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Since You Asked Birds don�t get Klamath water either We keep hearing about the fish getting the farmers� water over by Klamath Falls. What about the birds at the national wildlife refuges there? Do they get water too? � Don S., Medford What many birds may face this year is a cruel death, Don. Refuge officials have been given 180,000 acres of land to manage, but no water has been delivered to the refuges since January. Biologists say that countless thousands of ducks, geese, herons, egrets, ibises, avocets, sandhill cranes and other birds face a lingering death without water this summer and fall. The Klamath Basin is one of the main stops on the Pacific Flyway, one of four main north-south corridors for migrating North American birds. With 80 percent of the basin�s historic wetlands converted to agriculture over the past century as people were lured there to farm, the annual bird count has dropped from an estimated 6 million to something more like a million. But the refuges get their water from the same canals that are used to supply water to the basin�s farms. By this winter the lack of water is expected to begin killing bald eagles, for whom the refuges are the most important gathering point in the lower 48 states. The eagles prey on the waterfowl that will be dying of thirst and disease. Eagles, unlike the suckers of Upper Klamath Lake, are no longer on the endangered species list and so don�t get the protection afforded the suckers. ( "Sinc e You Asked'' is a daily feature in the Mail Tribune that answers questions from readers on virtually any topic of general interest. To submit a question, e-mail us at [email protected] Please include your name, address and phone number for verification. If you have specific questions about our Web site or other questions about the Mail Tribune, please send them to [email protected] ) Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.