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General Information
The Colorado Natural Heritage Program (CNHP) tracks and ranks Colorado's rare and imperiled species and habitats, and provides information and expertise on these topics to promote the conservation of Colorado's valuable biological resources. Data maintained in the Colorado Natural Heritage Program database are an integral part of ongoing research at CSU and reflect the observations of many scientists, institutions and our current state of knowledge. These data are acquired from various sources, with varying levels of accuracy, and are continually being updated and revised. CNHP also offers a wide range of related services including biological monitoring, research, mapping, and conservation planning services.
CNHP is a nonprofit organization, and is a sponsored program of the Warner College of Natural Resources, Department of Fish, Wildlife & Conservation Biology at Colorado State University. We are also a member of the Natural Heritage Network, an international network of partners that use the same scientific methodology to enable scientists to monitor the status of species and natural communities from state, national, and global perspectives.
Current Events - July 2008
- New Director at Colorado Natural Heritage Program
A Statement from our former director, Renée Rondeau.
Dear Partners and Friends of the Colorado Natural Heritage Program,
It is with great honor that I pass the Colorado Natural Heritage Program director’s position to Dave Anderson. CNHP is extremely fortunate to have Dave accept this position as Dave’s past 9 years of experience at CNHP means he already knows most of our partners and the primary conservation opportunities and threats that Colorado faces. He brings with him a passion for conservation, in depth knowledge of Colorado’s natural resources, and a commitment to increasing CNHP’s impact on protecting Colorado’s most precious areas. Dave’s sense of humor, fairness, and kindness is sure to win the hearts of all of our conservation partners. Please help me in welcoming Dave Anderson as CNHP’s Director and Chief Scientist.
The section below, from Dave Anderson, will provide you with more details about Dave and his commitment to conservation.
It has been a great honor to work with you all and I hope that our interactions continue as I take on my new position as Conservation Planning Team Leader.
Sincerely,
Renée Rondeau
A Statement from our new director, David Anderson.
Dear Partners and Friends of the Colorado Natural Heritage Program,
I am writing you to introduce myself as the new director of the
Colorado Natural Heritage Program (CNHP). Although this is
a new position for me, I have been on CNHP’s staff for nine
years. I’m taking over as director from Renée Rondeau, who
has done a tremendous job of leading CNHP for the last five
years. She has set the bar high indeed, and I am grateful for
the time I have had working with her. She is truly
inspirational, and I am overjoyed that she has remained on
staff at CNHP as our new Conservation Planning Team
Leader.
CNHP has a lofty mission- to provide the scientific information needed to ensure that Colorado’s
biodiversity is not lost. We can’t do this alone- our partners and friends are critical to our success. In
introducing myself I’d like to take this opportunity to offer a brief overview of my background and goals
as director.
Growing up in Aurora, Colorado, I was instilled with a love of biology at an early age by my father, a high
school biology teacher. At the University of Colorado, where I completed my undergraduate degree, I
developed an interest in arctic and alpine ecology. After college I worked for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service at three different wildlife refuges in Alaska, where I assessed bird colonies affected by the Exxon
Valdez spill, collected specimens for a refuge herbarium, and helped develop a vegetation map.
After working in Alaska I began work on a Masters degree at the University of Washington in Seattle,
where I had a phenomenal opportunity to spend two summers in the Canadian High Arctic on Devon
Island - the largest island in the world uninhabited by humans. Working in such remote and pristine areas
gave me a deep appreciation for nature unmarred by our activities, and for the importance to humankind of
preserving nature and preventing the loss of Earth’s biodiversity.
After finishing graduate school my wife and I joined the Peace Corps and were posted in the Solomon
Islands, where we taught 6th-8th grade for two years. The experience of adjusting to life in a non-western
culture, where the rules are so different, was a real eye-opener. Our time in the South Pacific helped me to
feel comfortable working with diverse partners and stakeholders, who vary greatly in their foci and needs,
to achieve common goals.
I was still a bit culture shocked when I applied for a position with CNHP in 1999. Over the nine years that
followed I have had the privilege to learn about Colorado’s biological wealth while working with many
partners on projects all over our state. I have seen quite a bit of change during my career with CNHP. In
1999 we used 7.5 minute quadrangles to document the extent of rare plants, animals, and natural
communities; now we use state-of-the-art GIS technology and a custom-built database (Biotics). We have
made huge strides in employing technology to improve our accuracy, increase our productivity, gather and
provide more information, and answer difficult questions. In some areas we have moved to the cutting
edge of conservation science, and we have 27 staff with the vision, initiative, and technical skills to keep us there.
Colorado is full of places that make important contributions to the Earth’s biodiversity. Some of these are
well known to many of us, like Mesa Verde and the Great Sand Dunes; others are places that many of us
never see or hear about, like Dudley Bluffs and Big Gypsum Valley; and many are places that people drive
past everyday without knowing their importance, like Droney Gulch and the Gunnison Basin. The great
thing about CNHP is that we are the only comprehensive source of information on the biodiversity riches
everywhere in the state, and this is important information to have when decisions need to be made
regarding development, management, and conservation. I am looking forward to working with you to
ensure that Colorado is not diminished by the loss of any of our unique biological resources.
CNHP has an incredibly bright future; although we face many challenges, there are extraordinary
opportunities as well. We have many exciting frontiers to explore, including modeling, monitoring, and
better ways to identify survey areas. There are many avenues for involvement in research, such as
restoration ecology and conservation genetics, that offer other exciting possibilities. I hope CNHP can
become more involved in Colorado State University’s educational mission too. We will continue to build
our database and provide the information our partners need to maintain our state’s natural heritage, but we
plan to explore innovations to make this easier and keep our clients more up-to-date, such as web-based
data delivery and subscriptions. As CNHP’s director I will do everything I can to ensure that we continue
to provide the data and expertise you depend on.
The chance to be CNHP’s director is the opportunity of a lifetime for me. My wife and I share the goal of
leaving the Earth a better place than it is right now for our two daughters; as CNHP’s director I have a
great opportunity to act on this goal. It is an incredible honor, as well as a great responsibility, to oversee
our work with you, and I hope you’ll keep in touch to share your ideas and feedback with me. I’m very
excited about this role and I look forward to working with all of you in the future. Please pass this letter on freely, and feel free to visit, call, or email me anytime.
Sincerely,
David G. Anderson
Director/Chief Scientist
P: (970) 491-6891
F: (970) 491-3349
David.Anderson@colostate.edu
http://www.cnhp.colostate.edu
- Colorado Natural Heritage Program 2007/2008 Project Abstracts (PDF 5.8 mb). Features abstracts and highlights from CNHP projects during 2007-2008.
- An article was written about Colorado's involvement in the Landscope America project has been published by the Land Trust Alliance organization. Click Here to view the article.
- CNHP is in the news for playing a leading role in launching a pilot conservation website, LandScope, in the fall of 2008, in cooperation with The National Geographic Society and the international conservation organization Natureserve. Click on one of the links below to see the pertaining news articles!
- CNHP was recently mentioned in an article in the Denver Post by Erin Emery - Taking Stock of Species: Plants, Animals, Fish Inventoried in Piñon Expansion Area (06/17/2007). Read about some of the work that we do!
- Aricle presented in the April 2007 periodical Cattle Guard, published by the Colorado Cattlemen's Agricultural Land Trust: The Southeast Colorado Biological Inventory – Ranchers showcase the benefits of private land wildlife stewardship.
- Related press release from Colorado State University: CSU researchers work with private landowners in Colorado on conservation efforts.
Past Events - June 2006
The poster "A Database for Tracking Populations of Endangered, Threatened, Proposed and Candidate Species in National Parks" (Tabloid, PDF, 2.1 mb) was presented jointly by the Colorado Natural Heritage Program and the National Park Service at the 20th Annual Meeting of the Society for Conservation Biology in San Jose, California from June 24-28, 2006. The full-sized poster in MS PowerPoint poster can be Seen Here (35 in x 49 in, PPT, 39.3 mb).
- Wetland Ecological Integrity Scorecards
Recently, CNHP assisted NatureServe in developing a pilot set of Ecological Integrity Scorecards to establish performance standards for wetland mitigation and monitoring. The scorecards provide a framework in which various biotic and abiotic indicators are rated and integrated into an overall assessment of ecological integrity of Southern Rocky Mountain wetland and riparian ecological systems. They can be used as a rapid or intensive assessment. Indicator ratings are based on deviation from “natural” reference benchmarks (natural range of variability). Final scores are produced for five categories: (1) Landscape Context; (2) Biotic Condition; (3) Abiotic Condition; (4) Size; and (5) Overall Ecological Integrity. The scorecards can be used to set priorities for conservation & management, ambient monitoring, and wetland mitigation monitoring and performance criteria.
An introductory report as well scorecards for wetland and riparian ecological systems of the Southern Rocky Mountains can be found here:
Note: these are pre-calibrated assessments and have not yet been tested on field data.
Highlights:
- Silky Pocket mouse subspecies trapped in Canyons of the Ancients -- not seen in Colorado for over 20 years!
- Two new species were described in Western Colorado, Cryptantha gypsophila and Physaria pulvinata. Three new B1 Potential Conservation Areas have been developed to encourage protection of the excellent occurrences of these shale barren plants.
- Guide versions of Ecological Systems now available for download.
- CNHP developing new Wetland and Upland Quality Assessment Tools.
- CNHP receives White House Conference on Cooperative Conservation Award for Army Compatible Use Buffer Project around Fort Carson.
- CNHP Director, Renée Rondeau, elected to serve as Western Representative on NatureServe’s Section Council.
- CNHP Director, Renée Rondeau, featured talking about Great Sand Dunes National Park in new NatureServe promotional video titled "Discovery, Understanding, Conservation: How NatureServe Makes a Difference".
- Click Here to view the online version of the video (43 mb broadband connection suggested).
- Click Here to download the fine-quality version of the video to your computer (161 mb, broadband connection strongly suggested).
- Other Recent Publications:
- Brad Lambert is co-author with Erin Muth (USGS) and others of a manuscript on Boreal Toads titled “Estimation of the probability of male toads returning to the breeding site” that was accepted for publication in Ecology.
- Gaughan, C. R., and S. DeStefano. 2005. Movement patterns of rural and suburban white-tailed deer in Massachusetts. Urban Ecosystems 8:189-200.
- S.L. Neid and D.D. Biesboer. 2005. Alleviation of salt-induced stress on seed emergence using soil additives in a greenhouse. Plant and Soil 268: 303-307.
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