Is electromagnetic radiation harmful to small birds like budgies?

 

im talking about the sort of EMR that is emitted from things like computers, cell phones, TV and stuff like that. normal household items (not including microwave ovens)

my GF is afraid our budgis are getting ill becouse we have them in our living room.

 

so i would like to know if anyone has had experience or just heard any reliable info if it´s harmful or not.

 

the reason i´m asking is becouse in August one of our birds died from Luekemia and now in Mars a second budgie died from yet unknown causes (we are waiting for the autopsy report) but it´s likely it´s some form of cancer or blood dicease. and to top it of, a 3rd budgie (wich we bought in late october) has had a eleveated level of "lymfocytes" i think they´re called but no infection wich would mean he has started to develop Leukemia.

the swedish radiological protection agency sais there is no risk for leukemia due to EMR in small children or animals (as was a great fear some 20 years ago), but what about budgies, i expect they mean cats and dogs when they say animals.

 

i´ts too much of a coincidence if 2 of our birds (that is in no way related or has ever met eachother) developes Leukemia and a 3rd dies from things that might be cancer or Leukemia in less then 9 months.

We have even moved to a new apartment in a new city becouse of this.

I don't have anything scientific to add, but just this anecdotal tale. Some customers of mine were telling me about their previous budgies. All of them lived into their teens. Except for their last one, which only lived to be about seven. They were speculating that the last one might have died younger because it had lived its life near the television. (But I guess the other ones hadn't). So they thought that over time, something from the TV might have had an effect on their bird. Now, that's total speculation, and probably not true, but if it were, it took seven years of builiding up before it killed the bird.

 

 

I agree with you that your case sounds like too much of a coincidence. Reading it, I thought that whatever it was, your family would be exposed to it as well. You read stories about towns and neighborhoods that are contaminated in some way causing higher than normal incidences of cancers. It is often blamed on the water, or on massive overhead power lines. There is also something called "new building syndrome" where formaldehyde is released from building materials. I don't know if any of that applies to your situation, but it sounds like a good idea that you moved away.

Hi re. your query about TV & birds. It's a well known urban myth. Scientist believe it is due to the mind numbing

number of repeats leading to death by boredom. I've got it, myself unfortunately it 's TERMINAL. Yours B.J.

 

 

 

 

We have a Air Purifier and a Air Humidifier wich we bought for our birds, but we are thinking that maybe they are causing our problems, both are ionizing and we wonder if they produce some kind of radiation or similar.

we know that the purifier according to the manufacturer may produce "small amounts" of ozon, might that be the cause?

does anyone know anything about it? is the ionizing dangerous to the birds?

does anyone use similar things?

we dont use them anymore after we moved and we are afraid to use them right now (until we find sources that say if they are dangerous or not, we wont take any chances.)

Hiya,

 

I'm a Building Biologist, and very interested in using this to help pets as well as people. When I read your question about EMR possibly affecting your budgies, I was interested, because EMR does affect humans and mammalian pets in the ways you've described - increasing cancer and leukaemia risk - so there's no reason why it wouldn't also affect birds in that way. Putting your birds next to a TV - especially an older style CRT TV - wouldn't be good, because those TVs do have a relatively large electromagnetic field. The ones I've tested so far have had a field of about one and a half to two metres around the TV, so if you ensure that you and your birds spend time outside of that distance, that's good. Obviously, turning it on etc is a short-term thing and not an issue, but don't spend a lot of time within that distance.

 

Microwaves you've obviously recognised as a huge source of EMR. Absolute minimum distance from a microwave I recommend is three metres. Same with your power meter box, the one on the side of your house / unit. Don't have your bed within three metres of that either.

 

Appliances that people don't tend to remember are washing machines or dryers, dishwashers and ovens - make sure you and your birds aren't spending large amounts of time within about three metres of those either (even if they're on the other side of the wall).

 

All of these measurements are in circles, too - three metres radius around the appliance, even if there's a wall in between. Unfortunately, without actually coming out and measuring your particular house and your particular circumstances (and any Building Biologist will be happy to assist with that) I can't give specific advice, however these are the precautionary principles we use. Because until it's been proven that EMR does NOT affect your health, it's better and safer to be cautious and stay at a safe distance from them. There's more information on my website (google Red Fox Building Biology) however any Building Biologist would love to assist you.

 

Also, you need to check outside - high voltage power lines, electrical substations and mobile phone towers can also have an effect.

 

I know that the effects on children and small animals such as cats and dogs are much higher than the effects on adults, so I would have to think the effects on birds would be even more pronounced.

 

Hope this helps!

 

Oh, with the humidifier - correct humidity for humans (and as birds live in close proximity I have to assume for them too) is between 40 and 60% RH. Optimum is 50%. Outside of these and you'll start to have respiratory issues.

Thanks for a great answer.

what about a LCD tv? whats the distance recomended around that?

i have read that it shouldnt be more then a couple of inches, but i dont know if i can trust that source completely.

 

anyway, we dont have anything other than the TV (wich is a LCD) in the same room as them right now. they are placed atleast 3m from the TV now, and when thy are out flying they dont stay within 2m from it anyway (they usually stay on the curtain pole) so im not really concerned about it after your answer, but it´s great to know so we can avoid placing bad things near them in the future.

 

what do you think about Infrared heat lights? they should be okay i hope?

and same about special bird UV lights (from Arcadia), what distance would you recomend between that and the cage?

 

there are a lot of questions right now, since 1 bird died in august in Leukemia, one in Mars from Lymphoma and our youngest one wich has been with us since November has very high levels of Lymfocytes (wich might indicate Lymphoma or Leukemia)

if it´s effecting them THAT FAST it must be something very bad.

the youngest one is from a different supplier and a different breeder so it´s impossible it may be from there. our only conclusion is that it is (or was) something in our old home.

we pray that our youngster may live a long and happy life, but cancer in birds seems to be impossible to save them from.

Have you considered that it might be the result of avian leukosis virus, or something similar? Especially if you sourced the birds from the same breeder. Because it seems to be happening so quickly I think its unlikely that the deaths are due to radiation (although I'm not an expert, so I wouldn't rule it out). ALV has mostly been studied in chickens but there is some evidence that it can cause lymphoma and other cancers in budgies... if thats the case it could either be endogenous (already part of their genetic make-up) or exogenous (from a recent infection). Unfortunately I'm not sure there are currently any effective treatments, but it might be worth looking into? Good luck

They are all from different breeders for a starter so it´s not genetically what we know.

We have checked the youngster for viruses wich came out clean.

 

and, to our great joy when we was at the vet last week for a checkup to see how much worse it had gotten all the new tests came out clean.

the X-ray was like frome a handbook and so was the exterior examination according to the vet, and the blood test didnt show anything at all. it was all like taken from a handbook of how a healthy bird should be.

 

the things we did was first of all move to a different apartment in a new town far away from the old place (that way we also got to a new vet)

second of all we gave them organic decaffeinated green tea! and organic aloe vera juice diluted in water (1 part aloe vera juice and 4 parts water)

but they only got that for 2 days so we´re not sure how it affected them.

but anyhow, the examination sais he is as healthy as a bird can be!

 

also the bird we have that had a huge amount of basophiles a couple of months ago had almost the same results, she did have some high values in the blood, but the vet said it might just have been stress.

 

so, whatever happened the symptoms they shown earlier is completely gone.

but, we still keep an eye on them just in case.

I wonder if the tests you had done before were false positives. That is not uncommon in the lab test world. They also say that different people (doctors or technicians) can interpret test results differently and do physical exams differently.

 

 

Also, if the ALV that Shann RK mentioned is mainly a chicken disease, it's possible that your old vet never considered testing a budgie for that one. If it can come about by infection, that could explain why it affected unrelated birds. We could speculate that your birds that are healthy now may have developed an immunity to it, whereas the other ones succombed. (Since we really don't know and all we have is speculation.) I'm just glad they seem to be all better now. Congratulations on that!