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Tracking endangered willow flycatcher
| On the hunt: Diane Laush in the San Pedro River bed in search of the endangered willow flycatcher. Laush, with Bureau of Land Management, heads for the valley from Phoenix once a month. (Thelma Grimes/photo.) |
Thelma Grimes/San Pedro Valley News-Sun
With a recording of a bird chirping, binoculars and an eagerness to see an endangered species' progress, Diane Laush of the Bureau of Reclamation spent five hours last week hiking upstream in the San Pedro River.
The endangered bird is called the willow flycatcher, and using what Laush called some extracurricular funds over the last three years, she has been able to track its progress. The small yellow and gray bird is now working to survive in the San Pedro River and at Roosevelt Lake.
Over the summer, Laush makes her way from an office in Phoenix to the San Pedro River near Cascabel once a month to track what are called territories. Starting three years ago with about eight territories, Laush now had a map showing about 15.
"It's more fun to come up and do this than to sit in my office and write environmental and biological reports," Laush said. "We come up in May, June and July to get an idea not only of the number of territories, but also how their habitats are changing."
A territory is not a nest. Laush explained that the surveys are focused on the male bird, and finding them isn't necessarily as easy as one may think.
The willow flycatcher likes to nest in heavily vegetated areas, so finding where they are nesting isn't easy.
Instead, Laush stands quietly with a small speaker system and has a recording of birds, and one distinctive call of a male willow flycatcher. Laush said that if they do not hear that specific call, she can't count it.
The male bird is important to the survey because it will find a territory to protect and begin sending out a specific call in search of a mate. Unlike quail, which mate for life, the male willow flycatcher mates with a different female every season.
In one of the territories, Laush said a male bird had a mate in one territory, and was managing another territory with another female just across the river.
Besides seeing how the water is flowing and how the natural habitat is holding up for the endangered bird, Laush said they keep their eye on the males and look to see if they are alone each time they visit, if they have a mate and whether or not the number of territories are continuing the grow, or if a certain bird relocates to a new territory.
According to the Center for Biological Diversity, the willow flycatcher has suffered more than a century of steady decline. Because of livestock grazing, dams, water withdrawal, and urban and agricultural sprawl, the bird has lost more than 90 percent of the southwestern riparian habitat it needs to survive. On top of these problems, as the bird's habitat is fragmented, it becomes more and more vulnerable to nest parasitism by brown-headed cowbirds and nest predation by other species. Currently, breeding sites are widely scattered and isolated, and most include fewer than five pairs.
The Center and its allies petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to list the flycatcher under the Endangered Species Act in 1992. When the Service refused to process the petition, the Center filed a series of lawsuits that forced the agency to list the flycatcher as endangered in 1995 and to designate more than 600 miles of southwestern rivers as critical habitat in 1997.
Besides protecting and providing educational information on the willow flycatcher, Laush said the San Pedro River is truly a treasure.
"The San Pedro as a whole is very important because it is the only major undamned river in Arizona," she said. "It pulls species from Mexico and acts as migratory corridor. There are plenty of neo-tropical migrants that winter in South America and along the way they have to stop and refuel. Rivers like this are just very important."
Laush said to get an idea of the vast amount of species using the rivers a passage way, the bureau also does what is called bat netting.
At night they take a net across the river and catch the bats passing through. They record the species, the wingspan and time of year it was captured. The animals are released after the information is collected.
With a recording of a bird chirping, binoculars and an eagerness to see an endangered species' progress, Diane Laush of the Bureau of Reclamation spent five hours last week hiking upstream in the San Pedro River.
The endangered bird is called the willow flycatcher, and using what Laush called some extracurricular funds over the last three years, she has been able to track its progress. The small yellow and gray bird is now working to survive in the San Pedro River and at Roosevelt Lake.
Over the summer, Laush makes her way from an office in Phoenix to the San Pedro River near Cascabel once a month to track what are called territories. Starting three years ago with about eight territories, Laush now had a map showing about 15.
"It's more fun to come up and do this than to sit in my office and write environmental and biological reports," Laush said. "We come up in May, June and July to get an idea not only of the number of territories, but also how their habitats are changing."
A territory is not a nest. Laush explained that the surveys are focused on the male bird, and finding them isn't necessarily as easy as one may think.
The willow flycatcher likes to nest in heavily vegetated areas, so finding where they are nesting isn't easy.
Instead, Laush stands quietly with a small speaker system and has a recording of birds, and one distinctive call of a male willow flycatcher. Laush said that if they do not hear that specific call, she can't count it.
The male bird is important to the survey because it will find a territory to protect and begin sending out a specific call in search of a mate. Unlike quail, which mate for life, the male willow flycatcher mates with a different female every season.
In one of the territories, Laush said a male bird had a mate in one territory, and was managing another territory with another female just across the river.
Besides seeing how the water is flowing and how the natural habitat is holding up for the endangered bird, Laush said they keep their eye on the males and look to see if they are alone each time they visit, if they have a mate and whether or not the number of territories are continuing the grow, or if a certain bird relocates to a new territory.
According to the Center for Biological Diversity, the willow flycatcher has suffered more than a century of steady decline. Because of livestock grazing, dams, water withdrawal, and urban and agricultural sprawl, the bird has lost more than 90 percent of the southwestern riparian habitat it needs to survive. On top of these problems, as the bird's habitat is fragmented, it becomes more and more vulnerable to nest parasitism by brown-headed cowbirds and nest predation by other species. Currently, breeding sites are widely scattered and isolated, and most include fewer than five pairs.
The Center and its allies petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to list the flycatcher under the Endangered Species Act in 1992. When the Service refused to process the petition, the Center filed a series of lawsuits that forced the agency to list the flycatcher as endangered in 1995 and to designate more than 600 miles of southwestern rivers as critical habitat in 1997.
Besides protecting and providing educational information on the willow flycatcher, Laush said the San Pedro River is truly a treasure.
"The San Pedro as a whole is very important because it is the only major undamned river in Arizona," she said. "It pulls species from Mexico and acts as migratory corridor. There are plenty of neo-tropical migrants that winter in South America and along the way they have to stop and refuel. Rivers like this are just very important."
Laush said to get an idea of the vast amount of species using the rivers a passage way, the bureau also does what is called bat netting.
At night they take a net across the river and catch the bats passing through. They record the species, the wingspan and time of year it was captured. The animals are released after the information is collected.
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The following are comments from the readers. In no way do they represent the view of bensonnews-sun.com.
Dennis Parker wrote on Jul 30, 2008 8:44 PM:
In reading the article on the San Pedro River and Southwestern willow flycatchers, entitled "Tracking endangered willow flycatcher," I couldn't help but note the serious misinformation provided the author by the Center for Biological Diversity which is repeated in this article as if it were fact.
First, Southwestern willow flycatchers have not suffered more than a century of steady of decline. This is especially so in New Mexico, where prior to 1928, only 4 records of its occurrence existed over time. Today, in the upper Gila River Valley of western New Mexico, on one working cattle ranch alone, the U Bar, more than 125 pairs of Southwestern willow flycatchers regularly make this ranch their home during the breeding season.
Second, a negative -- not a positive -- trend was found to exist by scientific study between the distance to grazing and brood parasitism by cowbirds in the grazed landscape of the upper Gila Valley, or the exact opposite of that baselessly claimed by the Center for Biological Diversity. (Brodhead, Finch and Stoleson, 2007).
Third, riparian habitats needed by Southwestern willow flycatchers have not decreased by 90% in the Southwest as claimed by the Center for Biological Diversity. In fact, these habitats have increased dramatically in the Southwest beginning in about 1940. On the San Pedro, this increase began long before livestock were ever removed. Overall, cottonwood has increased by about 69% in Arizona during this time period. (Webb, Leake and Turner, "Ribbon of Green," 2007).
These facts simply do not support the CBD's claims and directly question its motives for making them. These facts also suggest that the Center for Biological Diversity apparently cares much more about imposing its socio-political agenda on all of us than it actually cares about Southwestern willow flycatchers. "