Salamander Summit

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salado salamanderThis is the first time I’ve heard endangered species news through a city business journal, but perhaps I’m just reading the wrong publications.

The Austin Business Journal reports that US Fish and Wildlife director Dan Ashe has agreed to meet with stakeholders in Williamson County, Texas to discuss the possible listing of four salamander species.

According to the US Fish and Wildlife’s Ecological Services website, these salamanders are: Austin blind salamander (Eurycea waterlooensis), Jollyville Plateau salamander (Eurycea tonkawae), Georgetown salamander (Eurycea naufragia), and Salado salamander (Eurycea chisholmensis).  All four salamander species are entirely aquatic and depend on water from the Edwards Aquifer to survive.

The USFWS information says that these salamanders are totally aquatic, with no known terrestrial form.

A press release from US Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) says that he set up the summit.

Read the Austin Business Journal article here.
Read the USFWS Texas salamander page here, with lots of links to Federal Register listings and other info.
Read Sen. Cornyn’s press release here.

Photo: Salado salamander by R.D. Bartlett, courtesy of USFWS

Bat Training

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BCI workshopBat Conservation International (BCI) still has space available this June in its Arizona field training workshops for biologists, land managers, consultants, students, and serious advocates of natural resource conservation who need to develop skills to monitor and inventory bats.

An acoustic monitoring workshop will be held June 4-9 and will cost $1,795, which includes dormitory-style lodging and food, but not airfare or other costs of transportation to the training site. A bat conservation and monitoring workshop will be held June 10-15 and will cost $1,595. If you want to handle bats during the workshop, you will need a pre-exposure rabies vaccine.

The deadline for applying to one of the June workshops is May 1, 2013.

More information about the two workshops can be found on the BCI website, here.

New Sierra Bighorn Herd in California

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Sierra bighorn“Our recovery goals are both numeric and geographic,” said Tom Stephenson, California Department of Fish and Wildlife bighorn recovery program leader, in an article in The Los Angeles Times about the recent establishment of a new herd of federally endangered Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep.

“This is the first reintroduction effort of a new herd of Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep since 1988,” he said in a CDFW press release. The release explains:

During the week of March 25, 2013, ten female and four male bighorn sheep were captured from two of the largest existing herds in the Sierra Nevada and reintroduced to the vacant herd unit of Olancha Peak at the southern end of the range in Inyo County.

The newly created herd is the tenth herd of Sierra bighorn between Owens Lake and Mono Lake, the release says. Three additional herds are needed to meet recovery goals. There are now 500 Sierra bighorns, which as an increase from the low of just over 100 of them.

Read more in The Los Angeles Times, here.
Read the CDFW press release here.

Photo: A Sierra bighorn is released in a new area to create a new herd. Courtesy CDFW.

Time to Get Bear Aware in Colorado

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Colorado Bear AwareColorado Parks and Wildlife is looking for Bear Aware volunteers in Glenwood Springs and will train them tomorrow (April 20).

According to Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s website:

Bear Aware is a network of trained Colorado Parks and Wildlife volunteers throughout the state who help their neighbors and communities prevent problems for themselves and for bears. Our Bear Aware program was founded in 1998. Today there are over 220 volunteers, statewide, dedicated to helping people coexist with bears. Bear Aware volunteers can answer questions, offer practical advice and even make house calls. They also do educational programs and staff informational booths at events.

Wildlife managers in the Roaring Fork Valley expect significant bear activity in the region again this year.

“Simple things like keeping trash and food away from bears can help,” said said District Wildlife Manger Dan Cacho, of Glenwood Springs in a press release. “But people often need to be reminded and Bear Aware teams have been effective in spreading education in other communities across Colorado.”

Read the Colorado Parks and Wildlife press release here.
Find out more about the Colorado Bear Aware program here.
Read an article about the call for volunteers in the Aspen Business Journal, here.

Image: Colorado Parks and Wildlife Bear Aware program sticker

Time to Get Bear Aware in Colorado

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Colorado Bear AwareColorado Parks and Wildlife is looking for Bear Aware volunteers in Glenwood Springs and will train them tomorrow (April 20).

According to Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s website:

Bear Aware is a network of trained Colorado Parks and Wildlife volunteers throughout the state who help their neighbors and communities prevent problems for themselves and for bears. Our Bear Aware program was founded in 1998. Today there are over 220 volunteers, statewide, dedicated to helping people coexist with bears. Bear Aware volunteers can answer questions, offer practical advice and even make house calls. They also do educational programs and staff informational booths at events.

Wildlife managers in the Roaring Fork Valley expect significant bear activity in the region again this year.

“Simple things like keeping trash and food away from bears can help,” said said District Wildlife Manger Dan Cacho, of Glenwood Springs in a press release. “But people often need to be reminded and Bear Aware teams have been effective in spreading education in other communities across Colorado.”

Read the Colorado Parks and Wildlife press release here.
Find out more about the Colorado Bear Aware program here.
Read an article about the call for volunteers in the Aspen Business Journal, here.

Image: Colorado Parks and Wildlife Bear Aware program sticker

Northern Rocky Mtn. Wolf Population Is Down

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The US Fish and Wildlife Service’s 2012 Annual Report for the Northern Rocky Mountain (NRM) Gray Wolf Population shows fewer wolves in more packs. The overall decrease in the number of wolves is seven percent, the report found. It’s the first decrease in wolf population since wolf collaringrestoration efforts in the region began.

An Associated Press story that ran in the Helena (Montana) Independent Press and elsewhere noted that wolf populations were down 16 percent from 2011 in Wyoming, four percent in Montana and eight percent in Idaho. There were population gains in eastern Washington and eastern Oregon, the article says.

An article in the Spokane Spokesman-Review sites a slightly different number, an 11 percent decrease, and says that state wildlife managers had hoped for a larger decrease in the population.

Read the 2012 Annual Report for the Northern Rocky Mountain (NRM) Gray Wolf Population here. (13-page PDF)
Read the US Fish and Wildlife Service press release here. (It is a less a summary of the report than support for current management strategies.)

Read the AP story in the Helena Independent Record, here.
Read the Spokane Spokesman-Review article, here.

Montana Wolf Management Advisory Council also met on the same day the report was released. It suggested a bounty system and creating a list of trappers among other things. Read the article in the [Montana] Missoulian, here.

Photo: National Elk Refuge biologist Eric Cole removes a whisker from a male yearling wolf. The sample can be used for a sample isotope analysis to learn about the animal’s diet. Credit: Lori Iverson / USFWS

Thousands of Grebes Crash in Utah Desert

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eared grebe utahSome 5,000 eared grebes mistook pavement for water at the Dugway Proving Ground in Utah, the Salt Lake City Tribune reports. Hundreds of the birds died after their hard landing. Because the birds cannot take flight from dry land, Utah Division of Wildlife Resources personnel collected the living birds and transported them to nearby ponds.

Other birds were treated for their injuries or euthanized, the Tribune article says. The article also notes that the night was foggy, the pavement was wet and the grebes were on their spring migration to the Great Salt Lake.

The article also notes that 17 months ago migrating eared grebes crashed in a Wal-Mart parking lot, where about 1,500 of the grebes died.

Read the Salt Lake City Tribune article here.
Check out the slide show with the article, which includes beautiful grebe photos and state wildlife staffers at work.
Read a Utah DWR newsletter on loons and grebes.

Photo Copyright Nicky Davis. Eared grebe in happier times. Photo used courtesy of the Utah Department of Wildlife Resources.

NY, Vt. WNS Bats Winter in Maine

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bat bunker wnsThirty bats from New York and Vermont, some of which were visibly infected with white nose syndrome (WNS), were moved to a specially-prepared military bunker in Maine to spend the winter. Nine bats survived, a higher percentage than would have been expected if they had been left in the wild. Those bats were returned to the locations where they were found.

“We learned a lot from this experiment,” said Vermont Fish & Wildlife bat project leader Scott Darling in a department press release. “These bats were visibly infected before being placed in the bunker, so we wouldn’t have expected many of them to survive in their natural cave environment.”

Read the Vermont Fish and Wildlife press release here.
Read the US Fish and Wildlife Service, Northeast’s blog here — with many wonderful photos. (Scroll down a bit to get to the main story about the bunker and WNS.)
Read a guest post on the USFWS white nose syndrome blog from the assistant manager at the National Wildlife Refuge where the bats wintered here. (With the same photos, and a link to a Flicker page.)Read an article from the Rutland (Vermont) Herald here. (But be warned that its articles go behind a paywall in a week, sometimes sooner.)

And in related news, here’s a report from the Barre/Montpelier Times-Argus and Rutland Herald, about further WNS research in Vermont this winter. (It may also disappear behind a paywall.)

Photo: The bunker door at the Aroostok National Wildlife Refuge in late March. by Steve Agius, courtesy USFWS

Joshua Trees in Bloom

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Yucca_brevifolia_inflorescenceJoshua Trees are in bloom this spring across the Mojave Deserts. They are blooming in southwestern Utah, as well as California, Nevada and Arizona, The Salt Lake City Tribune reports. The article says that the long-lived trees rarely bloom and to have so many bloom over such a wide area is a “once in a lifetime event.” (An event that is likely just about over, the article notes.)

This is some “extra” news, which won’t inform your wildlife management work, but may add some joy to it.

Read The Salt Lake City Tribune article here.

Photo: Stan Shebs, Closeup of Yucca brevifolia inflorescence in Red Rock Canyon, taken March 2005. Used under Wikimedia license.

3rd Draft for Prairie Chickens

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SAMSUNG DIGITAL CAMERAFive states submitted a plan for conserving lesser prairie chickens to the US Fish and Wildlife Service last week. It is the third draft for the plan, Lone Star Outdoor News reports. The five states are Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Kansas and Oklahoma. The multi-state conservation plan is a bid to keep the bird of the federal endangered species list.

The planning process began a year ago, in April 2012. The USFWS will make its final ruling on September 30, 2013.

Read the press release from the Kansas Department of Parks, Tourism and Wildlife here.
Read the same press release from the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department here.
Lone Star Outdoor News adds a headline that mentions the third draft, here.

Photo: © Gerard Bertrand, courtesy Texas Parks and Wildlife Department