Category: Discover Conservation
Posted by Natural Resources Conservation Service, Louisiana Public Affairs on July 06, 2016 at 08:15 AM
Kobe Williams, son of Travis Williams, holds an NRCS partnership sign as Elvadus Fields looks on.
Soil erosion and drainage problems were plaguing Horace Robinson, Calvin Williams, and Travis Williams, a family of soybean farmers in the Mississippi Delta Region of Louisiana. They weren’t quite sure what to do to combat these problems while maintaining a productive farm.
Enter Harvey Reed and Elvadus Fields. Read more >>
Tags:
Louisiana,
StrikeForce,
EQIP,
soil erosion
Discover Conservation,
Conservation Programs,
Farmer & Rancher Stories
Posted by Julie MacSwain, Minnesota Public Affairs Specialist on July 05, 2016 at 07:54 AM
The golden-winged warbler breeds in the Great Lakes region and the Appalachian Mountains. Photo: DJ McNeil
Minnesota is a stronghold for the golden-winged warbler, a bird suffering a significant population decline. A new project brings together a nonprofit, a federal agency and private landowners to slow or even reverse this decline.
Golden-winged warblers depend on young forests for nesting. But across the country, including in Minnesota, forests have changed, and older forests have come to dominate huge areas. Both game and non-game species that rely on young forests are in decline. Read more >>
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Tags:
West Virginia,
Maryland,
Pennsylvania,
forests,
Working Lands for Wildlife,
golden-winged warbler,
Minnesota,
Regional Conservation Partnership Program,
Great Lakes region,
Appalachian region
Landscape Initiatives,
Conservation Programs,
Discover Conservation,
Environment,
Plants & Animals
Posted by Bridgett Estel Costanzo, NRCS Working Lands for Wildlife East Coordinator on July 01, 2016 at 09:03 AM
Like other wildlife that depend on young forests, the golden-winged warbler uses openings created by natural or human-induced disturbances. Photo by Indiana University of Pennsylvania.
As a nature lover and professional biologist, I like to brag that our daughters can identify trees, birds, insects, and even snakes. But one day I received a tiny stab to my prideful heart.
Our daughter, Natalie, had created a poster for her elementary school ecology class that had the message “Don’t kill trees!” When I saw it, I realized that in teaching her about trees, I hadn’t passed on to her an important lesson: that forests go through stages of life just like people do. Read more >>
Tags:
Working Lands for Wildlife,
habitat restoration,
forests
Landscape Initiatives,
Discover Conservation,
Environment,
Plants & Animals
Posted by Julie Wright, Acting Caribbean Area Public Affairs Specialist on June 30, 2016 at 02:57 PM
Shade-grown coffee plantations provide habitat for the Puerto Rican parrot. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service photo.
By growing coffee in the shade under a forest canopy instead of directly in the sun, Puerto Rico farmers help a variety of wildlife and improve the quality of their crop.
The coffee shrub, which originated in Ethiopia, grows naturally in the shade. But over the years, many Puerto Rican growers cleared shade trees to boost yields. Now, in an effort to grow higher-quality coffee and conserve natural resources and help wildlife, the island’s growers are bringing back shade trees.
Shade-grown coffee is especially important to wildlife in places where deforestation is common. Shade-grown coffee plantations provide refuge, shelter and nesting sites for the Puerto Rican parrot, sharp-shinned hawk, Puerto Rico nightjar, elfin woods warbler, and many other birds and wildlife species. Researchers have suggested that both birds and orchids have survived periods of deforestation in Puerto Rico because of the presence of shade coffee plantations. Read more >>
Tags:
Caribbean Area,
pollinators
Landscape Initiatives,
Discover Conservation,
Environment,
Plants & Animals
Posted by Julie Wright, Caribbean Area Acting Public Affairs Specialist on June 23, 2016 at 01:08 PM
A Puerto Rican monarch butterfly in a garden at the University of Puerto Rico's Utuado butterfly house.
The monarch butterfly is the iconic butterfly native of the Americas. The black-and-orange butterfly can migrate thousands of miles each year from North America and South America to Mexico. But the subspecies in Puerto Rico, Danaus plexippus portorricensis, is considered non-migrant. It likes to stay put!
The Puerto Rican monarch butterfly was identified in 1941 as a separate subspecies. It has also been found in the Virgin Islands, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, St. Lucia and Jamaica.
The adult Puerto Rican monarch grows up to 40 millimeters in size, and there are few differences to distinguish between the sexes. Like the monarch, the Puerto Rican monarch is particular about its host plants. Monarch butterflies depend on milkweed to lay their eggs, and the plant provides the only food source for monarch caterpillars. Read more >>
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Tags:
Caribbean Area,
pollinators,
monarch butterfly
Plants & Animals,
Discover Conservation
Posted by Ritch Nelson, Nebraska State Wildlife Biologist on June 20, 2016 at 11:06 AM
Through landscape conservation, both agriculture and wildlife thrive.
Two-thirds of the land in the lower 48 states is privately owned, and these productive working farms, ranches and forests account for much of our nation’s open space and wildlife habitat. USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) provides technical and financial assistance to help agricultural producers integrate wildlife-friendly conservation practices on private lands.
We’ve seen lots of successes over the years, and I’ve written a poem that highlights these private lands successes as well as honors the roots of land ethic. Read more >>
Tags:
Nebraska
Discover Conservation
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