GREEN BIRDS

Subject: Canada saves northern Ontario forest
Time: 8:49:35 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird



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Subject: Bird species declining
Time: 12:47:17 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird

Bird species plummet as habitat dwindles

Carolyn Lochhead, Chronicle Washington Bureau

Friday, July 11, 2008

(07-11) 04:00 PDT Washington - -- Hundreds of species of birds, including many once-common songbirds such as the meadowlark and bobwhite, are in severe decline in the United States, falling in population by as much as 90 percent since the 1960s, scientists, government officials and conservation groups told Congress on Thursday.

The chief cause is destruction of habitat, scientists told the House subcommittee on fisheries, wildlife and oceans. They said rising food prices and the push for alternative fuels are putting intense pressure on farmland set aside for conservation.

Other killers include invasive plant species that take over native seed and nesting sources, wind turbines located near critical flyways, lighted and glass-encased buildings, lighted cell-phone towers, domestic cats, disease, pesticides and climate change, which also is shrinking habitat ranges.

Farmers racing to plant corn for ethanol, which is subsidized by the federal government, and livestock feed are pulling millions of acres out of the nation's largest private land conservation program, the 32 million-acre Conservation Reserve Program, in which the government pays farmers under 10- and 15-year contracts to keep fragile lands out of production. Rising food and energy prices are leading to political pressure from Congress on the Bush administration to allow farmers to break their conservation contracts without penalty.

Crashing into buildings

Even "green building" codes that aim to make structures environmentally friendlier, mainly by conserving energy, pay no attention to bird destruction, said Karen Imparato Cotton, a bird crash specialist at the American Bird Conservancy. Cotton said as many as 975 million birds are killed by crashing into buildings each year. Many migrating species of neotropical songbirds, which breed in North America and winter in the Caribbean and South America, are attracted to internal and external building lights as they migrate at night.

"The light fields entrap night-migrating birds," Cotton said. "They seem to be reluctant to leave these lit areas and tend to circle within them. As they pile up in the light field, circling the structure, they collide with each other, with the building, or they collapse from exhaustion."

New green building codes often call for increased natural lighting that includes more glass, which also induces fatal bird crashes. Neither the private U.S. Green Building Council nor a new Senate bill that aims to promote green building by the federal government includes safe bird design features.

"The death of these birds has not been considered an environmental impact of buildings," Cotton said. Simple alterations, such as putting blinking rather than fixed lights on cell phone towers, would minimize the loss of birds, scientists told the panel, but the Federal Communications Commission has not yet acted to make such changes.

San Francisco officials will discuss a "lights-out" plan for building in the city that will be considered July 21 by the Commission on the Environment, said David Assmann, deputy director of the city's Department of the Environment. Only a handful of cities have incorporated bird safety into building design codes.

One-fourth of U.S. land birds are on a watch list, and a third of water birds are at risk, while scientists know too little about night birds such as owls even to assess their populations, said Paul Schmidt, assistant director of the migratory birds program at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Twenty common bird species have lost 68 percent of their populations in the past 40 years.

"A growing proportion of the landscape is occupied by humans," said Wayne Thogmartin, a scientist at the U.S. Geological Survey, which measures bird populations. "A large part is irrevocably lost to birds. The question is what populations do we want to keep. If we want more, we need to find ways to create habitat."

Grasslands threatened

About half the nation's wetlands and 70 percent of its prairie grasslands have been lost, scientists told the panel.

Grasslands that provide vital bird habitat are now the most threatened landscape on Earth, said John Wiens, chief conservation science officer for PRBO Conservation Science (originally the Point Reyes Bird Observatory), a nongovernmental organization in Petaluma. U.S. grasslands have been converted to large-scale agriculture, he said, and are being further eroded by high food prices.

The Agriculture Department recently announced that it will allow farmers to use conservation land for pasture in response to high feed prices. The new farm bill recently passed by Congress had already scaled back the Conservation Reserve Program by 7 million acres and increased incentives to break virgin prairie by allowing farmers to collect federally subsidized crop insurance and disaster payments on newly plowed land.

"A lot of sensitive land is being brought back into production," Rep. Ron Kind, D-Wis., said. "The nesting and habitat that migratory birds rely on is in great jeopardy."

Bill seeks to protect birds

Kind is sponsoring with Rep. Wayne Gilchrest, R-Md., a reauthorization of the Neotropical Migratory Bird Act, a program that leverages government money with private contributions in a 1-to-3 ratio to help protect birds in North and South America and the Caribbean. Many poorer countries in the Southern Hemisphere have little money for conservation. The program has a $4.5 million annual budget; Kind wants to gradually increase that to $20 million a year.

Kind also is pushing for improvements and expansions in the U.S. National Wildlife Refuge System, which he said are a boon to bird populations but are in poor condition because of lack of funding.

The Bush administration proposed a Birds Forever Initiative last fall to preserve bird habitat, but Congress has not yet acted on it.

First lady Laura Bush, an avian enthusiast, participated in Bush's announcement of the proposal at the Patuxent Wildlife Refuge in Delaware in October and was a major force behind creating the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Marine National Monument in 2006, the largest protected marine area in the world and an important habitat to seabirds, including the threatened albatross.

Plummeting populations

Twenty common American bird species have lost more than half of their populations since 1960. More than a quarter of American land birds and a third of water birds are on a watch list. Nearly half of neotropical migratory songbirds, which breed in North America and winter in South America and the Caribbean, are considered in severe decline. Among formerly common birds now considered imperiled are:

Eastern meadowlark: Since the 1960s, 90 percent decline in New England and 72 percent decline in the rest of its range.

Northern bobwhite: 82 percent decline. Found in grasslands mixed with shrubs through eastern United States.

Rufous hummingbird: 58 percent decline, found in Northern California, Alaska and Mexico.

Whip-poor-will: 57 percent decline. Found in dry, open woodlands in eastern and southwestern United States.

Loggerhead shrike: 71 percent decline. Found in short grass in southern half of United States and most of Mexico.

Visit PRBO Conservation Science at www.prbo.org/cms/56

for tips on how to help, with California-specific information.

Source: National Audubon Society

E-mail Carolyn Lochhead at clochhead@sfchronicle.com.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/07/11/MNO511N21T.DTL

This article appeared on page A - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

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Subject: Conressional hearing bird declines
Time: 7:02:43 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird

House Panel to Probe Global Decline in Bird Populations – Oversight Hearing July 10th, 2008<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

The House Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife and Oceans will hear from experts including American Bird Conservancy’s Vice President for International Programs Dr. George Wallace and others to further investigate the factors affecting stressed bird populations and bird habitats, and to explore possible policy options to address the situation.

 

Subject:        House Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife and Oceans Oversight Hearing on “Going, Going, Gone?  An Assessment of the Global Decline in Bird Populations”

 When:            Thursday, July 10, 2008, at 10:00 a.m.

 Where:          Room 1334 Longworth House Office Building, Washington D.C.

 

 

Dr. Wallace’s testimony will outline the many threats to migratory and resident birds, and ways these threats can be mitigated. He will call special attention to the Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act and its proven track record in funding conservation efforts that have benefited hundreds of migratory species throughout the hemisphere. ABC and a coalition of members of the Bird Conservation Alliance are asking for an increase in funding for this key program to better serve the needs of declining bird populations.

 

His testimony will resonate well with members of the Committee because many letters through the Act for Songbirds campaign were sent to Representatives asking that they cosponsor a bill put forward by Representatives Kind and Gilchrest (HR 5756) that will reauthorize the Act at significantly higher funding levels. Dr. Wallace’s testimony can be viewed at www.abcbirds.org/newsandreports/information/afs_testimony.pdf

 

Please join us at the hearing - having people present at the hearing helps emphasize the importance of the issue of declining bird populations.  If you are not able to join us, the hearing will be webcast live on the Committee's Web site at http://resourcescommittee.house.gov/.

 

Alicia

 

 

 

Alicia Frances King
American Bird Conservancy
Director, Bird Conservation Alliance

1731 Connecticut Ave. NW

Washington, DC 20009

Office - 202-234-7181 ext 201

Cell - 202-255-5816

 

Support Reauthorization of the Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act

The Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act (NMBCA) of 2000, established a matching grants program that supports bird conservation in the US, Canada, Latin America, and the Caribbean. These projects promote and foster the long- term conservation of neotropical migratory birds and their habitats. However, each year, grant requests far exceed the program's available funding.

 

NMBCA has a proven record of making a difference for neotropical migratory birds, and the reauthorization and appropriated funding should be significantly increased. H.R. 5756, introduced by Reps Kind (D-WI) and Gilchrest (R- MD) will reauthorize NMBCA at $20 million.

 

Pledge your organizations support today!  http://www.birdconservationalliance.org/actforsongbirds/index.htm

 

 

 

To unsubscribe mail:
BCAlist-unsubscribe@lists.abcbirds.org


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Subject: Gerritsen Creek White Island restoration attempt
Time: 5:40:01 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird

$15M FOR THE BIRDS
By RICH CALDER

Taxpayers are being forced to shell out $15 million on the off chance that a rare sparrow will come back to roost at a former city landfill overlooking Brooklyn's Marine Park.

The trash-strewn White Island is quietly being converted into a habitat for the little bird called Henslow's sparrow, which hasn't been spotted in the Big Apple in more than a decade, The Post has learned.

The effort to turn the weed-choked spot into beautiful grasslands came in response to promises officials made in the mid-1990s when allowing a developer to wipe out the sparrow's habitat to build a massive shopping center near Starrett City in 2002.

Ida Sanoff, chairwoman of the environmental group Natural Resources Protective Association, said she's glad the city is finally cleaning up the 70-acre site - also known as "Mau Island" - near Jamaica Bay but doubts the project will bring the inconspicuous bird back.

"What are they going to do? Put up a sign saying: 'Hello, sparrows. Beautiful nesting places here!'?" she said.

The original decision to clear out what was then Vandalia Dunes to make way for the $192 million Gateway Shopping Center infuriated environmentalists because about 56 the 93 acres of the dunes were significant habitats for all sorts of species, including the rare sparrow.

But officials felt it was in the city's best interest to have the hundreds of new jobs the shopping center brought, and the plan was to replace the 56 acres four miles away at the former garbage dump.

Now, more than 10 years later, the city Parks Department has finally begun recreating the sparrow's habitat. Workers last month began spraying herbicides to kill weeds that will be replaced by beautiful grasslands.

"I guess we are following the lead of the movie 'Field of Dreams,' in that if we build it, they will come. But I wouldn't bet on it," admitted Mike Fellar, the city Parks Department's chief naturalist.

But Fellar said the project is important - even if the Henslow's sparrow stays away.

"We're not spending all this money just for a single bird. We're creating a more sustainable ecosystem, which will bring more desirable plant and bird species to the island," he said.

Geoffrey Croft, who heads the watchdog group New York City Park Advocates, blasted the city for killing off not just weeds, but some endangered plant life, while spraying the herbicides. He also questioned why the project began without community input.

But Fellar said these same trees and shrubs also grow along 14 acres at White Island the city is leaving alone, and he predicted the endangered plants would eventually quadruple on the island through the job.

The National Audubon Society estimates about 50,000 Henslow's sparrows worldwide, down 80 percent from 1966. The bird's nearest known habitat is in western New York upstate.

Fellar said it's unlikely that the public will have access to White Island once it's cleaned up - despite it being classified as parkland - because officials want the habitat kept pristine for the wildlife.

White Island was last used as an active landfill in the 1950s.

Today, its shores are filled with construction and demolition debris and trash. The project also calls for stabilizing the island's eroding garbage-strewn banks.

Although no timetable is set to complete the project, Parks Department spokeswoman Jama Adams said the city "is working closely with the state Department of Environmental Conservation on structural and public safety issues" and hopes to finish the project "as quickly as possible."

rich.calder@nypost.com

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Subject: Bigger Bottle Law campaign
Time: 10:42:16 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird

We need a Bigger Better Bottle Bill! Dear Peter Dorosh, We need you to take action now! As we near the end of the Legislative Session, we need to make sure the Bigger Better Bottle Bill is high on the list of bills to <?XML:NAMESPACE PREFIX = ST1 />pass.  Tonight, the Assembly will be discussing the future of the Bottle Bill and your help now can help us make sure we have the support we need.  Time is of the essence!  <?XML:NAMESPACE PREFIX = O /> Recently, our opponents have been relentlessly working to erode our support in the Assembly as well as the Senate.  Due to this pressure, several members have backed away from supporting this important measure.  We need you to help us make sure your member isn’t one of them, and we maintain the Assembly's support on this critical bill so we can continue to push on the Senate.  Please take action now by sending a letter to your state representatives on this critical Environmental legislation for New York.   Send a letter to the following decision maker(s): Your Assemblyperson (if you live in New York) Your State Senator (if you live in New York) Below is the sample letter: Subject: Please Support the Bigger Better Bottle Bill Dear [decision maker name automatically inserted here], As a constituent concerned with conservation, and a frequent consumer of non-carbonated beverages like bottled water and sports drinks, I stand with Audubon New York in strongly supporting the Bigger, Better Bottle Bill. This legislation would expand New York's bottle deposit law to include non-carbonated beverage containers, which have become a major source of litter in Audubon Important Bird Areas (IBAs), Parks, and other important habitats across the state. The original Bottle Bill was created to reduce litter and support recycling of carbonated beverage containers, and has made a tremendous impact in reducing this waste. Not only will this legislation promote recycling, but this proposal will also take back the unclaimed nickel deposits, or the bottles that are not redeemed, and put that money into the state's Environmental Protection Fund (EPF) to support recycling and other critically important environmental funding projects. Dedicating these unclaimed nickels to environmental funding projects makes good fiscal sense for New York. It has been estimated that between $100 million and $180 million annually could be returned to the state if these unclaimed nickels were collected and dedicated to the EPF. Expanding the bottle deposit law will promote increased recycling, and decrease the pollution associated with these containers, all while providing new funding for important environmental programs. I urge you to support this important environmental initiative that will help to make IBAs and state parks cleaner and more enjoyable for all. Thank you for your consideration of this request. Sincerely, Peter Dorosh

Take Action! Instructions: Click here to take action on this issue Tell-A-Friend: Visit the web address below to tell your friends about this.  Tell-a-Friend! Campaign Expiration Date: June 22, 2008

If you received this message from a friend, you can sign up for Audubon New York.

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Subj:	Bronx Zoo Needs You to Act Now - Bottle Bill
Date:	6/6/2008 3:01:50 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time
From:	takeaction@mail.wcsmailings.org
Reply-to:	allparks.W0TH05541C4238130AD4F2B8DA7C32@mail.wcsmailings.org
To:	pdorosh@aol.com
Sent from the Internet (Details)

	This could be the year! The Bigger Better Bottle Bill is moving quickly in the New York Assembly and we need your support to get to the finish line. This critical bill expands coverage of the 5-cent deposit program to include water bottles and other noncarbonated beverage containers, which have grown - both in sales and in our waste stream. This update would: ensure that more than 2 billion additional cans and bottles get recycled each year; help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions; prevent litter in our communities, especially in our parks, beaches, and natural areas; conserve natural resources and space in landfills; and save tax-payer dollars! In addition, the updated Bottle Bill would dedicate vital funding from unreturned containers to the State Environmental Protection Fund (EPF) and the Zoo, Botanical Garden and Aquaria program (ZBGA). This could mean more than $180 million a year in new funding for the environment. We need you to help make this win-win solution for the environment a reality!!! New Yorkers, please take a moment of your time and let the New York State Senate and Assembly know how important the Bigger Better Bottle Bill is to you.
All images and text are Copyright WCS 2007. Click here to view our Privacy Policy and Legal Terms of Use Click here to unsubscribe to this newsletter The Wildlife Conservation Society 2300 Southern Boulevard Bronx, New York 10460 718-220-5100

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Subject: Harbor Herons Nesting Surveys  "volunteers"
Time: 9:56:07 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird

Hello everyone,

This is Andy Bernick here (forwarding from Liz Craig's account).  It's once again time for NYC Audubon's Harbor Herons Project nesting surveys, and we are looking for volunteers who are comfortable in identifying colonial waterbird species (i.e., wading birds, cormorants, and gulls) known to breed in NY/NJ Harbor.

This year, I will be leading the nesting surveys in conjunction with Elizabeth (Liz) Craig of NYC Audubon.  Liz is a talented researcher who has been working on nesting Double-crested Cormorants and their impacts on vegetation and invertebrate diversity in NY/NJ Harbor.  Liz will be starting her Ph.D. at Cornell this fall, and will hopefully be leading the Harbor Herons Project nesting surveys in future seasons.

We need a small number of volunteers for the following surveys, departing from locations noted in parentheses:

19 May: Goose Island (Co-op City, Bronx)

20 May: Swinburne Island (Great Kills, Staten Island)

21 May: Hoffman Island (Great Kills, Staten Island)

22 May: South Brother Island (TBA, Bronx)

23 May: Arthur Kill/Kill Van Kull colonies (Linden, NJ)

27 May: Huckleberry Island (TBA, Bronx/Westchester Co.)

Survey trips generally begin at 7-8 AM, and may take through 3-4 PM (including boat travel).  We are looking for volunteers who are experienced in wading bird identification and data recording, and tolerant of tough working conditions (including hot and cold weather, rough boat rides, poison ivy, ticks, thorns, and the like).

Wading bird species known to nest on the islands we visit include Black-crowned Night-Heron, Great Egret, Snowy Egret, Glossy Ibis, Yellow-crowned Night-Heron, Little Blue Heron, Tricolored Heron, Cattle Egret, and Green Heron.  We also keep a sharp eye out for rare species and vagrants, such as Little Egret, White-faced Ibis, and Western Reef Heron.  We also survey nesting activity of gulls (both Herring and Great Black-backed) and Double-crested Cormorants.

If you are interested, please send your name, contact info, your level of experience with wading bird identification (and any past nesting surveys you have been involved with), and your preferred dates to Liz Craig (ecraig@nycaudubon.org, 212-691-7483).

As this is an interim survey year (with only a few colonies surveyed), we have room for only a few volunteers.  However, we will try to accommodate everyone who wants to participate.

 

Sincerely,

Andrew J. Bernick, Ph.D.

AKRF, Inc.

&

NYC Audubon HarborHerons Project – Nesting Survey Leader

--
Elizabeth Craig
Research Associate, New York City Audubon
71 West 23rd Street, Suite 1523, New York, NY 10010
Phone: (212) 691-7483
Fax: (212) 924-3870

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Subject: Calverton Grasslands/EPCAL latest
Time: 5:31:35 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird



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Subject: BBC response on Calverton Grasslands/EPCAL
Time: 10:08:57 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird

The Brooklyn Bird Club wrote for conservation of Calverton Grassland/ Enterprise Park at Calverton near Riverhead , LI. The former naval Grumman site is under threat of developement.

http://www.capwiz.com/groupforthesouthfork/issues/alert/?alertid=11328491

See these links for more details and the BBC letter

Dear birders and friends:

_http://audubonaction.org/campaign/saveLIgrasslands_
(http://audubonaction.org/campaign/saveLIgrasslands)

The above link was sent out by National Audubon today appealing to all
birders, conservationists and concerned citizens to save Calverton Grasslands or
Environmental Park at Calverton (EPCAL) from complete destruction and
development.


This last remaining grassland in downstate NY (region 10) is a critical
issue needing your urgent support.It is a cause the Brooklyn Bird club is
supporting for this year's birdathon on May 10th with financial pledges.

You can be a great help in sending your note to Governor Patterson who has
exhibited concerns with "green" issues. Only thru a great coalition of
birders, many we are but needing your participation to save our habitats, most
especially Calverton Grasslands which I visited in early April and found it an
amazing place for birds . Please help if you can for conservation in writing to
Governor Patterson on the link I sent with its preformatted petition letter
created by National Audubon. Calverton is large grass habitat location with
87 observed bird species ,41 confirmed,12 possible,34 probable --quite a few
classified as "threatened or special concern" in atlas block 6853c in the
latest Breeding Bird Atlas (2000-2005); and not to mention all migratory species
passing through,including noted rarities.The more of us act, the better
chance in collective birders numbers in saving a terrific grassland spot.

I am in the process of writing my letter to Commissioner Peter Grannis of
NYS Dept of Conservation and Governor Patterson as well as notifying noted
elective officials interested or concerned in saving this rich grassland in
overdeveloped Long Island.

Peter Dorosh
President
Brooklyn Bird Club

Block 6853C Summary Total Species: 87 Possible: 12 Probable: 34
Confirmed: 41


PS. for more information,


_http://capwiz.com/groupforthesouthfork/issues/alert/?alertid=11221766_
(http://capwiz.com/groupforthesouthfork/issues/alert/?alertid=11221766)

_http://www.libirding.com/Calverton.html_
(http://www.libirding.com/Calverton.html) and

_http://www.libirding.com/Calverton_Proposal.html_
(http://www.libirding.com/Calverton_Proposal.html)

From Affiliated Brookhaven Civic Organization _http://www.abcoonline.org/_
(http://www.abcoonline.org/)

******************************************************************

BBC response and supporting Letter for EPCAL

 

April 30th, 2008

 

Commissioner Pete Grannis

New York State Department of Environmental Conservation

625 Broadway

Albany, NY 12233- 4500

Re: Calverton Grasslands/ Enterprise Park at Calverton (EPCAL)

Dear Commissioner Grannis:

The existence of grasslands, particularly in the northeastern United States, is facing its greatest crisis today. Fast disappearing grass landscapes are frequently targeted for development because local municipalities and private developers see them as cheap property lots to develop infrastructures, a result of poor land planning and ill-advised, neglected "smart growth". With this grassland destruction comes a tragic price: the permanent loss of natural biodiversity, for animal, bird, and plant species; the diminished quality of life for visiting and local citizens desiring a place to enjoy natural beauty or standard of living impacted by heightened population crunch. Furthermore, the strain and negative impact of developmental complexes with its resulting pollutants, waste byproducts, over reliance on public services and energy sources, along with excessive human disturbances upon the surrounding protected watersheds and ecological areas as we have evidently seen throughout the United States, is dramatically pronounced. An excellent example now is Suffolk County’s Calverton Grasslands (formerly the old Grumman Navy property) / Enterprise Park at Calverton (EPCAL) threatened by an indifferent and headstrong Riverhead local municipality thinking development.

One only needs to see the dramatic population declines of common grassland birds to get an idea how destructive the loss of extensive grass habitat entails. Studies released by the National Audubon Society, in their "The State of the Birds" report, paint a sobering note: in the last forty years, our most familiar grassland bird species overall plunged as much as an average seventy to eighty percent. In that study, for grass breeders, since the 1960’s, Northern Bobwhite crashed by eighty-two percent; Grasshopper Sparrow –a notable sensitive breeding species at EPCAL-- plummeting ninety-seven percent; Eastern Meadowlark dropped eighty-seven percent; Bobolinks an astounding ninety-seven percent. These species are a few selective examples; what of other native endemic species – reptiles, amphibians, mammals, insects, plants --that are in far more fragile state? Simply put, nature is losing out terribly to development pressures and careless attitudes for the "hope" of greater monetary enrichment-- no holds barred. More information about grassland bird decline can be read on New York Audubon’s website http://ny.audubon.org/BirdSci_Grassland.html

Long Island is, in a true sense, overdeveloped. At one time, vast farms, open spaces and natural habitats with wild plant cover dominated the landscape. But at an accelerated pace, all these viable, rich natural spaces fell under the bulldozer to become developedproperties. Given its 2900-acre size, Calverton Grasslands is the last remaining large contiguous grassland habitat in all of Long Island. Look at Nassau County: no large grasslands exist, lost forever to over development. The contention that the Calverton grassland property when developed for a trivial water theme park resort proposal, retail entities and extensive residential complexes bringing in more revenue for the Riverhead communities, will instead create more nightmarish headaches regionally. It becomes an endless detrimental cycle. More traffic (which leads to the need for wider expensive roads), heavy congestion, and engine idling on few accessible rural roads creates more pollution; greater energy use by proposed larger population centers decreases air quality (with release of more Carbon Dioxide, Methane, and Mercury by energy facilities); more reliance on water drains water supplier or aquifer resources and impacts the protected nearby Peconic and Pine Barrens watersheds, ecology, and ecosystems as well; increased sewage endangers those same Pine Barrens and Peconic watersheds. There are projections of an increased 1.5 million people upon this already crowded, scenic area. No doubt, governmental budgets will be stretched beyond the limit. What is the overlooked but tragic cost? The overall drastic loss of natural biodiversity and natural space, decreased quality of life standards and increased costs unfairly passed on to New York State citizenry. Most local citizens would certainly oppose any development at Calverton Grassland when given the hard facts, misrepresented by the few thinking otherwise.

I visited Calverton Grasslands this recent early April. Like many eager visitors, I wanted to see the renowned endangered Short-eared Owls that hunted the grounds. Numerous Eastern Meadowlarks, American Kestrels, Northern Harriers, Field Sparrows, and Eastern Bluebirds were some of the species that enlightened my experience that day. That same experience I felt can be shared by the many after me if EPCAL is saved. I was astounded by Calverton Grassland’s beauty; at the same time, I also felt discontentment when I envisioned the proposed development destroying all the EPCAL property. As I watched the sun drenched golden grasses, I was told by a local birder that nearly fifty-two species bred here besides the numerous migratory species, including raptors, owls and other noted endangered species. Checking those facts, through the NYSDEC records, I found block 6853C of the Breeding Bird Atlas 2000-2005 revealing eighty-seven bird species observed or confirmed breeding within Calverton Grasslands/EPCAL’s boundaries, an astounding avian number for any grass location. Of those eighty-seven species, seventy-four are accorded "protected species" by NYSDEC with a decent number designated "threatened or special concern". It has me thinking: if the Riverhead local municipality and its town council representatives went forth with its destructive plans, where will all these species go? Simply put, they will all vanish: displacement of native species or extirpation is absolutely unacceptable. It’s not just about rare species: it’s about the whole ecosystem and aggregation of all different interrelating species using this rich critical location.

Commissioner Grannis, I commend and thank you for issuing the stop work order your agency imposed on the Riverhead proposal and construction plan. As the state’s lead conservation agency, only an objective body with integrity can assert jurisdiction of this prime natural open space, initiate a State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) review of the site to render a stringent environmental judgement that is the best course protecting rare habitats and living species within. As a resident of Brooklyn, I have seen what has happened with Kings County’s Floyd Bennett Grasslands Field with its growing fragmentation and human disturbances. I would like nothing more then to raise the alarm of what can happen to other pristine grass habitat areas threatened by development. Birds use any kind of habitat suitable to their liking but are finding it difficult every year to visit, rest, and feed in diminishing open and forested habitats needed for their survival in downstate New York, particularly grasslands. This is the case with the Short-eared Owls needing winter open grounds full of prey; the fact that this species (and even threatened Northern Harriers with several other owl species) using these grasslands in any season is evidence of Calverton/ EPCAL grasslands' critical necessity; on the basis of its rich wildlife and its proximity to a NY State "Bird Conservation Area" (the David Sanoff Long Island Pine Barrens), Calverton Grasslands highly qualifies for special designation as an Important Birding Area which it lacks. It is my hope that Calverton Grasslands doesn’t get developed and instead become an extraordinary place –hopefully a preserve—a wildlife area and scenic landscape for all to visit for the grand experience. Essentially, particularly in downstate New York State, we really do need to conserve and save wild places for our rapidly declining birds and wildlife, with an adoring public to enjoy them.

Yours Sincerely,

 

 

 

Peter Dorosh

President

Prosbird@aol.com

Brooklyn Bird Club

www.brooklynbirdclub.org

 

 

 

 

CC: Honorable Governor David Paterson

CC: Honorable Senator Charles E. Schumer

CC: Honorable Senator Hillary R.Clinton

CC: Congressman Tim Bishop

CC: Congresswoman Yvette D.Clarke

CC: Suffolk County Executive - Steve Levy

CC: Suffolk County Legislator Ed Romaine

CC: Assemblyman Marc Alessi

CC: Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele, Jr

CC Assemblyman James Brennan

CC: State Senator Kenneth LaValle

CC: State Senator Eric Adams

CC: Honorable Judith Enck, Secretary for the Environment

CC: DEC Director Peter Scully

 

 

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Subject: Spotted Owl/Marbled Murrelet Alert
Time: 5:13:24 PM EDT
Author:  prosbird