Re: high voltage emissions effects on animals

Hi Ted!

I have seen a small amount of material on this subject. Please be aware that it is a controversial area in science. Up until recently, the accepted wisdom held that electromagnetic fields had NO impact on chemistry or biology. The recent stir about powerline EM fields and cancer was supposedly debunked. Yet today the tide seems to be turning, and new evidence for direct effects of EM upon biology is rapidly appearing. The major part of the information regards effects upon humans, not animals.

At low frequencies used in electric power transmission, the voltage fields and magnetic fields behave as separate phenomena. The deer could be responding to one or the other. Power transformers will be surrounded by significant magnetic fields, although any associated power lines will also produce voltage fields (electrostatic fields.)

It's reported that ants are attracted to household AC cables. See the article below this list of links. I've also seen this discussed in NEW SCIENTIST magazine in the UK, so presumably the ant-attraction phenomena is not local to Texas.

Science Politics: EM Fields and biology
More politics: Linde's statement at EMF review symposium
Science News: EMFs' Biological Influences
Science News: Magnetic fields can diminish drug action
Science News: Electromagnetic fields may trigger enzymes
The Bioelectromagnetics Society
Microwave News: Table of Contents
Dr. R. A. Luben, research on EM fields and biology
WEIRD SCIENCE: Magnetic fields affect chemistry?

FROM A WEB SEARCH:

]From WIRED via PointCast:
]
] Another Computer Bug: Ants in the Machine
] by Ashley Craddock, 19 May 1997
]
] Stephanie Upps watched in horror as one of her final papers disappeared
] off her PowerBook at 2 a.m. one night during her last semester as a
] University of Texas graduate student. Her friends couldn't find the bug,
] so she called the 1-800 support line in desperation.  "They told me to
] pull out the battery and give them the serial number," she says. "When I
] did, it was just crawling with ants."  Far from a fluke, Upps' encounter
] with ants in the machine is happening to others with greater
] frequency. "The problem's endemic across Texas," she said.

• Major problem is fire ants, an exotic introduced to the Southern US in the 1920s.
• Fire ants seem to like living in and eating electrical equipment.
• The critters may be attracted by electrical fields; Craddock writes,` "They have some short-range attraction to electricity," says Dr. Harlan Thorvilson of Texas Tech's Department of Plant and Soil Sciences. . . . "They become almost mesmerized and behave oddly, piling dirt against the wires and signaling to other members of their communities who come and join them." '