Patuxent Crane Facilities Visited by Audubon Reporter

Jacquelin Gribble, a reporter who is writing articles for the Columbus Audubon newsletter, will be visiting the facilities of the Crane Restoration Ecology Team on Friday, November 24. She is researching an article for this regional newsletter to educate citizens of Ohio about the crane migration program, since Ohio is one of the border states for the whooper migration next year. If a crane were to stray from the flock and land in Ohio, it would be helpful to the program coordinators if experienced bird watchers were on the lookout for it. The article will appear around OH in May and June. This newsletter reaches over 3000 members and if it is distributed to other chapters through the state, it will reach even more. Ms. Gribble has been interviewing staff members of the CRET about the program in general, the history of crane propagation and research at Patuxent, and the crane migration project. She will be shown the facilities by crane technicians Damien Ossi and Carlyn Williamson, and see some young whoopers.

Contact: Kathleen_O'Malley

North American Waterbird Conservation Plan Holds International Conference: Hosted by Patuxent Staff Steinkamp and  Kushlan

An International Conference on the Draft North American Waterbird Conservation Plan (NAWCP) was hosted by Melanie Steinkamp (Plan Director) and Jim Kushlan (Steering Committee Chair) on October 30th and 31st, 2000, in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The Conference was a huge success, drawing over 120 participants from multiple nations including Canada, Mexico, Greenland, Great Britain, Pacific Island nations, Central America, and Caribbean nations. As an outcome of the conference, 14 Working Groups were established and will meet over the next 12 months to develop Regional Waterbird Conservation Plans. The North American Waterbird Conservation Plan is one of four bird conservation plans under the North American Bird Conservation Initiative, an initiative focused on integrating continental bird conservation. The Draft Waterbird Conservation Plan can be downloaded for review from the NAWCP website at www.nacwcp.org.

Contact: Melanie Steinkamp

Melanie Steinkamp and Bruce Peterjohn held a workshop to review the draft North American Colonial Waterbird Monitoring Manual prior to the Waterbird Society Meeting on October 31st and November 1st, in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The Monitoring Manual is being developed for use by resource managers throughout North America, and is part of the North American Colonial Waterbird Monitoring Program coordinated by Patuxent's Monitoring Program. The draft manual will supply managers with a standardized set of methodologies and is hoped to aid in producing more comparable waterbird data sets at different geographic scales. The Draft Manual can be downloaded for review from the following website: www.nacwcp.org.

Patuxent's Sparling is Senior Editor for New Book "Ecotoxicology of Amphibians and Reptiles 

Researcher Don Sparling is senior editor for a newly released book entitled "Ecotoxicology of Amphibians and Reptiles". This book , which is published by the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (www.setac.org), reviews the state of the science for the effects and concentrations of contaminants in these two ecologically important vertebrate classes. The book is intended for contaminant ecologists who wish to know more about amphibians and reptiles, herpetologists who desire to learn how contaminants may be affecting their species, and for resource managers who are tasked with developing management plans for these animals. The book is 876 pages long and includes chapters on the distribution, physiology and ecology of amphibians and reptiles; the effects and concentrations of specific classes of contaminants on these animals; reviews of problems that are closely associated with contaminants such as malformations, disease, and declining populations; and considerations for the use of amphibians and reptiles in risk assessments and field experiments.

Gee Presents Slide Talk to Visiting Ecology Class 

Contact: Dr. George Gee 

See Previous HiLites:
August 31, 2000
September 21, 2000
September 28, 2000
October 5, 2000
October 16, 2000
October 30, 2000
November 8, 2000
November 16, 2000