Industrial strength herons: the black-crowns of Baltimore
No abstract available at this time
Outdoors in Maryland↗
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Restoration of waterbird habitats in Chesapeake Bay: Great expectations or Sisyphus revisited?
In the past half century, many waterbird populations in Chesapeake Bay have declined or shifted ranges, indicating major ecological changes have occurred. While many studies have focused on the problems associated with environmental degradation such as the losses of coastal wetlands and submerged vegetation, a number of restoration efforts have been launched in the past few decades to reverse the 'sea of despair.' Most pertinent to waterbirds, restoration of submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) beds, tidal wetland restoration, oyster reef restoration, and island creation/restoration have benefited a number of species. State and federal agencies and non government agencies have formed partnerships to spawn many projects ranging in size from less than 0.5 ha to ca. 1,000 ha. While most SAV, wetland, and oyster reef projects have struggled to different degrees over the past ten to twenty years with inconsistent methods, irregular monitoring, and unknown reasons for failures, recent improvements in techniques and application of adaptive management have been made. The large dredge-material island at Hart-Miller Island near Baltimore, Poplar Island west of Tilghman Island, Maryland, and Craney Island Portsmouth, Virginia have provided large outdoor 'laboratories' for wildlife, fishery, and wetland habitat creation. All three have proven to be important for nesting waterbirds and migrant shorebirds and waterfowl; however nesting populations at all three islands have been compromised to different degrees by predators. Restoration success for waterbirds and other natural resources depends on: (1) establishing realistic, quantifiable objectives and performance criteria, (2) continued monitoring and management (e.g., predator control), (3) targeted research to determine causality, and (4) careful evaluation under an adaptive management regime.
Book chapter↗
Restoration of waterbird habitats in Chesapeake Bay: Great expectations or Sisyphus revisited?
In the past half century, many waterbird populations in Chesapeake Bay have declined or shifted ranges, indicating major ecological changes have occurred. While many studies have focused on the problems associated with environmental degradation such as the losses of coastal wetlands and submerged vegetation, a number of restoration efforts have been launched in the past few decades to reverse the "sea of despair." Most pertinent to waterbirds, restoration of submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) beds, tidal wetland restoration, oyster reef restoration, and island creation/restoration have benefited a number of species. State and federal agencies and non-government agencies have formed partnerships to spawn many projects ranging in size from less than 0.5 ha to ca. 1,000 ha. While most SAV, wetland, and oyster reef projects have struggled to different degrees over the past ten to twenty years with inconsistent methods, irregular monitoring, and unknown reasons for failures, recent improvements in techniques and application of adaptive management have been made. The large dredge-material island projects at Hart-Miller Island near Baltimore, Poplar Island west of Tilghman Island, Maryland, and Craney Island in Portsmouth, Virginia have provided large outdoor "laboratories" for wildlife, fishery, and wetland habitat creation. All three have proven to be important for nesting waterbirds and migrant shorebirds and waterfowl; however nesting populations at all three islands have been compromised to different degrees by predators. Restoration success for waterbirds and other natural resources depends on: (1) establishing realistic, quantifiable objectives and performance criteria, (2) continued monitoring and management (e.g., predator control), (3) targeted research to determine causality, and (4) careful evaluation under an adaptive management regime.
Waterbirds↗
Effects of extended photoperiod on sandhill crane reproduction
Photoperiod studies were conducted with greater sandhill cranes (Grus canadensis tabida) from 1969 to 1972 and from 1982 to 1987 at the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center, Maryland. When housed indoors and exposed to long photoperiods, males produced semen during winter. When exposed to artificially extended photoperiods during spring in outdoor pens, females apparently laid earlier in the year and laid more eggs than they would have without the added light. Cranes did not exhibit any signs of photorefractory response to extended photoperiods.
Book chapter↗
Save the Great Lakes fisheries!
During the winters of 1939-40 and 1940-41, two experiments involving 456 bobwhite quail, were conducted at the Patuxent Research Refuge, Bowie, Maryland, to determine the palatability and comparative feeding value of 20 common wild quail-foods when offered as a part of a maintenance diet....2. Mortality was low on all diets, the highest occurring on that containing a mixture of bayberry and wax myrtle fruits. On all diets the birds showed increases in weight during the early winter. These gains were better maintained by birds on the wild foods than those on control diets composed entirely of cultivated feedstuffs.....3. There were statistically significant differences between the quantities of the various diets eaten.....4. For palatability and acceptability, seeds of common ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia) and of shrub lespedeza (Lespedeza bicolor) were the preferred wild foods.....5. It is concluded that pen-reared bobwhite quail can be maintained successfully through winters in the vicinity of Washington, D. C., on diets containing 50 per cent of any one of the wild foods listed and 50 per cent of a high-caloric commercial seed mixture with yellow corn as the principal cereal.....6. The results of these 'cafeteria' studies, although interesting and indicative of the preferences of quail in confinement, do not necessarily represent selections that might be. made by bobwhites in the wild.
Outdoor American↗