Author: Patty Murray

Bioblitz: Bugs and Birds in Your Backyard

  • A fish sample from this summer's BioBlitz in Ohio. (Photo courtesy of the Geauga Park District)

Hundreds of tiny plants and animals live in our city parks. But most people are too busy enjoying themselves to bother thinking about the critters… let alone to get down on their hands and knees and look for them. Now a campaign is underway to get people to take a closer look at what’s living in their neighborhood parks. The effort is called a “BioBlitz.” It pairs volunteers with scientists. They go into natural areas and see how many different species they can identify. The idea is to show the important role city parks can play in preserving diverse wildlife. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray attended a BioBlitz and has this report:

Transcript

Hundreds of tiny plants and animals live in our city parks. But most
people are too busy enjoying themselves to bother thinking about the
critters… let alone to get down on their hands and knees and look for
them. Now a campaign is underway to get people to take a closer look at
what’s living in their neighborhood parks. The effort is called
a”BioBlitz.” It pairs volunteers with scientists. They go into natural
areas and see how many different species they can identify. The idea
is to show the important role city parks can play in preserving diverse
wildlife. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray attended a
BioBlitz and has this report:


A small crowd of people is gathered around a table at a picnic shelter.
They’re not reaching for the mustard. Instead they’re watching Bob
Howe open a metal, shoe box-shaped trap… to see what comes out.


“Yeah, there he is, a masked shrew.” “Wow.”


Howe is a Professor of Applied Science at the University of Wisconsin,
Green Bay. He’s at Baird Creek Park… dumping the little, brown
masked shrew into a clear plastic display cage. It darts under a pile
of grass, probably wondering what the heck’s going on.


“There he is wow, he’s tiny.” ‘What is he?’
“He’s called a masked shrew. Sorex cinereus. It’s our smallest mammal in
Wisconsin. A very common species though most people never see them.”


The shrews are apparently rarely seen because they’re so small… not
even half the size of a toy rubber mouse you’d give your cat to play
with.


It’s obscure animals like this that the BioBlitz is all about.
Organizer Tammy Lee is with the group Great Lakes Forever. She wants
people to take time out from barbecuing… and think about the other
beings that share the park with them.


“And just to make them say, ‘Wow, I didn’t know that yellow billed
cuckoo exists here or that salamander.'”


Lee says BioBlitzes are deliberately staged in urban or suburban parks –
not wildlife sanctuaries -to drive home the point that wildlife doesn’t
always
stay within the boundaries of a preserve. It’s in our own backyards.


“Somewhere that they can walk to, something they can go to, not
necessarily to look for biodiversity, but they might come here to play a
baseball game or play on the playground.”


“Hey do you guys want to help me catch some bugs?”


Volunteer Joan Berkopec is corralling a young brother and sister team.
She
hands the kids cloth nets and leads them beyond the merry go
round and the slide to a patch of waist high wildflowers.


They make a few sweeps with the nets, then sit on the grass to see what
they
came up with.


“Oh Lydia! You have a bunch of stuff in here. You have a
grasshopper.”


“Oh… everything’s getting away!”


The nature hunters lose a few flying insects out of their nets, but in
a matter of minutes they’re able to grab five or ten other funny
looking bugs and put them in sample jars.


They’ll take the bugs back to the Park Shelter where professional
scientists
will identify them. By the end of the 12-hour BioBlitz in the park
they’ll
have identified 571 different species.


Professor Bob Howe, recovered from the excitement of the masked shrew
discovery, thinks this park harbors more than 800 different types of
wildlife depending on the season.


“Well, one species that we suspect is nesting there is Wilson’s fowler, which
is a species found in just a few places in the entire state. We’ve also found
a number of what’re called forest interior bird species like scarlet tanager and wood thrush.
That indicates this forest is intact and quite a good habitat for breeding
birds.”


Not bad for a city park.


Howe says it’s important to have a lot of different species living
together.
Without certain trees, some birds wouldn’t come around. Without the
birds… certain insects would proliferate… and so on. Also, Howe
says city parks filter out all sorts of pollutants such as fertilizers
before they get
into lakes and streams.


More BioBlitzes are going on in Wisconsin this summer. The events have
also
been held in places like Chicago and in New York’s Central Park.


For the
Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Patty Murray.

Related Links

Babysitting Spawning Sturgeon

  • The lake sturgeon, Acipenser fulvescens. (Photo courtesy of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, Canada)

Each spring, several hundred people volunteer to babysit fish. In spawning season, masses of the large lake sturgeon float near the surface of the water, making them vulnerable to poachers. A program called “Sturgeon Watch” is credited with helping to preserve the ancient fish. It’s become a model for sturgeon management and has been copied by other fisheries around the world. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray visited “sturgeon camp” and has this report:

Transcript

Each spring several hundred people volunteer to babysit fish. In spawning
season masses of the large lake sturgeon float near the surface of the water
making them vulnerable to poachers. A program called “sturgeon watch” is
credited with helping to preserve the ancient fish. It’s become a model for
sturgeon management and has been copied by other fisheries around the world.
Patty Murray visited “sturgeon camp” and has this report:


It’s a foggy, rainy day, perfect for sitting inside with a cup of coffee.


But instead we’re outside in the drizzle with Ron Reindahl, darting along
the high muddy banks of the Wolf River in Central Wisconsin. He’s looking
for sturgeon.


“There’s some big ones in there.
But there was one this morning, I’m not kidding, it was as big as I am.”


While the sturgeon are spawning, they swarm in large groups near the surface, close to
shore. It would be easy to reach out and grab one of them.


That’s the problem. The fish are tasty and their eggs rival Russian
Beluga caviar.


Concern over the vulnerable fish brought Ron Reindahl out in the elements.
He’s wearing a blue cap with “sturgeon guard” written on it.


He got it from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.
It shows that he’s here to babysit the fish while they’re breeding.


DNR wardens say guards like Reindahl have helped stabilize
the numbers of lake sturgeon.


Poaching used to be a big problem. That’s what retired Warden Dale Morey
remembers. Morey is jokingly nicknamed the “sturgeon general.”


From his post in a cabin at “fish camp,” it’s his job to assign
volunteers to sites where the fish are active.


Back in the 1940’s and 50’s, Morey says poaching was seen as a birthright.


“The general public attitude around here was if you could take them, fine.
The wardens were the bad guys. The locals felt they had a right to those
fish and they just took them any way they could.”


Legally, sturgeon can only be killed during the winter spearing season on
the ice of Lake Winnebago.


But some unethical people still try to take them during spawning.


That’s where the volunteers come in.


Retired teacher Mary Ann Eltink is in the basement of the cabin at fish camp. She’s eating a
hot breakfast after a rainy 12-hour overnight shift on guard.


“To be visible there is a definite deterrent. And should any incident
occur, we get as much information as we can and then radio it to the wardens to
follow up on it.


PM: ‘Did you see anything suspicious last night?’


“I wouldn’t say it was suspicious but we were very visible on the bank at twilight, and there was a
motorcraft that came up the river and he was slow at first and speeded up as he
rounded the bend where we were. So we can only surmise.”


Anyone caught with an illegal sturgeon will get a $3,000 fine.


And they won’t be able to fish or hunt in Wisconsin for three years.


Wardens take poaching seriously because sturgeon are a very delicate
resource.


Sturgeon don’t spawn until they’re 20 or 25 years old. So if too many fish are caught
now… the impact won’t show up for a couple of decades.


Back in the rainy woods, Ron Reindahl says that inspired him to volunteer. Like many of
the guards, he says he speared a sturgeon one winter. He’d like future generations to have
a chance at one too.


“Somebody’s got to protect
them. If you don’t do this I can imagine what’d happen. Our grandchildren won’t be able to appreciate
it like I did.”


Reindahl knows he’s doing something good for the sturgeon. And he says they’re doing
something for him, giving him an excuse to get up close and personal to one of nature’s
oldest species.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Patty Murray.

Related Links

Keeping Tabs on Eagles Infected With West Nile

  • Crows are not the only birds affected by West Nile virus. Some Bald Eagles have come down with the virus as well. (Photo courtesy of the USFWS)

A wild bird sanctuary is using high-tech tracking devices to keep track of bald eagles recovering from West Nile virus. There’s no medicinal cure for the disease. But volunteers have nursed some bald eagles back to health. They’ve recently released a few of the birds and are watching to see if the disease affects their long term behavior. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray has more:

Transcript

A wild bird sanctuary is using high-tech tracking devices to keep track of
bald eagles recovering from West Nile Virus. There’s no medicinal cure for
the disease. But volunteers have nursed some bald eagles back to health. They’ve recently
released a few of the birds and are watching to see if the disease affects their long term behavior.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray has more:


Marge Gibson is crunching through the snow on the grounds of the Raptor Education Group
Incorporated. Several big brown buildings stand stark against the gray Wisconsin winter. They
make up a hospital campus for injured or sick raptors.


(bird chirping)


Gibson approaches a screened in gazebo.


Inside is a very talkative young female bald eagle who’s hopping around on a perch and giving
Gibson a knowing look.


“She’s very vocal and she likes to chat…She’s doing her rendition of ‘poor me, get over here and
pay attention to me’ in bald eagle.”


West Nile Virus began showing up in birds here about two years ago. It’s not known if a bird can
ever fully be cured of it. But in January the sanctuary released three bald eagles that had
sufficiently recovered.


Gibson says it would have been irresponsible to let them go without first observing the lingering
effects of the disease. She’s studying West Nile Virus in eagles with the help of Nick Derene.
He’s a graduate student from the University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point.


Derene logs onto a special website and tracks down one recently released bald eagle that’s been
tagged with a satellite transmitter.


A topographical map shows the region where the bird has settled. A red “x” marks the spot
within 100 yards of where the bird is at that moment.


“And he’s found a nice place on a bluff alongside a stream outside of Black earth About 3 miles
off the highway that runs from Madison to Blackearth.


“Very nice secluded spot atop a hill.”


The satellite transmitters are more accurate than traditional radio monitoring. And they’re a lot
more expensive. Since the Raptor Education Group doesn’t get state or federal funding, Marge
Gibson foots most of the bills herself. The monitoring project could cost as much as 60-thousand
dollars.


Just getting birds to the sanctuary is an involved process. Volunteers pick up birds they think
need help and drive them here. Then Nick Derene keeps an eye on the birds to see if they exhibit
any tell-tale signs of West Nile Virus.


“They’re usually convulsing, they have poor balance, head tremors. Usually
eye problems, sometimes they can’t fly-usually they can’t fly.”


West Nile Virus can also affect an eagle’s voice. That’s a problem because its mate might not
recognize its call.


When the sanctuary staff suspects a bald eagle has West Nile Virus they draw
a blood sample and send it to a local clinic for testing. Once the virus is confirmed, the only way
to treat it is with some tender loving care.


“Hi…lookit”


The birds are kept in cardboard boxes so they don’t expend energy flapping around. And they’re
fed baby food so they don’t waste energy in digestion. When the birds feel up to it they’re put in
an indoor flight room.


It looks like a warehouse-150 feet long and almost three stories high. It’s essentially a rehab ward
for birds who need to test their wings. An immature eagle flies overhead, but he hasn’t perfected
flight yet. He misses his perch, hits the wall and falls to the gravelly floor.


“Flapping, hits wall….is he okay?”


He’s okay but almost looks a little embarrassed.


On the floor of this flight room is a pile of fish, a deer carcass, and the ribcage of an animal that
became eagle chow.


Marge Gibson says she wants the eagles to stick to their wild diet. That’s why the satellite
monitoring program is so important because the birds’ behavior in the wild will indicate the
lasting effects of West Nile Virus.


“We can judge certain things in captivity, in a flight building. Whether the bird is flying well.
But one of the things we can’t judge is his visual acuity, his mental acuity and those things we
have to rely on once they’re released. And the satellite transmitter can follow them to see how
they’re reacting with their own species and other species once they’re in the
wild.”


So far, West Nile Virus is fairly rare in wild bald eagles. In Wisconsin, more bald eagles die
from being hit by cars than they do from West Nile virus.


Nationwide the birds have made a remarkable recovery since being nearly wiped in the 1970’s by
the pesticide DDT. It’s now banned.


It doesn’t look as though West Nile virus will reverse that upward trend.


Marge Gibson hopes to keep tabs on just a few of the eagles infected by the virus to help shed
light on a still mysterious disease.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Patty Murray.

Related Links

BIG CLEAN-UP OF RIVER PCBs

There’s a plan in place to clean up a PCB-contaminated river. It could be one of the most comprehensive, and most expensive, river cleanups ever done in North America. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray has more:

Transcript

There’s a plan in place to clean up a PCB-contaminated river. It could be one of the most comprehensive, and most expensive, river cleanups ever done in North America. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray has more:


The Fox River, which flows into Green
Bay, is the biggest source of PCBs
emptied into Lake Michigan.


Tom Skinner is with the EPA’s Great
Lakes National Program Office. He
says the Fox cleanup will be one of
the most ambitious ever.


“There’s a lot of talk about the
Hudson River project. This project has
the Hudson beat in a number of different ways.”


Such as: the cleanup may cost
400-million dollars, and Skinner says
the amount of contaminants to be
removed is also significant.


“The analogy we’ve used previously is that a
cubic yard is equivalent to a very
compact refrigerator. We’re
going to take probably over 7 million
of those out of the river.”


Seven paper companies that
dumped the PCBs in the river will
pay the cost of the project.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Patty Murray.

Related Links

Biologists Launch Society to Save Sturgeon

Biologists from seven countries are banding together to protect a large, ancient fish. Earlier this month, scientists launched what they call the “World Sturgeon Conservation Society.” The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray has more:

Transcript

Biologists from seven countries are banding together to protect a large,
ancient fish. Earlier this month/last month (March) scientists launched what they
call the “World Sturgeon Conservation Society.” The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Patty Murray has more:


Sturgeon are among the oldest fishes in the world. They’ve been around
since the pre-historic era.


But modern pressures are testing the fish. That’s why sturgeon biologists
recently formed the “World Sturgeon Conservation Society.”


Ron Bruch is a sturgeon biologist with the Wisconsin Department of Natural
Resources.


He says North American sturgeon stocks are fairly healthy. But Bruch says
that’s not the case in the Caspian and Black seas where the fish often wind
up on the illegal caviar market.


“The stocks there are on track to collapse in the next 15-20 years because
of poaching, problems with habitat and pollution. There’s a real need in
the sturgeon community for international help to pull that situation out
before it’s beyond repair.”


Bruch says members of the World Sturgeon Conservation Society will share
research that can help reduce illegal sturgeon harvest. One idea is to
raise sturgeon on aquaculture farms to offset the need for black market
caviar.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Patty Murray.

Greener Cleaners

  • Joseph DeSimone, founder and chairman of Micell Technologies, explains the cleaning process that clothes undergo in his Hanger’s store in Morrisville, NC.

Consumers may not realize it, but the simple act of dropping off clothes at the cleaners could end up harming the environment. For decades, dry cleaners have used a toxic solvent to clean clothes. Now there are many contaminated former dry cleaning sites across the country. But a solution to the dry cleaning problem may now be available. A new chain of cleaners is touting a “greener” system that uses a non-toxic everyday substance. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray has more:

Reviving an Ancient Fish

Sturgeon are one of the oldest vertebrates on earth. The giant fish have survived for more than 150 million years. But encroachment by humans, and in some cases poaching, have decimated the fish in many areas, including the Great Lakes. Now the sturgeon is on the brink of extinction. That’s why hundreds of scientists from around the world came to Oshkosh, Wisconsin recently. As the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray reports, they came to witness a sturgeon success story:

Transcript

Sturgeon are one of the oldest vertebrates on earth. The giant fish have survived for more than one hundred fifty million years. But encroachments by humans, and in some cases, poaching, have decimated the fish in many areas including the Great Lakes. Now the sturgeon is near the brink of extinction. That’s why hundreds of scientists from around the world came to Oshkosh, Wisconsin recently. As the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray reports, they came to witness a sturgeon success story.


The sturgeon is a really big fish. It can grow six feet long and weigh as much as two hundred pounds. Because of its size it faces few challenges from any other animal, except says Ron Bruch, from humans. Bruch is a fishery biologist with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. He says most of the twenty-five species of sturgeon found around the world are in trouble, including those living in the lakes here. Years ago, he says the Great Lakes used to be full of sturgeon, but European settlers didn’t like them because they tore up fishing nets.


“Nets were very expensive back then they didn’t have the fancy nylon twine and all the other equipment we have today. So these big fish would get into the nets and rip them up so they didn’t like sturgeon. So they’d just kill the sturgeon, stack them up just to get rid of them. Then they found out the fish had caviar and there was a market for caviar.”


And that meant the sturgeon began facing another threat. Today, a pint of caviar can bring as much as six hundred dollars. That’s enough money to bring out poachers.


(Sound of boat on river)


So with the sturgeon population in rapid decline, scientists are eager to find ways to save those fish that remain. That’s why many of them came to Wisconsin this summer. While most of the sturgeon population in the Great Lakes has long since disappeared, some of the fish still survive here. So scientists gathered on the banks of the Wolf River to watch as DNR wardens plucked a few of the big fish out of the water.


(Natural sounds)


Wisconsin’s Lake sturgeon population is considered to be the healthiest on earth. Sturgeon experts’ say that is because of a strong, two-pronged effort by state officials. First, they have a monitoring program. Many of the sturgeon are fitted with radio monitoring chips to keep track of how each fish is growing and where it is living.


(Sound of measuring, checking for chips)


Then, to make sure the fish remain safe, game wardens regularly patrol for poachers, and volunteers guard riverbanks during spawning season. That’s when the fish are the most vulnerable because they float close to the surface and can be easily speared. But despite these efforts, the state’s sturgeon population still holds a threatened status. Most of the fish live in the Wisconsin’s inland lakes and rivers, while very few remain in Lake Michigan, and it’s that fact which prompted a very unusual donation. An Italian count recently visited Wisconsin and learned of the fish’s decline, so he has donated two thousand dollars to study how to strengthen the population. The count’s money will pay researchers to go into Lake Michigan and Green Bay to see how many fish are left. They’ll also look at what obstacles may block restocking efforts.


Scientists hope what they learn in Lake Michigan can be applied to the rest of the Great Lakes. The money may also help fish elsewhere in the world. The count sent a team of Italian scientists to spend a week shadowing Wisconsin researchers. Darren McKenzie is an English scientist working with the Italians on preserving sturgeon in the Po River.


“Well I hope we can learn a few things about the techniques they use particularly with radio tracking and population issues. Because probably the Wisconsin lake sturgeon rehabilitation management thing, whatever it is called, is one of the best in the world for monitoring sturgeon population.”


For many of the foreign scientists, the importance of the sturgeon was brought home by a visit to a Northern Wisconsin Indian Reservation.


“Welcome to the Menominee tribal reservation. The way we look at it you’re people of the sturgeon just like we are-concerned about the sturgeon.”


For the Menominee, the sturgeon is more than just unusual looking and good tasting. The tribe’s relationship with the sturgeon goes back ten thousand years to the Menominee creation story. Before European settlers came along, the tribe relied on the fish for food and fuel. Then, in the 1890’s a dam went up downstream that stopped the sturgeon from swimming to a traditional spawning ground on Menominee land. Back then, tribal historian David Grignon says, the federal government would not let the Indians go off the reservation to spear sturgeon.


“It was denying us of a resource that we’d had for centuries. You know it was probably like the buffalo to the plains…. a way of life was gone, wouldn’t return anymore.”


But the fish are returning, since they can’t swim to the reservation anymore, the tribe is trucking them in. It is a long-term project. Sturgeon don’t mate until they’re at least twenty-five years old, so some tribal members won’t live long enough to know if their efforts have paid off. But if the tribe’s project and others like it are successful, then humans may claim credit for saving the fish once almost pushed to extinction. For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Patty Murray in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

State Tries to Avoid Superfund Stigma

A polluted river in northeastern Wisconsin is due for a clean-up. But
who runs the massive project is a hot topic. The Environmental
Protection Agency may add the Fox River to its national priorities list,
more popularly known as Superfund. But state officials would rather
handle the project on their own…and have recently released preliminary
studies on how they envision the cleanup. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Patty Murray reports:

Fish Release Scaled Back

There’s a shortage of fish food in the Great Lakes, so Wisconsin and
three other states have agreed to reduce the number of Chinook salmon
released into Lake Michigan in the spring. The action comes because a
limited food supply in the lake could threaten other fish populations.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray reports:

States Turn to the Feds to Fight Gypsy Moths

Last month (July, 1998), Congress cut funding for an ongoing program to control the gypsy moth. Now, five Great Lakes states hope Forest Service dollars might save the program. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Patty Murray has more: