling generically called "drilling mud." (Click here to read the blog about drilling mud matching the Goo 100%.) The drilling mud and the surfactant are comprised 80% of matching materials (tung oil, seed oil, animal fats and silicone.) A foaming agent would emulsify the surfactant and drilling mud, creating a sludge that would float through the lagoon portal out into San Francisco Bay.


Below are several web links to sites that explain surfactants and the process of emulsification.

Web Sites: 
Key Center for Polymer Colloids
"Surfactants": http://discovery.kcpc.usyd.edu.au//9.5.5-short/9.5.5_introsurfactants.html

Youtube Videos:
"32-6 surfactant energy...": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYLbca-hI5E

"What are emulsions": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bC_czAL24zY

"Surfactant. How does a Surfactant Work?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOGtGmScZzw

"How Surfactants Help You Clean": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HwSJLO_cVs

"Warning: Dispersant/surfactant eats through...": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mt7pC8yzvok


*Wikipedia: "An emulsion is a mixture of two or more liquids that are normally immiscible (unmixable or unblendable) ...A colloid is a substance in which microscopically dispersed insoluble particles are suspended throughout another substance.Sometimes the dispersed substance alone is called the colloid;^[1] the term colloidal suspension refers unambiguously to the overall mixture,,."

"A foaming agent is a material that facilitates formation of foam such as a surfactant or a blowing agent. A surfactant, when present in small amounts, reduces surface tension of a liquid (reduces the work needed to create the foam) or increases its colloidal stability by inhibiting coalescence of bubbles."


Other References:
Bätje, M., and H. Michaelis. 1986. Phaeocystis pouchetii blooms in the East Frisian coastal waters (German Bight, North Sea). Marine Biology 93:21-27.
Courtemanch, D. 2004. Foam—A cause for concern? http://www.state.me.us/dep/blwq/doclake/foam.htm

Eckhardt, B.W., and T.R. Moore. 1990. Controls on dissolved organic carbon concentrations in streams, southern Quebec. Can. J. Fish. Aquat. Sci. 47:1537-1544.

Fact Sheet: Foam. 2004. Indiana Department of Environmental Management, Office of Water Quality Assessment Branch.
http://www.in.gov/idem/macs/factsheets/media/foam.html

Fendinger, J.J., D.J. Versteeg, E Weeg, S. Dyer, and R.A. Rapaport. 1994. Environmental behavior and fate of anionic surfactants. In, Environmental Chemistry of Lakes and Reservoirs, L.A. Baker (ed.). American Chemical Society, Washington D.C.

Fuller, D. 2003. The occurrence of foam on lakes and streams. Great Lakes Environmental Directory, 394 Lake Ave. S. Suite #222, Duluth, MN 55802. http://www.greatlakesdirectory.org/zarticles/012903_great_lakes1.htm

Gergel, S.E., M.G. Turner, and T. K. Kratz. 1999. Dissolved organic carbon as an indicator of the scale of watershed influence on Lakes and Rivers. Ecological Applications 9:1377-1390.

Maryland Department of Natural Resources. 2004. Harmful Algae Blooms in Maryland. 
http://mddnr.chesapeakebay.net/hab/news_083104.cfm


Wegner, C., and M. Haburger. 2002. Occurrence of stable foam in the Upper Rhine River caused by plant-derived surfactants. Environmental Science and Technology 36:3250-3256.

From Dredging to Bird Goo: How Does It Happen?

I live on a seawater lagoon in Alameda and for some reason they are doing dredging this week all around the lagoon. Never seen boat traffic like this on the water here ever. Usually it is kayaks and paddle boats. So I shot this timelapse of the dredging. In case you have never seen it yourself. Choose to ignore if you want. I thought it was kinda cool. Posted to Facebook "Peeps" Group by Kevin Rockwell on Thursday, October 23, 2014

What could link the dredging of a lagoon to the San Francisco Bay Area's Mystery Bird Goo and Alameda's October 2014 Invisible Spill?

It is not the dredging itself but a side-effect--the post-dredging clarification of cloudy lagoon water with a foaming surfactant* which can create a plume of sludge that morphs over time from exposure to the sun and elements into bird-killing goo.

The mechanical disturbance of the lagoon floor necessitated by dredging clouds the water, referred to as turbidity.

Turbidity is unsightly and can be smelly, and it won't go away quickly. Not without help. The particles the turbid water contains can be toxic to marine life and damage habitat. Many municipal sewage plants routinely use surfactants for clarifying contaminated water, but their use is controversial and many surfactants are restricted throughout the world.

Evidence of the apparent use of a foaming surfactant appears in the photo at Image 1kc. The grey fringe around the white foam suggests a chemical reaction is occurring between the foam and the water's contaminants (undissolved and dissolved solids, in technical terms.) This photo was taken from within Alameda's finger lagoon community and posted on Facebook by Kevin Rockwell.

The photo shows many splotches of the same grey as the foam's fringe. It's the same color as the bird goo, and it floats like the bird goo. The reported chemical content of the goo ("silicone fluids, tung oils, resins or rosin oils, animal fats, and edible or inedible seed oils from plants") is not inconsistent with surfactant-laced post-dredging lagoon contaminants.**

Lagoon dredging stirs up decades-old deposits, throwing them into suspension. The surfactant "grabs" these particles, clarifying the water, but the residual composite "grey goo" must be accounted for.

I maintain that it is this mobile post-dredging composite of surfactant-contaminants that hitched a ride on the outgoing tide through the lagoon portal on October 12, 2014 and is the very material that I and my friend observed that afternoon.  I maintain that such a clarifying agent IS the source of the grey bird-killing goo.

SFGate.com reports that even California Department of Fish and Wildlife specialists aren't sure what, exactly, is in the "goo" that's harming the birds. International Bird Rescue describes the contaminant as a "viscous substance that destroys feather waterproofing, which can cause hypothermia and death;". This is precisely the effect a surfactant would have. (I have contacted International Bird Rescue about my surfactant theory.)



Look closely and note how hard the grey is to discern from surrounding water. This may be why neither the Alameda nor Oakland Fire Departments could act on my 911 calls. To the untrained eye, the goo can be practically invisible. 

The next step is proving it. This photo is the closest I have come to finding a "smoking gun" for the Mystery Goo and the October plume of sludge I reported.



*An acronyn for SURFace-ACTive AgeNT. See Wikipedia explanation of surfactants A surfactant can be lethal to marine flora and fauna, stripping away protective slime and body oils, exposing these plants and creatures to parasites, disease and noxious or poisonous elements such as herbicides, leading to an often hideous death.

**Reference SF Gate's article about Cal Fish & Wildlife's lab analysis of the goo: Scientists close in on IDing bird-killing mystery goo.