Special Announcements

Northern Saw-whet Owl Recaptures

In five seasons, Charlie has banded ten Northern Saw-whet Owls in his backyard, four of which were recaptures of birds banded by other banders.

Click on the map below view the locations relative to Charlie's yard where the four recaptures were originally banded.

Current IBA volunteer needs

• Someone willing to sew bird carrying bags

• Someone willing to design a multi-use shelter for bird banding, outdoor classroom and picnics at Panola Mountain State Park

• Someone willing to periodically mow or weed whack net lanes at Joe Kurz WMA in Meriwether County

If you can do any of these, please contact IBA Coordinator Charlie Muise at cmmbirds@yahoo.com 

The Georgia IBA program recently joined Georgia Ornithological Society and other important conservation groups in signing on to the letter below. Feral cats are an important problem for native birds, reptiles, amphibians and mammals. We need to slow or stop some recent disturbing legal trends regarding feral cats. For instance, "TNR" colonies have been legalized in Athens-Clarke County, and the Jekyll Island Authority is sponsoring one on that globally important bird area. Feral cats can also be a hazard to people and our pets.

A new, peer-reviewed report entitled, Feral Cats and Their Management, from the University of Nebraska Lincoln, has put the annual economic loss from feral cat predation on birds in the US at $17 billion. The report analyzes existing research on management of the burgeoning feral cat population over 60 million and counting in the US, including the controversial practice of Trap, Neuter, Release. The report can be downloaded from

Press Release
January 19, 2010

The Georgia Important Bird Areas Program (IBA) has received a major grant from Georgia Ornithological Society (GOS) to support several bird conservation initiatives. The grant, in the amount of $18.560, will support work at several locations, including Altamaha Waterfowl Management Area in MacIntosh County and Joe Kurz Wildlife Management Area in Meriwether County.

Among the needed projects at Altamaha WMA is the replacement of two structures vital to water level manipulation, used to ensure proper habitat for ducks, shorebirds and other animals at different times of the year. The grant will also support trail restoration around three impoundments, previously used by hunters, anglers, bird watchers and managers, until the trail became too overgrown for use. Also planned is a roundtable discussion by these four groups to discuss opportunities to work together toward common goals.

Other projects supported by the GOS grant include providing staff for prescribed fires at several locations in Georgia, the removal of invasive plants at Joe Kurz WMA, and assistance in native grassland restoration by Georgia DNR. Grassland birds as a group have suffered greater declines in recent years than birds of any other major habitat.

Each of these projects will utilize volunteer help. To inquire about volunteering, contact IBA Coordinator Charlie Muise: cmmbirds@yahoo.com.

The Plant Genetic Resources Conservation Unit (PGRCU) is part of the United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, National Plant Germplasm System (NPGS) (http://www.ars-grin.gov/npgs/index.html). The mission of the NPGS is to acquire, document, preserve, characterize, evaluate and distribute plant material important to global agriculture. The NPGS is comprised of numerous germplasm repositories throughout the United States including the PGRCU in Griffin, GA. The PGRCU is responsible for the safeguarding of materials that are adapted to the southeastern United States including peanuts, sorghum, cowpeas, peppers, summer vegetable crops, annual clover, sweet potatoes, and warm season grasses. Crops are assigned to curators who are responsible for managing the germplasm collection of that particular crop. Melanie Harrison-Dunn is the curator of the warm season collection which includes over 8500 samples of warm season grasses representing close to 100 different genera and 500 species.

One of Dr. Harrison-Dunn's goals is to collect a diverse set of native warm season grass germplasm throughout the country and preserve the material in the NPGS for future generations and scientific research. Due to habitat destruction and competition with invasive species, many populations of native warm season grasses are declining in the United States. These populations serve as important gene pools for the species and allow for the diversity of the species to be maintained. In addition, they potentially hold genes encoding for traits of significant interest to agriculture and energy production for the country. Loss of these populations can be avoided through habitat management on public lands such as state parks but further safeguarding the materials through preservation in genebanks such as the NPGS is critical.

By partnering with Charlie Muise, Coordinator of the Georgia's Important Bird Areas Program, Dr. Harrison-Dunn was able to collect several species of native grasses at Sprewell Bluff State Park including lopsided indiangrass (Sorghastrum secundatum), indiangrass (Sorghastrum nutans) and little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium). The collected material will be increased at the Griffin location and then placed in cold storage facilities for long term preservation and distributed as requested to researchers for scientific investigations. Partnerships such as this are extremely valuable in pinpointing and accessing sites throughout the state where these native grasses exist making the acquisition of native grasses possible.

The Golden-winged Warbler (GWWA) is in trouble. It is federally endangered in Canada, and state listed in most of its range in the United States. In Georgia the only significant population resides within Chattahoochee National Forest. Some people believe it should be considered for federal endangered species status. For a number of years Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and the United States Forest Service (USFS) have worked together to try to save this southern-most group of GWWA. The Georgia Important Bird Areas Program (IBA) has helped with monitoring and public education. Advocates of the GWWA recently received some very good news.

On July 17, 2009, Andrew Baker, Acting District Ranger of Chattahoochee National Forest announced the decision to authorize work which was jointly proposed by USFS and GA-DNR biologists. “This has been a very long process. I was worried it would take so long that we would lose the birds, but I’m happy this decision was made in the end. I can’t wait to start this important work” says Nathan Klaus, Senior Biologist of the Non-Game Commission of Department of Natural Resources. The decision was made to go forward with “alternative 3” with some small modifications. This is the alternative which was preferred by ornithologists, and for which the IBA program lobbied. There is a 45-day period during which this decision can be appealed.

Klaus was one of the first to document the colonization of GWWA in some very large treefalls caused by remnant of a hurricane. Partnering with Jim Wentworth of USFS, Klaus began to monitor what they determined was the largest population of GWWA left in Georgia. They began to plan management for this species, to be conducted after three years of survey work. These surveys, completed in 2008, provided a baseline view of GWWA populations for later comparison.

According to Dr. David Buehler, “GWWA is one of the most significantly declining birds in eastern North America. It has already been listed in Canada and has been listed as endangered in GA. Without immediate and significant management attention, it will likely be extirpated from the Appalachians.” Dr. Buehler reminds us that the top GWWA experts in the country reviewed and approved the management during the meeting of the Golden-winged Warbler Working Group in March, 2009.

The final management decision was reached after USFS read many letters from people across Georgia and consulted with many groups, including a field day in which representatives from several organizations walked through the area so that all could share ideas. In the end, several modifications were made to incorporate concerns held by groups such as the Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC).

The Georgia IBA program, which operates on donations and grants, will continue to help organize monitoring of the area during and after the treatment phase. If you would like to help, please contact Charlie Muise, IBA Coordinator, at cmmbirds@yahoo.com.

In early May I assisted Jim Wentworth of the US Forest Service and Nathan Klaus of Georgia Department of Natural Resources, in conducting surveys of their habitat management areas along Ivylog Gap Road and Cooper's Creek within the Chattahoochee National Forest. Beginning in 2001, the Georgia IBA program has assisted in DNR and USFS efforts to manage for the increasingly rare Cerulean Warbler (CERW). Work began with intensive surveying followed by small patch cuts in these two areas to try to mimic the structure of old-growth forest interspersed with large treefall gaps along these two areas. The purpose is to find whether birds would occupy new habitat, and if so, how long it would take them to find it. While CERW is the target species, it is hoped that other songbirds requiring a well-developed canopy structure will benefit as well.

The sites were chosen for their elevation, aspect, and forest type, which are similar to those occupied by CERW in other parts of Georgia. Ivylog Gap in particular was chosen because CERW have been observed there since at least the 1920s. With the help of the IBA program and Georgia birders, these sites were surveyed for 3 years prior to treatment. Sites already hosting CERW were not treated. 20 to 30% of the trees were removed from each ten-acre treatment site by a commercial logger, and proceeds from the timber sale covered all project costs. Because CERW tend to occupy the largest trees in an area, these were carefully marked and left standing. Four years later, CERW occupy at least half of the cuts along Ivy Log! CERW are notoriously difficult to detect because they sing infrequently and only very early in the season, but if casual observations are added to official counts, it is likely that CERW occupy 8 of the 10 cuts along Ivy Log this year. We have also documented an increase in populations of Chestnut-sided Warblers, Worm Eating Warblers, Hooded Warblers, American Redstarts and Kentucky Warblers. So far, CERW have not occupied any of the control (untreated) sites or any part of the monitored Duncan Ridge/Coopers Creek area.

Volunteers, organized in part by the IBA program, have played a critical role documenting locations of CERW from the project’s inception. Preliminary data collected by volunteers resulted in much earlier surveys than previously believed necessary by several experts, which in turn resulted in the highest CERW counts. Specifically, it was these citizen scientists who learned that the males are holding territory and singing when spring foliage is still emerging. By the time traditional surveys are conducted, many of the males have found mates and stopped singing. This information would not have come to light without our volunteers, including Dot Freeman, Ken Blankenship, Pierre Howard, Darlene Moore, Rachel Cass, Georgann Schmalz, and Betty Belanger.

The next step will be to determine if CERW begin occupying the other cuts along Duncan Ridge in the Cooper's Creek WMA. To our knowledge there weren't any CERW in these areas when the cuts were made. But the news from Ivylog is very encouraging, and these cuts may yet prove to be a useful tool for the conservation of our fastest declining warbler!

This work was supported in part by donations to Georgia's Nongame Conservation Section (Buy a tag!) and the Important Bird Area program (Make a donation!).

Volunteer Conservation Days were established to match an important need to a valuable resource. While land managers throughout Georgia can evaluate which conservation tool best suits an area, they often lack adequate help. Under shrinking budgets, most organizations and agencies are unable to fill vacancies or even have to lay off skilled staff. Most Wildlife Management Areas have only one staff position, and some WMAs even share a single person. State Parks are in a similar situation. Unfortunately, applying for grants to cover the cost of machinery, equipment and supplies is easier than hiring people. Thus ironically, many managers find that they have all the tools needed to do the work, but don’t have the people to do it.

Click here to find out how you can fulfill an important role during Volunteer Conservation Days.

---

GoodSearch & GoodShop YOU SEARCH OR SHOP WE GIVE! Raise money for Atlanta Audubon just by searching the web and shopping online! Search the web now! Free coupons at top stores! Add to your site

Here is a way you can help the Georgia Important Bird Area Program and it will not cost you anything, or take a lot of your time. It involves doing some of the things you already do online search for information, and shop. But if you route your searching and/or shopping through this website, they will donate money to our program. GoodSearch.com is a search engine with a unique social mission. It's powered by Yahoo! and each time you search, GoodSearch makes a donation to the IBA program. Simply go to the web page, and in the box for charity, type Audubon Atlanta. You can even add the GoodSearch box to your internet browser in the same way you do other search engines. GoodShop.com is an online marketplace that donates a percentage of your purchase to the Georgia IBA program. You can choose from hundreds of merchants, including Amazon, Target, Gap, Best Buy, eBay, Macy's and Barnes & Noble. Please help the Georgia IBA Program by trying this out. If you have any questions, please contact me.

---

As Coordinator of the Georgia Important Bird Areas (IBA) Program, I am happy to announce a wonderful donation to the IBA Program. We have received a C175 2000 lumen LCD projector, which will be a tremendous asset for the many IBA Program presentations across the state. This gift was sent to us by Birding Adventures, Inc. which is operated by long-time Georgia Ornithologist Georgann Schmalz. For more information on Birding Adventures, go to their website at http://www.birdingadventuresinc.com

If your club or organization is interested in a presentation on the progress of the IBA program, bird banding, sparrow identification, or other topics, please contact me.

Thank you, Georgann, for this very generous donation!

The Georgia IBA Program is a private, not-for-profit 501(c)3, so donations should be tax-deductible.

Southern Co. and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation have given seven grants worth an undisclosed amount to conservation and natural resource agencies, including the Atlanta Audubon Society and Georgia Department of Natural Resources.

The grants will be used to restore bird populations and longleaf pine habitats in the Southeast, according to Chris Hobson, Southern Co. senior vice president for research and environmental affairs.

Atlanta Audubon Society will use its grant to create a Georgia Important Bird Area conservation program to benefit American oystercatchers, red knots and loggerhead shrikes.

Georgia Department of Natural Resources will use its grant to support conservation and restoration of 8,430 acres of longleaf habitat and to plant more than 2 million trees in Southwest Georgia.

Atlanta Audubon Society Receives Major Grant from Savannah Presbytery for the Important Bird Areas Program

Many thanks to The Savannah Presbytery for its support of Georgia’s Important Bird Areas Program. For more information on the Savannah Presbytery and the fund created to support ecological stewardship, please visit:

http://www.savannahpresbytery.org/EventsPrograms/
MKPentecostEcologyFundGrant/tabid/37457/Default.aspx