Top all-time · #17392
Robert Francis
Personal blog · birdhistory.substack.comsciencehistory
Robert Francis writes Bird History, a personal blog at birdhistory.substack.com about science and history. Since 2024, 4 different Hacker News readers have linked it 4 times, most often “The First Cat War”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-15, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (1) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
Linked for a post reflecting on work as a bird collision monitor at wind turbines, about bird deaths from turbine blades. The one comment disputes the framing that blades are a risk and compares death counts by cause.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 1 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Telling the stories of the birds of America - and the people who named them, ate them, studied them, and saved them.
Most-linked posts?
- The First Cat War2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2024-03-29
- 100 Greatest Bird Names of All Time2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2026-06-03
What Hacker News says?
> we're told the blades are a risk This is a moral panic emanating from the same people who brought you "climate change isn't real because snow still happens". If you look at graphs of the number of preventable bird deaths due to human causes, the graph is dominated by outdoor cats (which kill billions per year), then a sliver of that is from window collisions, then the part attributable to wind turbines is too smal…
Comment linking /p/the-first-cat-war
on “Reflections of a bird collision monitor”Submitted The First Cat War as a story · 40 points
HN discussionSubmitted 100 Greatest Bird Names of All Time as a story · 2 points
HN discussionSubmitted Greatest Bird Names of All Time as a story · 1 points
HN discussion