Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell announced the award of $44.2 million in grants to permanently protect 16 working forests in 15 states, including a project that will protect 8,000 acres of working forestland in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina and another project to protect 1,100-acres located in Franklin County, PA that contains a stretch of the Appalachian National Scenic Trail. “Since 1990, the Forest Legacy Program has prevented the loss of more than 2.3 million acres of private forest lands for future generations of Americans,” said Tidwell. “In an era of continued sprawl, this program protects land and
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Throughout the year, birders look forward to changing seasons and avian scenes as they explore woods, grasslands, and wetlands: the spectacle of spring migration, the songs of breeding birds, the autumn southward flight of wintering species from northern nesting grounds. Increasingly, though, both casual bird-watchers and ornithologists note a steady decline in numbers—not just of endangered species, but also of common birds not usually considered to be at risk. Study after study, survey after survey show a worrisome downward trend in populations. A National Audubon Society report called “Common Birds in Decline,” for instance, shows that some widespread species generally
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Fragmentation of habitat can be a serious threat to plant communities when it disrupts seed dispersal and limits population connectivity. Corridors can promote seed dispersal over long distances, especially when dispersal is by birds. However, bird habitat use varies seasonally: most birds are territorial in the summer but not the winter, and territoriality leads to less long-distance movement. Therefore, the ability of corridors to promote seed dispersal via birds may change seasonally according to shifts in individual bird movements. In their recent paper in Ecological Restoration, Evans and colleagues tested whether this hypothesis was true at a large experimental corridor
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Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Interior Secretary Sally Jewell today announced the release of the State of the Birds 2013 Report on Private Lands. A collaborative effort as part of the U.S. North American Bird Conservation Initiative, involving federal and state wildlife agencies and scientific and conservation organizations, the report shows how private land conservation incentives positively impact bird habitat. “Sixty percent of U.S. land is in private hands, making the efforts of farmers, ranchers and landowners critical when it comes to creating, restoring and protecting bird habitat,” Secretary Vilsack said. “Today’s report highlights the positive impact of voluntary conservation
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Birders in North Carolina are flocking to the recently re-designed N.C. Birding Trail website (www.ncbirdingtrail.org), which provides more detailed information on each of the 327 sites statewide that comprise the trail. The key feature of the new website is a map from which visitors can browse sites by location, using a Google map interface, according to Scott Anderson, the bird conservation biologist for the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission. When visitors click on a site on the map, they will see a short summary of the site, including a description of the site, birds they might see or hear and the
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A bald eagle soaring high on the Fourth of July. It’s about as American an image as one could conjure. And for Pennsylvanians this Independence Day, the opportunity to witness such a sight firsthand is greater than at any other time in recent memory. In the 30th anniversary year of efforts to restore bald-eagle populations in the Commonwealth, the bird – a national symbol of strength and freedom – not only is continuing its remarkable comeback, but is taking it to new heights. The Pennsylvania Game Commission this week released its preliminary count of bald eagle nests statewide, and the numbers chart yet
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