Author Archives: MadelineBodin

Feds Honor State Biologists

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Heidi Holman

Three state biologists and one tribal biologist have been named US Fish & Wildlife Service Recovery Champions for 2010. According to the announcement, Recovery Champions, “are U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service staff and their partners whose work is advancing the recovery of endangered and threatened species of plants and animals.”

The state biologists who won the award are Heidi Holman and Lindsay Webb of the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department, Misty Buchanan of the North Carolina Natural Heritage Program, and Dan Carney of Blackfeet Fish and Wildlife in Montana.

The award honors the New Hampshire scientists for helping to restore the Karner blue butterfly, which was at the brink of extirpation from New Hampshire when their work began. More information about their work for the Karner blue is available in a New Hampshire Fish and Game press release, and in the Recovery Champions announcement.

Misty Buchanan was honored for her work with two plants, rough-leaf loosestrife and golden sedge. She was named for her survey work on 27 listed plant species in North Carolina, which located populations of those species, and provided information about their health. That expertise made her a valuable partner to the US Fish and Wildlife Service.

Dan Carney was recognized for his work with grizzly bears on the Blackfeet Indian Researvation in Montanta. The US Fish and Wildlife Service cites his tireless work in defusing conflicts between the grizzly bears and humans, as well as his management plan, and research as key factors in the grizzly bear recovery in the hundreds of square miles of bear habitat on the reservation. He works for the Blackfeet Nation. A US Fish and Wildlife press release has more info. His award generated TV coverage.

More info on the work of all of these wildlife biologists is available from the Recovery Champions announcement.

Photo: Heidi Holman participates in a controlled burn. Photo credit: NH Fish and Game

Upcoming Research Round-up

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The New York Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit is planning two black bear studies.One will study New York’s black bear population as it moves into new areas. GPS-collared bears will be tracked in core habitats and fringe areas. The researcher will compare how bears chose habitats and when they use habitats in the core areas to where to when they are active in newly populated areas. Another study will use DNA to estimate the population of black bears in those newly-occupied regions of the state. The study will use mitochondrial DNA markers from hair samples snagged on barbed-wire snares for a mark-and-recapture survey of sorts. More details are available in the NY Cooperative Unit’s newsletter.

In Oklahoma, biologists with the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation are planning a big study of bobwhite quail to gather the data needed to try to rebuild bobwhite quail populations in the Rolling Plains in the western part of the state. The study will investigate toxins, weather, parasites, and predators as potential causes of the bobwhite quail population’s decline. The biologists will coordinate their efforts with biologists in west Texas, since the Rolling Plains region crosses state lines. Read more in the Oklahoman. More info on quail in the Rolling Plains is available from the Rolling Plains Quail Research Ranch (which is in Texas).

Photos: Bobwhite: Dan Sudia, US Fish &Wildlife; Black bear, US Fish & Wildlife

Harnessing March Madness – Great Lakes SmackDown

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A great example of how to liven up important conservation information is the Great Lakes SmackDown!, created by two graduate students at Michigan State University. (In the spirit of academia, their work is done for the Great Lakes Echo, a news service that is a program of the Knight Center for Environmental Journalism at MSU. Got it?)

Graphic: John Kalmar. Great Lakes Echo

This March, an invasive species version of the NCAA basketball tournament has a Sweet Sixteen of invasive plants and animals facing off to determine which of the exotic losers is the most destructive to the Great Lakes region. This time the focus is on land-based invaders, and the competitors include the mute swan, the feral hog, and the gypsy moth.

After perusing fighter profiles, participants submit their brackets, then vote to influence the outcome of each bout.

Last October, a similar SmackDown pitted eight aquatic invaders against each other for the title of “most destructive.” The quagga mussel, aka “The Quagmeister” finished on top. Twenty-five people submitted brackets, and there were over 100 votes in the polls. Best of all, the SmackDown received local newspaper and radio coverage.

“The fact that we pulled it together and got very positive feedback from readers, scientists and our colleagues was a success in itself,” said Alice Rossignol, who coordinates the SmackDown with Rachael Gleason. She expects this March’s SmackDown to be even more successful, thanks to public relations assistance from Michigan State University.

While everything about the SmackDown is executed with Comedy Central-worthy humor, you don’t have to be funny to pull off a similar project, the coordinators said.

“If you have a new idea that discusses an issue in a new way, go for it,” said Rossignol. “The project’s character will be shaped for your own effort and how people interact and respond to it.”

“The SmackDown! was funny because it was fun — fun to read, fun to be a part of and especially fun to put together,” said Gleason, . “We wanted to relate to our readers and get them thinking about an important issue in a new way. And who doesn’t love filling out a March Madness bracket? After deciding on that theme, everything else, like the idea to characterize invasive species as cage fighters, fell into place”

Harnessing March Madness – Great Lakes SmackDown

Posted on by
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A great example of how to liven up important conservation information is the Great Lakes SmackDown!, created by two graduate students at Michigan State University. (In the spirit of academia, their work is done for the Great Lakes Echo, a news service that is a program of the Knight Center for Environmental Journalism at MSU. Got it?)

Graphic: John Kalmar. Great Lakes Echo

This March, an invasive species version of the NCAA basketball tournament has a Sweet Sixteen of invasive plants and animals facing off to determine which of the exotic losers is the most destructive to the Great Lakes region. This time the focus is on land-based invaders, and the competitors include the mute swan, the feral hog, and the gypsy moth.

After perusing fighter profiles, participants submit their brackets, then vote to influence the outcome of each bout.

Last October, a similar SmackDown pitted eight aquatic invaders against each other for the title of “most destructive.” The quagga mussel, aka “The Quagmeister” finished on top. Twenty-five people submitted brackets, and there were over 100 votes in the polls. Best of all, the SmackDown received local newspaper and radio coverage.

“The fact that we pulled it together and got very positive feedback from readers, scientists and our colleagues was a success in itself,” said Alice Rossignol, who coordinates the SmackDown with Rachael Gleason. She expects this March’s SmackDown to be even more successful, thanks to public relations assistance from Michigan State University.

While everything about the SmackDown is executed with Comedy Central-worthy humor, you don’t have to be funny to pull off a similar project, the coordinators said.

“If you have a new idea that discusses an issue in a new way, go for it,” said Rossignol. “The project’s character will be shaped for your own effort and how people interact and respond to it.”

“The SmackDown! was funny because it was fun — fun to read, fun to be a part of and especially fun to put together,” said Gleason, . “We wanted to relate to our readers and get them thinking about an important issue in a new way. And who doesn’t love filling out a March Madness bracket? After deciding on that theme, everything else, like the idea to characterize invasive species as cage fighters, fell into place”

Light, fertilization, and biodiversity

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Fertilizing a grassland will cause plant biodiversity there to decrease. It’s not known why this is so, and one theory says that it is because some fast-growing species shade out slower-growing species. A recent study in the journal Ecology Letters says that it’s not a lack of light, or at least not just a lack of light, that is stifling diversity. The study found that the impact of light availability varied greatly in years when there were droughts.

In dry years more light meant less diversity, but in wet years, more light meant more diversity. Either way, fertilization meant species diversity went down, no matter what the light situation was.

With nutrient pollution such a widespread problem, getting to the bottom of this would be useful in protecting rare plants and threatened ecosystems.This paper doesn’t offer the answer, but adds another piece to the puzzle.

Find the paper here.

A previous paper on the subject appeared in the journal Science two years ago. Find that paper here.

Photo: Bobolink, a grassland bird, courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service

Light, fertilization, and biodiversity

Posted on by
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Fertilizing a grassland will cause plant biodiversity there to decrease. It’s not known why this is so, and one theory says that it is because some fast-growing species shade out slower-growing species. A recent study in the journal Ecology Letters says that it’s not a lack of light, or at least not just a lack of light, that is stifling diversity. The study found that the impact of light availability varied greatly in years when there were droughts.

In dry years more light meant less diversity, but in wet years, more light meant more diversity. Either way, fertilization meant species diversity went down, no matter what the light situation was.

With nutrient pollution such a widespread problem, getting to the bottom of this would be useful in protecting rare plants and threatened ecosystems.This paper doesn’t offer the answer, but adds another piece to the puzzle.

Find the paper here.

A previous paper on the subject appeared in the journal Science two years ago. Find that paper here.

Photo: Bobolink, a grassland bird, courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service

Stats on two threats to birds

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A study of a Wisconsin wind farm found that raptors mostly avoided the site, resulting in a big reduction of raptors in the area after the turbines went up. It also found that red-tailed hawks and turkey vultures took the most risks near the turbines, although red-tails were the only raptors found dead in the wind farm. Read the open-access article in The Journal of Applied Ecology here.

Also in the Journal of Applied Ecology, Dutch researchers found that birds breeding near noisy roadways had smaller clutch sizes than other birds. When the roads were noisy in April, the birds had fewer fledglings, regardless of clutch size. The species studied was Parus major. The paper, again, open access, is here.

Stats on two threats to birds

Posted on by
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A study of a Wisconsin wind farm found that raptors mostly avoided the site, resulting in a big reduction of raptors in the area after the turbines went up. It also found that red-tailed hawks and turkey vultures took the most risks near the turbines, although red-tails were the only raptors found dead in the wind farm. Read the open-access article in The Journal of Applied Ecology here.

Also in the Journal of Applied Ecology, Dutch researchers found that birds breeding near noisy roadways had smaller clutch sizes than other birds. When the roads were noisy in April, the birds had fewer fledglings, regardless of clutch size. The species studied was Parus major. The paper, again, open access, is here.

Climate change and bird feeders

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Even when bird feeders are readily available, some species of birds head for warmer climes, says a paper in the latest issue of the Journal of Animal Ecology. The scientists, who are affiliated with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Project FeederWatch, studied 18 bird species that are common at bird feeders in the northeastern US and found that some species of birds did not stick around over the winter in spite of there being plenty to eat at bird feeders.

They also found that the birds that stayed north in winter were more likely to visit a bird feeder during a cold snap. Finally, the scientists found that for species that tolerate urban life, such as house sparrows, the abundant bird feeders in developed areas provide a winter refuge. Species that find urban life stressful, such as downy woodpeckers, are less likely to stay in developed areas during winter.

The scientists note that when predicting how climate change will influence a bird species, these other factors, such as tolerance to urbanization, need to be considered as well.

You can find the paper here, and a simple summary of the work on the Project FeederWatch blog.

Photo: I say it’s a nuthatch, although admittedly not the nuthatch species in this study. So don’t look too closely at the bird, just look at the bird feeder and the pretty green background, OK?

Climate change and bird feeders

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Even when bird feeders are readily available, some species of birds head for warmer climes, says a paper in the latest issue of the Journal of Animal Ecology. The scientists, who are affiliated with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Project FeederWatch, studied 18 bird species that are common at bird feeders in the northeastern US and found that some species of birds did not stick around over the winter in spite of there being plenty to eat at bird feeders.

They also found that the birds that stayed north in winter were more likely to visit a bird feeder during a cold snap. Finally, the scientists found that for species that tolerate urban life, such as house sparrows, the abundant bird feeders in developed areas provide a winter refuge. Species that find urban life stressful, such as downy woodpeckers, are less likely to stay in developed areas during winter.

The scientists note that when predicting how climate change will influence a bird species, these other factors, such as tolerance to urbanization, need to be considered as well.

You can find the paper here, and a simple summary of the work on the Project FeederWatch blog.

Photo: I say it’s a nuthatch, although admittedly not the nuthatch species in this study. So don’t look too closely at the bird, just look at the bird feeder and the pretty green background, OK?