In Ukraine’s Donbas region, birds have begun weaving their nests from plastic drone remnants and fiber-optic cable left on battlefields, in a striking sign of how the war is reshaping wildlife habitats. TechSpot reported the phenomenon on Wednesday, saying it was discovered in an area that has been affected by intense fighting since 2014.
The report was prompted by a photo posted on X by Olena Tregub, a co-founder of the Independent Commission for Combating Security Corruption. She said a Russian glide bomb brought down a tree in Donbas, and a bird’s nest rolled out from the shattered branches. The nest appeared to be made of grass and thin strands of fiber-optic cable used by FPV drones on both sides of the war.
Unlike radio-controlled FPV drones, fiber-optic drones trail a physical cable that cannot be jammed by conventional electronic warfare. Their downside is that each flight can leave behind kilometers of nearly invisible plastic wire in fields, roads, forests, and trenches. Some of these spools can stretch up to 65 kilometers, or about 40 miles, while earlier systems reached about 42 kilometers.
For birds, the fibers are just another nesting material, because they are light, flexible, strong, and likely offer some insulation. But researchers have warned that discarded fiber-optic cables may become a long-term environmental problem in Ukraine. The British Ornithologists’ Union said polymer fiber-optic lines used by drones could entangle birds, bats, and ground-dwelling mammals, and could also break down into microplastics over time.
