Please have a look at these links.

http://birding.about.com/od/birdconservation/fl/Birds-and-Drones.htm

http://phys.org/news/2016-04-quantifies-impact-drones-bird-life.html

Thanks Arvind.  The first is a report from a paper on testing the deployment of drones for scientific use and the second is a scoping discussion post mentioning possible problems with recreational drones but no evidence (other than common sense!).  I was looking for a synthesis of any evidence so far, or any primary reports of impacts (or lack of such) from recreational use.  But those are both very helpful, thank you.

Dear Gary,

Please check this PDF attachment.

Good luck

Thanks Arvind - very interesting.  

Gary 

Hi.

I have heard of cases of attack of drones in flight by some raptors, as the drones were very close to their breeding territories. It may be a problem for the conservation of endangered species, e.g. the Osprey in the Canary Islands. In any case, for the moment the effect of drones on birds seems to be low in our archipelago, but this can change in the near future if there is no appropiate regulation and surveillance of natural protected areas...

Best regards. 

Thanks Ruben.  It might be worth publishing a short note if you see any behavioural response as there is virtually nothing published on basic observations that I can find.

Cheers 

Dear Gary,

Yes, you're right, but I haven't seen such interactions in the field. The observations were made by other people from Iberian Peninsula.

Fortunately, this activity is being regulated in some protected areas (e.g. Canarian National Parks), so it seems its negative effect on local birds must be low, but the situation can be different in other sites without appropiate regulations and field surveillance. 

Best regards.

I know of an attack of a raptor (a buzzard) on a drone, which lead to the crash-down of the drone. It happened on the Peloponnes in Greece this year in May. I do not know it, but I think it was close to the nesting area of the bird.

Rudolf - thanks very much for that.  Is this observation published?  If its was by you then I woudl encourage you to write it up reporting it as a simple observation.  Biodiversity Observations is an easy place to publish such things.

Hi Gary,

Here is a link to an Ibis blog from last year summarising a Biology Letters paper. They experimentally tested behavioural disturbance response of waterfowl to a quadcopter. Whilst it was specifically aimed at simulating drone use for wildlife research, as McEvoy et al 2016 does, it can also be applied to much recreational drone use which tends to use quadcopters at low altitudes. 

Other places you could also check are the Journal of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (see link) and the Researchgate page of Margarita Muleroe-Pázmány in Seville.

All the best, Matthew

http://www.bou.org.uk/of-drones-and-birds/

http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/journal/juvs

Biological Observations published the note on Whimbrel today.  You can view it on RG here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/306039832_Fleeing_by_Whimbrel_Numenius_phaeopus_in_response_to_a_recreational_drone_in_Maputo_Bay_Mozambique or here on BO:   http://oo.adu.org.za/content.php?id=237 .  Thanks very much for your inputs.

Article Fleeing by Whimbrel Numenius phaeopus in response to a recre...