One bird, two birds. Red bird, bluebird.

Today you’re hearing from Patrick Comins, the director of bird conservation for Audubon Connecticut and  chair for the Friends of Silvio O. Conte National Fish and Wildlife Refuge. Hear Patrick explain what being a conservationist means to him.

It’s 1900.

“This year, let’s try something different. Instead of hunting birds during the holiday season, let’s “hunt” birds only to identify, count and record them.”

Something like this was said by an early leader in the National Audubon Society – Frank Chapman. That year, 27 observers tallied 89 different species in 25 counts across the country. Now 113 years later, his alternative, called the Christmas Bird Count, continues to add to a long-standing data set helping scientists understand how birds and the environment are faring throughout the Northeast and beyond.

Best of 2012: 2) Recovering wildlife



New England cottontail at Great Bay National
Wildlife Refuge. Credit: New Hampshire Fish and Game.

We're bringing in the new year with a look back at our milestones for 2012. Check back each day for featured events and activities from across the Northeast!

Many threatened and endangered animals across the Northeast improved last year, and much of that progress is thanks to the many people working to recover and maintain healthy wildlife populations.

Around the world and back: The amazing feats of our feathered friends

Today you're hearing from Deb Reynolds in our Division of Migratory Birds. She has worked as their outreach coordinator for eight years, and in her free time, she likes to run and play with her girls and dogs.

Whimbrel. Credit: Lynn Schmid

I love shorebirds.

They range from the cute little fluffy piping plover chick to the greater yellowlegs and its elegant long legs. But the shorebird I am most taken with these days is the whimbrel, a gray-brown wading bird characterized by its long, curved bill.

A week with the terns: Great Gull Island

Today you're hearing from one of the interns in our regional office, Rani Jacobson. Rani is in the Career Discovery Internship Program and will be a junior this year at Ithaca College, where she studies environmental science.

Rani Jacobson with a tern chick. Credit: Venice Wong.

After an hour of flying across the water in a fishing boat, the small Great Gull Island came into view. After docking, terns flew above us, screaming, and I could not help but feel a sinking feeling of apprehension as we were dive-bombed.

Surveying nesting American oystercatchers throughout coastal R.I.

Today, you're hearing from Pam Loring, a biological science technician in our Southern New England-New York Bight Coastal Program office. She is finishing her master of science at the University of Rhode Island, where she used satellite telemetry to study sea ducks in southern New England.

Pam holding an American oystercatcher. Credit: USFWS

Our office, the Southern New England-New York Bight Coastal Program, has monitored American oystercatchers for just over a year now as part of a collaborative effort to improve their status in the Northeast.

American oystercatchers are large, charismatic shorebirds with long orange bills that they use to shuck the shells of their favorite foods – clams, mussels, and oysters – to take advantage of nature's ultimate raw bar! During the summer breeding season, oystercatchers nest in coastal habitats, laying two or three eggs into a nest scrape on the ground decorated with bits of shell, pebbles, or shoreline wrack (the seaweed and other matter that washes up on shore).

Among shorebirds, oystercatchers provide unusually extensive parental care to their young. Fluffy young oystercatcher chicks are entirely dependent on adults to deliver them food and to eventually teach them how to find and eat shellfish with their dark, stubby bills. 

Partnering to save endangered animals: Delaware

We're so excited about the new interactive map highlighting endangered species efforts in each state across the nation. Each day we'll feature a state, partner and animal. Subscribe on the right to keep up!

And we're back! Time to feature Delaware and one of its most renowned avian visitors--the red knot. 

Back at the end of May, biologists cheered when a legendary red knot was seen in Delaware Bay. This dove-sized shorebird was tagged in 1995 in Argentina and is thought to now be around 19 years old. If an odometer tagged along with the bird, it would read over 350,000 miles, thanks to its yearly migration from Argentina to the Canadian Arctic.

Celebrate Independence Day with wildlife in mind

When people think of the Fourth of July, they often think of the red, white and blue, patriotism, apple pie, cookouts and of course – fireworks. As we celebrate our Independence with these beautiful displays of explosive colors and sounds, it is important to remember not only how much joy they bring us, but also how they affect the wildlife that live close by. 

A particular area of concern is the beach, a very popular location for partying and viewing fireworks, but also prime habitat for endangered bird species such as piping plovers and roseate terns. The unfamiliar lights and sounds erupting from the beach are perceived not as a celebration, but as a threat. 

Photo by Anita Ritenour.

News Roundup

Today we're taking a break from featuring endangered species by state, but take a few minutes to see what we heard this week! Check back next week for features on the wonderful states of Delaware, Maryland, West Virginia and Virginia.

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NJ Cape May County Herald: Water and Praises Flow at Cox Hall Creek Event
VILLAS — Like an epic movie, it was 11 years in the making but the ending is monumental. On Wed., June 20, officials from Lower Township and county agencies cut a ribbon dedicating the Cox Hall Creek Improvement Project which removed a derelict sewage pumping station and sent a pipe to Delaware Bay to allow cleansing salt water in the phragmites reed clogged creek.

Over hundreds of years, attempts to control water flow has allowed invasive plants to crowd out other wildlife. This project is part of a long-term effort to control invasive wildlife along the Delaware Bay of New Jersey. A team is working to restore 87 acres of wetlands to control water quality and flooding, as well as provide habitats for our native wildlife. Through our Delaware Bay Estuary Project and New Jersey Field Office, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service provided much-needed resources to complete this project.

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From the Appalachians to the Adirondacks to the Rhode Island coast

One biologist’s contribution to conservation

Today, in line with our feature of endangered species work in Rhode Island, we’re featuring one of the folks who is making this type of work happen--Ryan Kleinert, a 2012 graduate of the University of Rhode Island, where he studied wildlife and conservation biology, and a biological science technician for the Service.

Over the past three summers, I’ve seen numerous piping plover, American oystercatcher, and least tern chicks grow feathers and fly, and I’ve also seen many not make it past the first week of hatching.

A successful field season takes an enormous amount of time, dedication to detail, consistent effort and devotion. But it’s hard to describe how gratifying it is to see that egg hatch or chick fly away.

The most challenging aspect that I face while monitoring and protecting shorebirds involves circumstances that are completely out of my control, such as when a nest gets over-washed by a spring high tide. I have to consistently remind myself that I did everything I could possibly do for that nest, adult bird, chick, and so on.

Partnering to save endangered animals: Rhode Island

We're so excited about the new interactive map highlighting endangered species efforts in each state across the nation. Each day we'll feature a state, partner and animal. Subscribe on the right to keep up!

From the beginning, Avalonia Land Conservancy recognized Sandy Point Island as a treasure, a property unlike any others it owned – a sandy island enough removed from the shore to provide isolation and uniqueness while still close to home, says its former president Anne Nalwalk.

When the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service began to monitor the use of the island by various shorebirds, the true value of Sandy Point as a nature preserve became most apparent. Avalonia has been amazed to learn the importance of Sandy Point to shorebirds that use it for nesting, resting and staging. Read the story.

Binti Ackley, a volunteer at Sandy Point, helps tag horseshoe crabs, watch
and protect shorebird nests and chicks, and educate visitors. Credit: John Ackley