Category Archives: raptors

Raptor-Killing Poison Ban Starts Soon in Canada

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Bald_EaglePotent second generation anticoagulant rodenticides (ARs; aka, rat poisons) kill birds, particularly raptors in the United States and Canada. Canada will ban sales of these poisons on January 1, while in the U.S. talk of banning consumers from using the poisons has been around for a while, but never seems to be enacted.

“In a study of more than 130 dead birds of prey found in and around Vancouver, Canada, ‘virtually 100%’ of the owls and a large proportion of the hawks had residues of at least one second-generation AR in their livers,” said a news story in the journal Nature last month.

The Canadian Cooperative Wildlife Health Centre blog illustrates just how tough it can be to diagnose AR poisoning in raptors. A toxics screen of the bird’s liver may be the only sign that AR poisoning was the cause of death, the blog says.

Read the Nature article, here.
Read the CCWHC blog post, here.

We’ve covered this subject before. Read one of our previous posts, here.

Photo: bald eagle by Dave Menke, USFWS

Smoothing Ruffled Feathers

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It took a long time to sort out, but this week the the federal Justice Department clarified its stand on native people possessing eagle feathers. The policy said that tribal members can possesses or wear feathers from bald or golden eagles. They can also lend, give or trade the feathers or bird parts to other tribal members, as long as money doesn’t change hands.

Further, tribal members can keep eagle feathers that they pick up off the ground, but they can’t kill or harass the federally protected birds to get the feathers. There’s a federal depository for eagles that were accidentally killed, and tribal members can apply to receive feathers or parts from the repository for ceremonial purposes.

The US Fish and Wildlife department also issues a few permits for tribal members to kill eagles for religious purposes.

The Summit County Citizens Voice was the article getting all the buzz. Read the article, here.
You can also check out the Washington Post‘s take on the issue, here.

But now that we have eagle situation solved, other migratory birds are an issue. An Alaskan man was stunned to find out that selling items decorated with bird feathers is illegal, the Anchorage Daily News reports. As a member of the Tlingit nation, he felt that he was just doing what his people had done for generations. He settled the case for a $2,005 fine.

Unfortunately, the article does not clarify how the federal Migratory Bird Act applies to tribal members, but it is likely that the rule is similar to the rule for eagle feathers and parts.

Read the Anchorage Daily News story here.

Photo by Dave Menke, courtesy US Fish and Wildlife Service

Vermont Eagle Population Soars

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Vermont has long lagged behind the other New England states in bald eagle populations. Even when bald eagle populations in neighboring states recovered to the point where they had dozens of nesting pairs, Vermont was still not home to eagles that were successfully raising young.

That changed in 2008, when a single pair fledged a single chick. In 2009, the state did its best to help a second breeding eagle pair that lost their nest when the tree it was in fell down. Now, just four years after that first eagle fledged, 23 eagles were fledged in 15 Vermont nests this year, reports the Vermont Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Read the Vermont Fish and Wildlife press release, here.
Read Vermont’s bald eagle recovery plan, here.

Condor Reintroduction Reviewed

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According to the Arizona Game and Fish Department:

A review of the 2007-2011 period of the California condor reintroduction program in northern Arizona and southern Utah was recently completed and identifies a number of successes, including an increase in the free-ranging population, consistent use of seasonal ranges by condors and an increased number of breeding pairs. However, exposure to lead contamination from animal carcasses and gut piles left in the field continues to limit the success of the program. The team made several recommendations to address the lead issue.

You can read the rest of the press release on the AZGFD website, here. It’s the third item on the page.

Go straight to the news with this Peregrine Fund press release. (I think it says exactly the same thing.)

On Saturday (Sept. 29), the reintroduction continues with 17th public release of condors in Arizona since the recovery program began in 1996. At this event three endangered California condors will be released to the wild.

Read more about it in the AZGFD’s Wildlife News. It’s the sixth item from the top and is followed by another release praising Arizona hunters for voluntarily reducing their use of lead bullets to help the condors survive.

Photo: California condor, courtesy Arizona Game and Fish Department.

New Nest Helps Eagles in Arizona

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After three years of ticks killing off bald eagle nestlings in Arizona, the Arizona Game and Fish Department constructed “starter nests” in nearby trees. This year the bald eagle pair used one of the man-made nests and successfully fledged two young, says a department press release.

Several attempts to protect the nestlings from the ticks in the old nest were unsuccessful. While building the man-made nests, the old nest was removed and burned.

The press release gives more detail about the attempts to rid the nest and the tree from ticks, but does not give any detail about techniques used in the building the starter nests.

According to the release: “Bald eagle conservation in Arizona is a partnership effort of the Southwest Bald Eagle Management Committee — a group of 25 government agencies, private organizations and Native American tribes.”

Photo: Building a new bald eagle nest, courtesy of the Arizona Game and Fish Department.

New Nest Helps Eagles in Arizona

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After three years of ticks killing off bald eagle nestlings in Arizona, the Arizona Game and Fish Department constructed “starter nests” in nearby trees. This year the bald eagle pair used one of the man-made nests and successfully fledged two young, says a department press release.

Several attempts to protect the nestlings from the ticks in the old nest were unsuccessful. While building the man-made nests, the old nest was removed and burned.

The press release gives more detail about the attempts to rid the nest and the tree from ticks, but does not give any detail about techniques used in the building the starter nests.

According to the release: “Bald eagle conservation in Arizona is a partnership effort of the Southwest Bald Eagle Management Committee — a group of 25 government agencies, private organizations and Native American tribes.”

Photo: Building a new bald eagle nest, courtesy of the Arizona Game and Fish Department.

More Details on Protecting Burrowing Owls

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Back in 1995, the California Department of Fish and Game released a report on burrowing owls that described how to survey for them and steps that could be taken to mitigate loss of habitat. Yet, the numbers of burrowing owls in California have continued to decline.

A new, 36-page report goes into more detail and incorporates research that has been done since the 1995 report. It includes suggested survey protocols, and buffers for various times of the year.

Read the California Fish and Game press release here.
Find the report itself (a PDF), here.

Photo by Lee Karney, courtesy US Fish and Wildlife Service

More Details on Protecting Burrowing Owls

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Back in 1995, the California Department of Fish and Game released a report on burrowing owls that described how to survey for them and steps that could be taken to mitigate loss of habitat. Yet, the numbers of burrowing owls in California have continued to decline.

A new, 36-page report goes into more detail and incorporates research that has been done since the 1995 report. It includes suggested survey protocols, and buffers for various times of the year.

Read the California Fish and Game press release here.
Find the report itself (a PDF), here.

Photo by Lee Karney, courtesy US Fish and Wildlife Service

Research: Screech Owls, Urban Coyotes and Social Mountain Lions

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Forest cover is the best predictor of screech owl presence, and citizen scientists doing call-playback surveys compared well to professionals, says a paper in the March issue of the Northeastern Naturalist. The research was conducted in the metropolitan New York tri-state area.

Read the abstract here. (Fee or subscription required for the full article.)

Teton Cougar Project, which has been studying mountain lions (Puma concolor) in the Jackson Hole region for years, recently documented two adult female mountain lions feeding at the same kill on three different occasions. Once, a male also joined the group. Four years ago the research team documented one female mountain lion adopting another’s kittens.

The observations refute the conventional wisdom that mountain lions are solitary and only spend time together to mate.

Read more details in the Jackson Hole News & Guide, here.

Researchers in Denver, Colorado will begin radio-collaring up to 60 coyotes in the metro area with the goal of tracking them for the next two years. Stewart Breck, a researcher with USDA-APHIS Wildlife Services, will lead the effort.The researchers would like to know how the coyotes are using settled landscapes, and if community-based hazing programs are working.

Read the Colorado Division of Wildlife press release, here.

March Roundup of New Research

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Spring is here and a bunch of wildlife surveys are underway around the country.

In Delaware:
-It’s the fifth and final year of the Delaware Breeding Bird Atlas.
-A special effort is being made in 2012 to tally owls as part of the atlas.
–Horseshoe crabs are being tallied again, and volunteers are being trained.
-The annual osprey count is offering a volunteer training for the first time since 2007.

Maryland is two years in to four years of surveys for an amphibian and reptile atlas and is looking for volunteers.

In Kansas, they are searching for lesser prairie chicken breeding areas, or leks, from the air with helicopters. Field crews will train on March 29-31 and conduct official survey work across all of western Kansas until the middle of May. The Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism is also asking people to report leks. The survey is part of a five-state effort, and the survey technique will be evaluated.

In North Dakota, the Game and Fish Department has launched a two-year study of white-tailed deer in intensely farmed agricultural areas.

In Maine, biologists at the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife have visited up to 100 dens each winter for 37 years, making the survey in the nation’s oldest radio-collar monitoring program for bears. This year the Maine Sunday Telegram wrote a story about it, with lots of pics. Read it here.

And in Washington, commuters have been reporting wildlife sightings for over a year on the I-90 corridor in anticipation of road improvements. The project’s first annual report was released recently, generating articles in the Everett Herald  and The Seattle Times, and coverage other media.

Photo of I-90 Wildlife Watch billboard by Paula MacKay/Western Transportation Institute, used by permission.