NWF hails reintroduction of legislation conserving Colorado’s San Juan Mountains

February 15-Colorado Sen. Mark Udall’s reintroduction of a bill that would conserve about 61,000 acres in the San Juan Mountains of southwestern Colorado is welcome news to hunters and anglers, said John Gale of the National Wildlife Federation.

The San Juan Mountains Wilderness Act, reintroduced Thursday, would protect important fish and wildlife habitat, watersheds and hunting, fishing and recreation areas in San Miguel, Ouray and San Juan counties.

“Sportsmen have been strong supporters of this legislation from the start. The bill has wide, grassroots support and was developed from the ground up,’’ said Gale, NWF’s regional representative. “The National Wildlife Federation applauds Sen. Udall for his foresight in protecting one of the region’s most iconic places to hunt and fish.”

House “Sodsaver” Measure Would Protect Native Prairie Habitat

February 14-Representatives Noem (R-SD) and Walz (D-MN) today introduced legislation to save America’s grasslands through a national sodsaver provision. The Protect Our Prairies Act, which has the support of eight bipartisan co-sponsors, is common-sense legislation that would reduce taxpayer-funded incentives to destroy vital grassland resources.

Aviva Glaser, Legislative Representative for Agriculture Policy at National Wildlife Federation, said today:

“America is at risk of losing one our most iconic ecosystems. Native prairies, along with the wildlife that are dependent upon them, are disappearing at an alarming rate.”

To learn more about Sodsaver, read our Sodsaver Factsheet (pdf).

Obama Outlines Bipartisan Path to Climate Action

February 12-President Barack Obama delivered his State of the Union address tonight, issuing a strong call to action on climate change. “For the sake of our children and our future, we must do more to combat climate change,” said President Obama. “The good news is, we can make meaningful progress on this issue while driving strong economic growth.”

Larry Schweiger, president and CEO of the National Wildlife Federation, said today:

“President Obama made it clear tonight that we need to confront the climate crisis – but that he hasn’t given up on reaching across party lines to forge a bipartisan solution. The climate-fueled extreme weather that’s battered America from Cape May to Waldo Canyon has destroyed Democratic and Republican homes and businesses with equal malice.

For more on the Climate Crisis, check out the report: Wildlife in a Warming World 

Porpoises Make Amazing Return to the San Francisco Bay, Need Help from Citizen Scientists

February 12-After a sixty-five year absence, porpoises have made an amazing return to the San Francisco Bay. To celebrate this success and to ensure the marine mammal’s continued residence in the Bay, National Wildlife Federation and Golden Gate Cetacean Research have partnered on a “Return of the Porpoise to San Francisco Bay” campaign.

Sightings of harbor porpoises have recently delighted visitors to and residents of San Francisco, yet most do not realize the significance of seeing this animal in the Bay.

“The return of porpoises to the San Francisco Bay tells us that the ecosystem is healthier than it has been in a long time,” said Beth Pratt, California Director for the National Wildlife Federation.

To learn more about the campaign, visit www.sfbayporpoises.org.

Tester Bill “A Win-Win” for Clean Energy, Public Lands

February 11-Conservation and clean energy leaders today welcomed the reintroduction of the Public Lands and Renewable Energy Development Act of 2013, championed by Montana Senator Jon Tester, Nevada Senator Dean Heller, Idaho Senator Jim Risch and bipartisan champions in the U.S. House of Representatives. The legislation would create the framework for more efficient, responsible renewable energy development on public lands and would strategically direct the revenue from development to pay back local communities, fish and wildlife resources, and hunting and angling access potentially impacted by this clean energy development.

“This is a win-win strategy to facilitate needed renewable energy development on suitable public lands,” said Tom France, Senior Director of Western Wildlife Conservation of the National Wildlife Federation’s Rocky Mountains and Prairies Regional Center. “This bill works because it balances the need to expand our renewable energy base and still protect key fish and wildlife habitats.”

Learn more about National Wildlife Federation’s work to promote safe development of renewable energy on public lands.

And now here are highlights from NWF in the news:

• The Washington Post: Farmers, environmentalists await seventh analysis of 60-year-old Mississippi levee plan
• The Washington Post: Climate change could burn a hole in the government’s finances, GAO says
• Reuters: Pressure builds for Keystone decision after Obama speech
• The Voice: Columbus Township property certified as Wildlife Habitat
• Great Falls Tribune:  Beetle Outbreak worst ever, professor says
• North Andover Citizen: North Andover Wildlife Team forms
• sctimes.com: Groups Rally behind benefits of recess
• YNN: App Wrap: “Ranger Rick’s Treehouse,” “GeoDash”
• The Times and Democrat: Making the most of the wind
• dallasnews.com: Water experts weigh in on financing, project priority
• The Philadelphia Inquirer: Obama must act on climate change
• The Mercury: Global warming effects on the planet

For more visit www.nwf.org/news

In honor of 75 years of conservation and protecting wildlife, the National Wildlife Federation is holding its annual Workday for Wildlife on April 16^th at Patuxent Research Center and Refuge in Laurel, Maryland. I was lucky enough to spend a day sneaking a peek at what’s in store for volunteers this weekend.

J.N. "Ding" Darling

The origins of both NWF and Patuxent lie in the mastermind of conservation icon J.N. “Ding” Darling. On a crusade for action, Darling helped found NWF in 1936 and was elected its first president, establishing principles and strategies to protect and restore wildlife, reconnect people to nature, and confront pollution and its unforeseen consequences and environmental challenges.

Just a year earlier, as chief of the Bureau of Biological Survey (now the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service). Darling envisioned a research center to study wildlife-habitat relationships and lobbied Congress to establish a national wildlife research center.

Just a hop, skip, and a jump outside our nation’s capital, the USFWS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center on the USGS Patuxent Research Refuge is now 4,700 acres of nature oasis. Home to whooping cranes, diving ducks, screech owls, masked bobwhites, sandhill cranes and other critically endangered wildlife, scientists carefully monitor these breeding stocks to ensure future preservation in the wild.

Though the majority of the land is natural habitat, the landscape still needs active management to create the safest home sweet home for the wildlife, and there’s plenty to be done.

Work to be done

Volunteers will take part in a wide variety of essential restoration activities, such as:

• Removing invasive species (such as wisteria, multiflora rose and others)
• Planting native plants and flowers in wildlife habitat
• Cleaning research pens for cranes and ducks
• Conducting citizen science investigations for bees, frogs, and other species
• Installing conservation trail

Want to join us and lend a hand to give wildlife a better place to live? All are welcome, and you can register here.

Here’s a sneak peak at some of the wildlife you might bump into while getting your hands dirty.

Ruby-throated hummingbird

After Pat Neuhaus read in the December/January issue of National Wildlife that out-of-range-and-season sightings of hummingbirds are becoming increasingly common, he put out his sugar-water feeders. The next day, a hummingbird arrived in his South Carolina yard.

“I hope to go by his house this weekend to try to band this hummer,” says Doreen Cubie, a licensed bander and author of the feature that inspired Neuhaus to take action. Bob Sargent of the Hummer/Bird Study Group put the two in touch after the homeowner reported his sighting. Both Cubie and Sargent are part of a coalition studying the apparent shifts in the cold-weather ranges of several hummingbird species.

“Bob Sargent emailed me to say he has received nearly 700 replies so far from people who read the hummingbird article and have hummingbirds in their yards now,” reports Cubie. “Pretty amazing, really. Because of these contacts from National Wildlife readers, wintering hummingbirds have been banded in Pennsylvania, Michigan and in several places in the Southeast.”

Report winter hummingbirds: If you have a sugar-water feeder out and spot a hummingbird, the Hummer/Bird Study Group would like hear from you. Contact the group at rubythroat@aol.com.

Find out more: Read “The Hummingbirds of Winter” by Doreen Cubie, then check out her tips for attracting these avian pollinators to your garden.

Mary Esch at AP reports:

“John Losey, an entomologist at Cornell University, launched the Lost Ladybug Project last year to try to figure out why once-common native ladybug species had all but disappeared across the country. The project, funded by the National Science Foundation, recruits citizen scientists – especially children – to search for ladybugs and send photos of them to Losey and his colleagues.  Of particular interest are the nine-spotted, two-spotted and transverse ladybugs, three native species that have declined dramatically.. The big breakthrough came in June, when 6-year-old Alyson Yates and her mom, Kate, started sending in photos of nine-spotted ladybugs from their rural backyard in Lakeview, Ore., in the sagebrush desert east of the Cascades. It was really an amazing find,” Losey said. “Usually, someone just finds one or two. Alyson and Kate sent in a couple one day, a few more three days later, a couple more a few days after that. It became apparent they had a population out there.”

So Losey and a colleague boarded a plane with their collecting nets and came back to Ithaca with 13 nine-spotted and more than 30 transverse ladybugs. Aly was thrilled that people would come all the way from New York to go collecting in our yard,” said Kate Yates, who got involved in the project when her daughter saw an ad in the National Wildlife Federation’s Ranger Rick magazine for children.”

See full article >>

Watch Martha and Dave and their jumpy guests:

Frog Facts:

• Frogs are amphibians. They start life under water breathing through gills and go through metamorphosis, growing legs and lungs.
• Females are typically much larger than males.
• All frogs are carnivorous and feed voraciously on insects and other small animals.
• As predators they play a key role in controlling insects. They are also important for agriculture, gardening and also control of insect-borne diseases.
• Frogs have very sensitive skin that absorbs liquids and gasses. This makes them “canaries in the coal mine” when it comes to monitoring how pollution or other changes are disrupting ecosystems.
• Skin secretions of frogs protect them from disease and are being studied for human medical benefits.
• One-third to one-half of all frog species are at risk of going extinct. About 120 species have gone extinct in recent years. This is the biggest potential mass extinction of one group of creatures since the dinosaurs.

You can help scientists know what frogs are hopping around your backyard by taking part in the National Wildlife Federation’s Frogwatch USA™ program. It’s fun for the whole family, a great way to get outside and it’s a neat thing individuals can do to help frogs.

This year, NWF has teamed up the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, Amphibian Ark and organizations around the world as an official partner of the “Year of the Frog” campaign to raise awareness about the alarming decline in global frog populations. Year of the Frog calls attention to the alarming decline of frogs globally from factors such as…

• Global warming
• Air and water pollution
• Habitat destruction
• Invasive species
• Exotic pet trade
• Chytrid fungus

Find out how you can be a part of Frogwatch USA in the Year of the Frog!

My co-worker Danielle and I had been dreaming about this day for weeks. Our backpacks were filled with water bottles, snacks and I of course brought not one, but two insect field guides. We had signed up for the aquatics insect team, not my specialty per say (I always managed to catch more grasshoppers than anything), but I was certainly ready to learn.

It’s probably best that we weren’t on the bird or mammal teams because the animals would have heard us coming miles away. But our non-stop enthusiastic chatter wouldn’t bother our aquatic friends. Nets in hand, plastic containers in our pockets and armed with new pairs of forceps the group set off for the first shift of the day around noon.

Hunting was not going to be easy today. Hardly any sun and a few drizzles here and there posed a challenge for the team. We did manage to find a few caddisfly, damselfly and dragonfly larvae along with the tiniest rove beetle that I have ever seen. True to my grasshopper-locating background, I managed to catch a pygmy grasshopper camouflaged in the small muddy sections of the river’s shoreline. Not exactly what we were supposed to be looking for but we would pass it along to the terrestrial insect team. Even the ferocious tiger beetle couldn’t be bothered to make an appearance along the sandy shores of the river.

Pickings were slim in the river so Danielle and I headed towards dry land in search of fallen tree branches and logs. Turning over one ancient looking log we had found our prize. A plump, lazy millipede slept curled in a tight little coil. Our excited squeals and slight poking with the forceps couldn’t rouse this gentle arthropod from its slumber. A light brown centipede quickly crawled under the decaying leaves and wood probably in search of its next meal. A shy wood cockroach ran for the comfort and safety of the dark underside of the log. After noting our findings we gently rolled the log back into position.

The distant call of songbirds, the gentle rushing river, the deep emerald green of the forest…I truly couldn’t imagine a better way to celebrate biodiversity and Endangered Species Day.

If you haven’t done so already, I’d like to invite you to send your Members of Congress a special message in support of the Endangered Species Recovery Act and also fair funding for endangered species management. The official Endangered Species Day may be over, but we can still take action to protect the wildlife and wild places that we cherish for future generations.