The bill passed City Council and was signed by the mayor of Washington DC last 
year. It takes effect in 2022. Reasons for the ban were that gas-powered leaf 
blowers violated the noise ordinance already in effect, and their engines are 
very polluting of the air, thus they are a double hazard, particularly for the 
people using them, while battery-powered leaf blowers are already available 
which don’t have either of these problems. Such bans had already been enacted 
in over 100 cities. 

(The DC ban will not affect federal lands, which will continue use chemical 
weapons, noise grenades, and military police either mounted on horses or on 
foot with batons. No wait, that’s how they mow down peaceful people. But DC has 
limited self-rule and cannot control the feds, whose general policy of late is 
to pollute.)

Excess noise affects wildlife, and it also adds stress to people and affects 
our enjoyment of wildlife. As someone who values the hearing I still have and 
my ability to hear, identify, and enjoy birds, I would love it if all the 
lawn-care devices were as clean, quiet, and effective as my meticulous 
80-something-year-old next door neighbor and the rake she uses. Leaf blowers 
always struck me as an offensively absurd waste of energy in addition to the 
noise and air pollution, just one of many examples of completely unnecessary 
environmental destruction which affects the climate and birds along with many 
other negative consequences. Better yet, let the leaves return to the soil in 
place wherever you can.

When I am on the first mile of the Black Diamond Trail I am often bothered by 
the lawn mowers at Cass Park. This past May 19 at 9:50am I was very surprised 
and fortunate to hear and then see a singing Swainson’s Thrush a few feet away 
from the Black Diamond Trail above the Hangar Theatre. I could easily have 
missed it (perhaps I did miss others) because there was a big active Cass Park 
mower making lots of noise at the time. Without the noise pollution I could 
have heard and enjoyed the Thrush more easily and from farther away, and 
non-birders on the trail might have noticed it as well and gotten just a taste 
of the beauty that is still out there. 

Rather than use our tax dollars to pay someone to pollute Cass Park while 
mowing it, I would rather that a part of sports team workouts included using 
manual reel mowers to maintain the playing fields. It seems to me that the 
amount of lawn one owns should not exceed the amount one is willing to 
personally supply the energy and time to cut. For people who feel compelled to 
mow lawns but lack that strength, electric lawnmowers, like electric 
leaf-blowers and electric weed-whackers, are much quieter and less stinky than 
gasoline powered. 

- - Dave Nutter

> On Jun 14, 2020, at 5:37 PM, Regi Teasley <rltcay...@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> This concerns the use of gas-powered leaf blowers and their impact on birds.
> Comments please.
> 
> https://anshome.org/2018/08/ans-testimony-on-wildlife-harming-noise/
> 
> Regi
> Ithaca
> ____________
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> or weary of life.  Rachel Carson.
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