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Impact of solar lights on wildlife ?
Rachel Shutt
Posts: 3
Are the impact of solar lights having an impact on night time wildlife? I've noticed that there are more of these lights popping up in neighbouring gardens which is now having an impact on the nocturnal wildlife into my garden, is anyone else concerned about the problems they may be causing for our wildlife ?
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That shoots the theory down in flames pansyface!
I can't see how it would have a significant effect. After all, the street lights don't seem to make any difference. Animals will adapt - as pansyface as seen. It would be interesting to see if there's a difference when houses are festooned with Chr***mas lights in a few weeks time.
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
A house across the rise has a light which is set off by a motion sensor - we couldn't work out why it went on and off so much on some evenings ... until we realised the bats were using it to trap moths.
Our streetlights turn off at midnight and back on at 5am - pitch dark out there in the middle of the night unless the moon is up
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
You can't extrapolate from seeing some species that aren't too bothered (e.g. Pipistrelles) to assume that all species are equally unaffected. Several species of bat (e.g. Lesser Horseshoe, which has declined a lot) are badly affected by light at night, although garden solar lighting is probably fairly minor compared to street lights, security lights etc. Lighting around/near a roost entrance could be pretty disruptive to some species.
I'm sure it does affect some species more than others - now that our lights are out at night our robin goes to the main road to sing all night under the streetlights - he must be exhausted
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
I think Verdun's right - and over time, nature generally adapts to it's surroundings. Every time a new shopping complex or housing estate is built, most of the creatures that were living there will move elsewhere. Also, developers have to plant trees etc in these areas, so you could argue that they're helping some species of wildlife, and lots of 'new house' owners will make gardens. So it's not all bad. Swings and roundabouts....literally.
We can't save the world, but we can save small parts of it. It's only when humans start building on or digging up every tiny scrap of land that we'll need to worry. Hopefully I won't be around to see that.
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
I think because I've always lived in a remote area with no street lights or security lights my evenings have always been in darkness but now I've recently moved into a small town we have street lights (which are turned off at 24.00)and some neighbours with security lights and multiple solar lights, so this is why I'd wondered what all the lighting had on the wildlife. I think I shall start to monitor my wildlife and see the local results I get.
As an astronomer, I absolutely hate the things. Artificial lighting at night not only affects wildlife but us too! Please take a read of some of these links:
http://darksky.org/light-pollution/wildlife/
http://www.britastro.org/dark-skies/wildlife.html
http://darksky.org/light-pollution/human-health/
Our local streetlamps now also go off at midnight which is wonderful - I can, at last, see the stars again!
Most of the children I ask have NEVER seen the milky way which I find really sad!
And re-torches I grew up using these in the evenings and loved to see and hear the owls, bats, foxes, badgers and monitor the moths whilst enjoying spectacular star formations. If friends need to go out in the dark who live in rural areas they tell me they prefer to wear head torches and that they're small enough to pop into their pockets. Maybe because I'm older and my living location has changed, I'm just reminiscing about my lost younger wildlife experiences.
Bobthegardener I have never seen the milkyway
Always too cloudy on our camping holidays in wales and too much light pollution from nearby towns everywhere else