#florida grasshopper sparrow

[todaysbird]

WELCOME BACK LITTLE GUYS!!! conservation DOES have meaning even in a struggling world, and we still have the opportunity to make a difference

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from Inside Climate News:

On a recent morning, 10 Florida grasshopper sparrows, tiny brown-speckled birds that are the most endangered on the continent, took their first scampers and flaps on the state’s central prairie.

It happened so fast it was hard to distinguish which of the captive-raised sparrows was the 1,000th released on this expanse of grasslands not far from Walt Disney World, the only place on Earth where the birds are found in their natural habitat.

Dozens of conservationists, gathered some distance away to avoid spooking the skittish sparrows, celebrated the milestone in an unprecedented recovery program that in only a few years has doubled the bird’s wild population, from a mere 80 five years ago to some 200 today.

By the time the land-dwelling sparrows emerged from the two large enclosures and disappeared onto the prairie, the observers couldn’t help but cheer. The moment marked the culmination of years of deliberation, doubt and diligence among those engaged in the bird’s fate, said Paul Gray, science coordinator for the Everglades Restoration Program at Audubon Florida.

“It’s just a lot of hard work by a whole lot of people,” said Gray, who has worked on the Florida grasshopper sparrow for about 30 years and was present for the 1,000th release in July. “I can’t describe how hard it was emotionally for everyone involved in this because every step of the way, we had to do something that nobody had done before.”

[happilyblueconnoisseur]

[lizardsaredinosaurs]

Florida Grasshopper Sparrow (Ammodramus savannarum floridanus)

Florida, USA

Status: Endangered

Threats: habitat loss, extreme weather, invasive species

[shitsncraps]

Me: I only read Federal Register Document from 1982-12-30 for the plot!

The plot:

[great-and-small]

Can you think of a better bird for Rhode Island?

My pick for Rhode Island might not be super popular since it’s a visually unexciting bird to some, but I would have the Saltmarsh Sparrow as my selection. With RI being the ocean state, I think this tidal bird would be appropriate. A little bird for a little state! The Saltmarsh sparrow is in a lot of trouble conservation-wise (similar to grasshopper sparrow in Florida) and many people in Rhode Island are moving heaven and earth to try and save them. I love RIR as a chicken breed but the Saltmarsh Sparrow is a native bird that could really use some good press.

[aplpaca]

Lowkey tho the urge to write a thingy about florida grasshopper sparrows but if they were little dragons,,,,

[xtruss]

Florida’s Vanishing Sparrows

A group of eccentric endangered birds serves as a bellwether of the climate crisis.

— By Dexter Filkins |July 17, 2023

The survival of the Florida grasshopper sparrow is in doubt, but the scientists who are working to help the species refuse to give up.Photograph from Nature Picture Library/Alamy

The Avon Park Air Force Range, in central Florida, is a noisy place. Most weeks, American pilots practice dropping bombs and firing rockets there, turning old Humvees into clouds of scrap metal and smoke. Last month, a crowd gathered at the range to listen for the song of the Florida grasshopper sparrow—a faint chittering noise that evokes an insect’s buzz, giving the bird its name. As the crowd looked on expectantly, a group of tiny birds, small enough to fit in your palm, ventured tentatively from a pen, looked into the sunshine, and then flew away. The grasshopper sparrow, a modest and eccentric creature that inhabits the prairies of the central and southern parts of the state, is considered the most endangered bird in the continental United States. The birds at the bombing range were part of a program to bring their species back from the brink. “It will be hard, but we think this sparrow is worth saving,” Angela Tringali, a researcher at Archbold Biological Station, which is involved in the effort, told me.

With its subtropical climate, Florida hosts a vast array of wildlife that exists nowhere else in the county. But years of relentless human population growth have driven many to the vanishing point: Florida is home to sixty-seven species of threatened and endangered animals, among the highest numbers in the continental U.S. Those include the Miami blue butterfly, the Everglade snail kite, and the Florida panther, of which fewer than two hundred and fifty remain.

Birds that nest on or near the ground—like the Cape Sable seaside sparrow and the grasshopper sparrow—are especially vulnerable. Grasshopper sparrows can fly, but they spend most of their lives on the ground, nesting in clumps of tall grass. This provides easy access to the insects that they eat (though it also makes them susceptible to predators, like skunks and snakes). As more and more people moved to Florida, their habitat—in the prairies that used to cover much of the state south of Orlando—gave way to shopping centers and housing tracts.

For decades, scientists watched the sparrows’ numbers slowly ebb. In 1986, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declared them endangered; by the end of the century, there were thought to be fewer than a thousand left. Shortly after that, the population began dropping precipitously, and by 2012 as few as seventy-five males remained. Beyond habitat loss, the reasons for the steep decline weren’t entirely clear, though some scientists suspected fire ants, an invasive species. “We started to panic,” Mary Peterson, an endangered species biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said.

As the sparrows approached extinction, Peterson and other scientists decided that they couldn’t risk letting the bird continue to breed only in the wild. After identifying three concentrations of birds in protected habitats, and one on a private ranch, they gathered what adults they could and began breeding them in captivity around the state. Captive breeding is generally considered a last resort—some species of birds and other animals don’t survive it. But, Peterson said, “the risk of not doing anything could be catastrophic.” The scientists released their first batch of youngsters, a dozen birds, in 2019. Since then, they have bred and released more than seven hundred. In a good year, about a quarter of the chicks survive to adulthood in the wild; the release at the Avon Park bombing range last week brought the estimated number of birds to about two hundred and fifty.

The Avon Park range appears to be an especially promising venue for the birds. With more than a hundred thousand acres, it contains more than a dozen other threatened and endangered species. Twenty years ago, before populations collapsed, it was home to about three hundred grasshopper sparrows. The Department of Defense has proved to be an eager partner in preservation: Charles (Buck) MacLaughlin, the range operations officer, told me that the Air Force and the Fish and Wildlife Service periodically survey the landscape, when there aren’t air strikes scheduled. “I don’t think any have been killed there,” he told me.

Still, the survival of the grasshopper sparrow is in doubt. “Extinction is still a possibility,” Peterson said. The scientists aim to create ten protected sites of at least fifty breeding pairs each—a goal that is many years away, at best. The challenge is less in breeding sufficient numbers than in finding space for them; some ninety per cent of the bird’s historic habitat is gone. There are similar stories throughout the state. The Florida panther is making a modest comeback, but it’s constrained by human presence in the Everglades; last year, some twenty-five panthers were killed by cars. In the oceans off the coast, temperatures of ninety-plus degrees threaten coral reefs. But the scientists who are working to help the grasshopper sparrow refuse to give up. Tringali, the biologist, told me, “It’s really easy to do nothing. We are not done. We have a long way to go.” ♦

[juno-infernal]

i recently came across a very sad poem i wrote in 2018, concerning grief & memory & survivorship, which centered on the imminent extinction of the florida grasshopper sparrow.

thought about editing it today, and decided to look up the birds in question to see what became of the real “last sparrow” i imagined back then (“waiting, singular and fated / unaware and unremarkable / small enough to hold in one hand”). this is what i found instead:

not out of the woods by any means, but persisting. living their little sparrow lives in a world that is changed (& changing) but still theirs, for now. you and me both, sparrow. look at us, living!

[meret118]

A captivating drama from the frontlines of the race to save birds set against the devastating loss of one third of the avian population.

Three years ago, headlines delivered shocking news: nearly three billion birds in North America have vanished over the past fifty years. No species has been spared, from the most delicate jeweled hummingbirds to scrappy black crows, from a rainbow of warblers to common birds such as owls and sparrows. In a desperate race against time, scientists, conservationists, birders, wildlife officers, and philanthropists are scrambling to halt the collapse of species with bold, experimental, and sometimes risky rescue missions. High in the mountains of Hawaii, biologists are about to release clouds of laboratory-bred mosquitos in a last-ditch attempt to save Hawaii’s remaining native forest birds. In Central Florida, researchers have found a way to hatch Florida Grasshopper Sparrows in captivity to rebuild a species down to its last two dozen birds. In the Sierra Nevada Mountains, a team is using artificial intelligence to save the California Spotted Owl. In North Carolina, a scientist is experimenting with genomics borrowed from human medicine to bring the long-extinct Passenger Pigeon back to life. For the past year, veteran journalists Anders and Beverly Gyllenhaal traveled more than 25,000 miles across the Americas, chronicling costly experiments, contentious politics, and new technologies to save our beloved birds from the brink of extinction.

[ecoguardiansorg]

Conservation Breakthrough: 1,000th Florida Sparrow Grasshopper Released from Captivity

An important environmental event took place in Florida: conservationists celebrated the release of the 1,000th Florida grasshopper sparrow, bred in captivity. This unique species, which is under threat of extinction, has received a second chance at life in the wild thanks to the efforts of scientists and ecologists. The population restoration program, which began several years ago, has demonstrated significant success, and the release of the 1,000th individual was a real breakthrough in preserving the region's biodiversity.

https://eco-guardians.org/activities/conservation-breakthrough-1000th-florida-sparrow-grasshopper-released-from-captivity/

[obtener2]

"The words 'bombing range' might evoke a desolate war zone. Avon Park is anything but. In fact, its 106,000 acres are home to scores of plants and animals that are endemic to Florida, as well as 13 threatened and endangered species, including Florida grasshopper sparrows (North America’s most endangered bird) and Florida bonneted bats (North America’s most endangered bat)." Story from the Smithsonian

[1973listener-blog]

EP 155: Welcome to Florida: Saving the Grasshopper Sparrow 6-3-23 https://audioboom.com/posts/8311531-ep-155-welcome-to-florida-saving-the-grasshopper-sparrow-6-3-23

[great-and-small]

Hello! I hope you’re doing well! :)

Do you have a bird you’d prefer as Florida’s state bird?

I’ve heard a lot of criticism over the choice of a mockingbird and I’d like to see what you think

I love northern mockingbirds but definitely not as Florida’s state bird. There are SO many better options! Here are my gentle (violent) suggestions for replacement

1. Florida scrub jay

2. Roseate spoonbill

3. Swallow-tailed kite

4. Grasshopper sparrow

5. Crested Caracara (though this would actually be my primary pick for Texas)

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this story from National Geographic:

Ashleigh Blackford has seen her share of dramatic bird releases over the years. She vividly recalls California condors soaring high into the sky and San Clemente loggerhead shrikes fluttering free. The tiny Florida grasshopper sparrow, on the other hand, merely hopped out of an open screen and skittered along the ground, says Blackford, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist.

Still, it was a thrilling moment to witness: one of the most endangered birds in the continental U.S.—one that just two years ago seemed doomed to extinction—had begun a remarkable comeback.

“It wasn’t visually exciting,” Blackford says, “but it was emotionally exciting.”

No more than five inches long, Florida grasshopper sparrows have flat heads, short tails, and black and gray feathers that camouflage their nests, built in the low shrubs and saw palmetto of the state’s grassy prairies. Their name comes from their call, which consists of two or three weak notes followed by an insect-like buzz.

The Florida grasshopper sparrow (Ammodramus savannarum floridanus) was first described in 1902 by a U.S. Army surgeon, Major Edgar A. Mearns. Back then the birds were widespread across central and South Florida. By the 1970s, though, most of the prairies that form their habitat had been ditched, drained, and converted to pastures or sod production.

By 1986, the sparrow population had plummeted to a mere thousand. By 2013, fewer than 200 of the little songbirds remained.

“This is an emergency, and the situation for this species is dire,” Larry Williams, head of the South Florida office of the Fish and Wildlife Service in Vero Beach, said at the time. “This is literally a race against time.”

To many, they’re just little brown birds. They’re not especially beautiful or exciting or awe-inspiring. And that is part of the challenge in saving them.

By 2018, only 80 birds remained in the wild, including just 20 breeding pairs, says Craig Faulhaber, avian conservation coordinator for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. If this trend continued, “there was a strong possibility for extinction,” he says.

The wild population now numbers about a hundred, with 30 breeding pairs. It’s an improvement, Faulhaber says, although still far from the point of declaring them no longer endangered, so the captive-breeding program continues.

Meanwhile, in a deal announced in November, the family of deceased Subway co-founder Fred DeLuca donated 27,000 acres of undeveloped ranchland for preservation—land that contains about half of all the breeding pairs. It’s also critical link in the Florida wildlife corridor, a network of wild and rural lands that, once complete, will allow other rare animals, including the endangered Florida panther, to move more easily throughout the state.

[xtruss]

Deep in Florida, an ‘Ecological Disaster’ Has Been Reversed—and Wildlife is Thriving

Much of Florida’s Kissimmee River has been restored to its natural state, a milestone worth celebrating—and learning from.

— Photographs By Carlton Ward Jr. | April 6, 2023

The Kissimmee’s meandering floodplains teemed with life before they were diverted into a straight canal a half century ago. A recently completed project has restored the curves—seen here—and replenished the wetlands. The waterfowl, raptors, fish, and mammals are returning. By Douglas Main

If you’ve been to Disney World in Orlando, you’ve been to the Northern Everglades. Much of the water within the famous “river of grass” originates in Central Florida and flows south via the Kissimmee River—one of the more important and lesser-known waterways nationwide.

Sixty years ago, the Kissimmee meandered for more than 100 miles from the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes to Lake Okeechobee, and its floodplains were home to seasonal wetlands rich with life. But in the 1940s, in response to flooding and hurricanes, the state asked the federal government to help build a sprawling network of canals and waterways to drain the land.

The Army Corps of Engineers complied and, beginning in the 1960s, turned the meandering Kissimmee into a 30-foot-deep, channelized canal. Within a few years, populations of waterfowl dropped by 90 percent, bald eagle numbers by 70 percent, and some fish, bird, and mammal species vanished. The channel acted like a pipe, moving water quickly off the landscape to Lake Okeechobee, and then to the ocean. While that helped prevent some flooding in the short term, it robbed the stream of oxygen, which decimated the fish community and gave nutrient pollution no time to settle and be absorbed by the wetlands.

The disrupted hydrology and ecological problems were so glaring that, beginning in the 1990s, the Army Corps and a variety of state, federal, and local partners cooperated to undo the damage. More than 20 years later, at a cost of over $1 billion, the physical restoration of the river is now complete: 40 square miles of wetlands have been reestablished and rehydrated.

Researchers Fabiola Baeza-Tarin (right) and Nicole Rita (left) place bands on Florida grasshopper sparrows, one of the most endangered bird species in North America. These creatures are making a comeback in the prairies surrounding the Kissimmee River.

Already the biological impact of the project has become clear. As the wetlands have come back, so have the birds. “That response was immediate and pretty impressive,” says Lawrence Glenn, director of water resources with the South Florida Water Management District.

‘Triumph of Imagination’

In all, nearly half of the river has been restored to its original state. The project involved filling in 22 miles of the canal, re-carving sections of the old river, and restoring 44 miles of the waterway’s natural meandering paths, according to the Army Corps.

“It's a triumph of imagination [and] of partnership between the federal government and the state” and other organizations coming together, says Shannon Estenoz, assistant secretary for fish and wildlife and parks with the Department of Interior, who formerly worked for several different environmental organizations in Florida.

Populations of popular game fish, such as bass, have climbed, in part because the water is more oxygenated and invertebrates that demand such conditions, such as mayfly and caddisfly larvae, have returned. Populations of wading and waterbirds are already above intended targets; some species that disappeared during the days of the canal—including ibis, bitterns, avocets, and sandpipers—are back.

The restoration is a grand success story that “shows it’s possible to act at the landscape scale, and [it] demonstrates how quickly ecosystems can recover,” Estenoz adds. And it’s vitally important for water quality and the threatened species that live there, including limpkins, snail kites, and bald eagles, says Congressman Darren Soto, whose district abuts the river.

Riders on horseback move cattle across Otter Slough on the Lightsey Ranch with Lake Kissimmee in the background. The Lightsey family has protected more than 90 percent of their land in conservation easements, helping steer development away from sensitive areas in the Everglades Headwaters and Kissimmee River Valley. First receiving cattle and horses from the Spanish in 1521, Florida has the longest history of cattle ranching in the United States.

The Kissimmee will become part of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System, thanks to an act sponsored by Soto and signed into law as a part of the 2023 Consolidated Appropriations Act. The designation entails special protections and future funding for conservation work.

On the Water

To see the fruits of the restoration myself, I take a late summer ride down the river with photographer and National Geographic Explorer Carlton Ward, Jr., and Adam Bass, vice president of Conservation Florida. The first stretch of the river, directly south of Lake Kissimmee, consists of the old canal—300 feet wide and 30 feet deep, straight as a runway, with almost no birds or wildlife to mention. This part was left as a canal in part to prevent flooding in the Orlando area.

Passing through a lock to get the restored part of the river, the difference is stark and obvious as the river begins its natural flow. The abrupt edges are replaced by thickets and grasses and sabal palms and oaks—and we start seeing birds: herons, egrets, limpkins, and more. Surveys show that there are 50 species of fish in the Kissimmee, nearly 70 species of wetland-dependent birds, over 20 types of reptiles and amphibians, and four mammals that only live in the rehydrated marshes.

Snail kites are medium-sized hawks that feed on mollusks. They are considered an endangered species in Florida, the northern end of their range. The Kissimmee and its surrounding wetlands are an important habitat for them.

It's the rainy season and the wetlands are flooded, partially submerging vast fields of grasses and flowers. We pass dozens of alligators and bass fishermen. Though we are in crowded South Florida, there are long stretches where we see no people and hear only the sounds of frogs and waterbirds. This is still a wilderness. The river wiggles and bends and sometimes braids, leaving multiple pathways to choose from.

The next morning we wake before dawn and head out. As light creeps over the water nearly 10 snail kites—a subtropical species that’s considered endangered in the United States—fly overhead, many with apple snails in their beaks, large mollusks nearly the size of my fist.

These medium-sized hawks have striking red eyes and hooked beaks; the males are an almost bluish gray, with cream-and-slate undertails, the females a mottled chestnut and white.

Near the town of Lorida, we pull off at the Istokpoga Canal Boat Ramp—one of the only direct ways to access the restored part of the river, and meet Paul Gray, science coordinator with Audubon Florida. He also explains how the restoration project adds 100,000 acre-feet of water storage, which helps prevent flooding, and slows much of the water down, allowing nutrients to settle out.

Adam Bass, with Conservation Florida, steers his mud boat through a restored section of the Kissimmee River. With 1,000 people moving to Florida each day and land rapidly being developed, conservationists are working to protect land surrounding the Kissimmee and in the Florida Wildlife Corridor for the benefit of people and wildlife.

One night, we make camp along the river, serenaded by tree frogs and katydids—and watch fireflies flash in an open field, mirrored by twinkles of lightning in a brooding storm cloud on the horizon. Camping in Florida in August is not for the faint of heart, though, as a self-regenerating swarm of mosquitos appears at dusk—the likes of which I’ve never experienced.

Back to the Future

When the channelization was completed in the 1970s, everybody realized it was a mistake. Locals had been against it from the beginning, explains Monrad Chandler, a longtime resident of the area, because “a lot of people used to make a living on the river.”

We’re sitting on a parcel of land he owns right next to the Kissimmee. His son-in-law, Matt Pearce, ranches on this land, where he practices rotational grazing—cattle are currently excluded from this area, allowing the plants to recover and grow back.

“When they channelized the river, there was no marsh no more … then no ducks, no snipe, [no] wading birds,” he says. “A lot of people had to change their livelihood.”

“It was an ecological disaster,” Gray agrees.

But now, those birds are coming back—and the restored section looks essentially the way it used to, Chandler says, fondly recalling hunting and fishing on the river as a youngster.

The Kissimmee River and surrounding wetlands flooded after Hurricane Ian. This helped to prevent property damage in developed areas. “The Northern Everglades’ biggest challenge is water storage,” says Paul Gray, science coordinator with Audubon Florida, and these rehydrated wetlands help take excess water.

These restored wetlands provide corridors for larger wildlife such as Florida panthers and bears and habitat for endangered species, including grasshopper sparrows. By storing water, they also help prevent flooding during storms.

“The Kissimmee River accomplished an amazing feat last summer when Hurricane Ian slammed Florida,” Ward says. “It filled to the 100-year flood level and did its job naturally absorbing billions of gallons of water, with no loss of property, because of the restoration efforts.”

Yet there’s still much work to be done. About half of the Kissimmee consists of a canal, and there’s a big backlog of hydrological and research projects. One vital and imminent project involves raising the water level in Lake Kissimmee—and thus increasing water storage.

Gray explains that various areas of Florida—including Orlando—are running out of easily accessible water, draining the state’s aquifers. “These water projects are going to become more and more important for the future of Florida,” Gray says.

“This project is going to be saving water, going to be slowing it down—not only is that a benefit to wildlife, but to water management, and our ability to meet [our] water needs.”