Game Commission Seeks Bird-Watching Volunteers

By Bob Frye, The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

Jul. 14–If you’ve got an eye or an ear for birds, the Pennsylvania Game Commission and Carnegie Museum of Natural History want you.

The two organizations are conducting a Pennsylvania Breeding Bird Atlas. The five-year effort is meant to locate nesting pairs of birds and document their distribution and abundance.

Already, nearly 3,000 volunteers across the state have contributed more than 500,000 bird observations to the atlas effort. They’ve identified at least 187 different species of birds nesting and raising their young in Pennsylvania.

This is the final year for field work, but it’s not too late to help out.

For purposes of the research, the state has been divided into a grid of more than 4,700 “atlas blocks,” each covering a 10-square mile area.

Only about 2,000 of those blocks can be considered “complete,” though, meaning 75 percent or more of the possible breeding species have been reported. More than 2,600 others have only been partially surveyed, while there’s been no data at all collected in 50 others.

The commission and museum are hoping volunteers can fill in those gaps with a last-minute rush of observation. To get involved, register and enter bird observations online at bird.atlasing.org/Atlas/PA. You can also call toll-free 1-888-PABIRD1 or send an e-mail with your name, address, date, place and details of your breeding bird observations to mypabird@pabirdatlas.org.

Observations can also be mailed to Bob Mulvihill, 2nd PBBA Project Coordinator, Powdermill Avian Research Center, 1847 Route 381, Rector PA 15677.

Research projects

Birds, rattlesnakes and mussels will get a little attention thanks to $1.2 million in grants from Pennsylvania’s Wild Resource Conservation Program.

Twenty-six projects received grant funds. Among them was a $34,900 Pennsylvania State University effort to survey the navigational channels and deepwater habitats in the Ohio, Allegheny, and Monongahela rivers. The work is meant to determine the influence of dredging on those habitats, develop a protocol for surveying fish on big rivers and provide fisheries data.

California University of Pennsylvania received a $19,700 grant to conduct a comprehensive inventory of fish biodiversity in the South Fork of Tenmile Creek, which is affected by agricultural runoff and acid mine drainage.

Western Pennsylvania Conservancy received $10,125 to produce a habitat protection plan for the endangered Eastern massasauga rattlesnake, which exists in just a few western Pennsylvania counties.

Global warming

Is global warming real, and will it impact hunters and anglers?

At least some groups think so. Wildlife Management Institute and eight of the nation’s leading hunting and fishing organizations, including Ducks Unlimited, Trout Unlimited, BASS, and Pheasants Forever, are behind a new report that predicts the impact of climate change on wildlife habitat and hunting and fishing.

The report is titled “Seasons’ End: Global Warming’s Threat to Hunting and Fishing.” It can be seen in its entirety www.seasonsend.org.

The report suggests, among other things, that climate change could lead to the loss of 42 percent of existing trout and salmon habitat nationwide before the end of the century, with the south, southwest and northeast experiencing especially severe reductions.

New time

Karen’s Fishing Corner, which airs on PCTV-21 in Pittsburgh, is moving from its normal 9 p.m. Friday time slot to 10 p.m. Fridays as of this month.

The show has been on for eleven years and features Karen Gainey, who also teaches fishing classes at Community College of Allegheny County and is a certified fishing instructor with the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission.

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Copyright (c) 2008, The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

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