Whooping cranes have been abandoning their nests, and eggs, in search of food (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
The experiment to create a migrating flock
of whooping cranes in the Eastern US is having a
parenting problem. Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Transcript
The experiment to create a migrating flock
of whooping cranes in the Eastern US is having a
parenting problem. Chuck Quirmbach reports:
About 70 whooping cranes now migrate between the Southeast US and the Midwest.
Wildlife experts have been hoping that more pairs of the birds would start hatching eggs
and raising chicks in the wild.
This spring, at their northern home in Wisconsin, several female cranes did lay eggs and
sat on the nests during cold weather. But when it warmed up, the adult birds abandoned
their nests to look for food.
George Archibald is co-founder of the International Crane Foundation.
“If there is a food stress, when it becomes warmer their drive to feed may increase much
more than when it’s cold.”
Some of the crane eggs were saved and hatched out by wildlife centers.
New research suggests that kids today have a harder time outgrowing
milk and egg allergies than kids in past generations. Rebecca Williams
reports:
Transcript
New research suggests that kids today have a harder time outgrowing
milk and egg allergies than kids in past generations. Rebecca Williams
reports:
Milk and egg allergies are the two most common food allergies in the
US.
Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center followed children
with milk or egg allergies for more than 13 years. They found that
both types of allergies were harder for today’s kids to outgrow.
Dr. Robert Wood directs Pediatric Allergy and Immunology at Johns
Hopkins. He says these allergies tend to last into middle school, and
sometimes into high school or college years:
“In my 20 years of practicing pediatric allergy my impression would be
that there really is a tendency toward more severe allergy and that the
disease of food allergy is behaving differently than it used to
behave.”
Dr. Wood says it’s not yet known why this could be happening. But he
says researchers are focusing on finding ways to better treat these
aggressive allergies in kids.
The Sirex woodwasp is killing pinetrees in New York, Pennsylvania and parts of Ontario and seems to be spreading. (Photo by Lester Graham)
Foresters are worried that the wasp is spreading quickly and are considering using the imported predatory nematode to control it. (Photo by William M. Ciesla)
The female Sirex woodwasp injects a combination of toxic mucus and fungus while laying her eggs in pine trees, which kills the trees. (Photo by Paula Klasmer)
Foresters are worried about a wasp that’s killing pine trees. The insect is
spreading through pine forests in northern states. Steve Carmody reports:
Transcript
Foresters are worried about a wasp that’s killing pine trees. The insect is
spreading through pine forests in northern states. Steve Carmody reports:
The female Sirex woodwasp injects a combination of a toxic mucus and a
fungus while laying her eggs in pine trees. The mixture feeds the eggs, but
kills tree cells, often further weakening stressed pines.
In the three years since it first appeared in upstate New York, the Sirex
woodwasp has spread to 25 New York counties, and two counties in
Pennsylvania and part of Ontario.
Bob Heyd, with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, says the Sirex
woodwasp is spreading:
“The wasp is actually very strong fliers. They can fly 70 or 100 miles, so what it
is here… it will disperse very quickly.”
In other countries, forestry officials have found an imported predatory
nematode from the wasp’s home range in Europe has been an effective
biological control. It’s unclear if officials in the US will try the same
tactic.
For the first time in 100 years in the Midwest, whooping
crane chicks have hatched in the wild. But wildlife agencies say the
young birds may be especially vulnerable to predators. The GLRC’S
Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Transcript
For the first time in 100 years in the Midwest, whooping crane chicks have hatched in the
wild. But wildlife agencies say the young birds may be especially vulnerable to predators.
The GLRC’S Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Government and private wildlife agencies have been working for several years to re-
establish a migrating flock of whooping cranes in the Eastern U.S. This spring, two
crane eggs taken from the wild birds hatched in captivity, and now two more eggs have
hatched in the wild, at the Necedah National Wildlife Refuge in Wisconsin. But Rachel
Levin of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says being in the wild means potential
predators:
“These crane chicks will be with their parents and will be vulnerable to raccoons and
other types of predators that might be on the refuge.”
Levin says it’s possible the managers at Necedah will trap some raccoons. By the end of
the summer, the crane chicks will get their flight feathers and should be able to more
easily get away from dangers on the ground.
Officials say a disease might be killing an invasive species of fish in Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River. The GLRC’s David Sommerstein reports:
Transcript
Officials say a disease might be killing an invasive species of fish in Lake
Ontario and the St. Lawrence River. The GLRC’s David Sommerstein
reports.
Where the lake and the river meet, people have been finding dead round
gobies.
“Dozens in some cases, hundreds of dead gobies that have been washing up on shores.”
Steve Litwiler is with New York’s Department of Environmental
Conservation. He says a change in water temperature or a poison could
cause the die-off, but initial sampling suggests some kind of disease.
“Is it a disease that could potentially affect other fish? Fortunately right
now the only fish that are dying appear to be the round gobies.”
If only the round gobies die, this could be a good news story. Round gobies
hitched a ride from Europe in the ballast of foreign freighters. They’ve
displaced native species across the Great Lakes by breeding faster and eating
other fishes’ eggs and young.
A whooping crane experiment in the Eastern U-S has had its first hatch of eggs from migrating birds. But humans had to help. The GLRC’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Transcript
A whooping crane experiment in the Eastern U.S has had its first hatch
of eggs from migrating birds. But humans had to help. The GLRC’s
Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Several migrating cranes laid eggs this spring at the Necedah National
Wildlife Refuge in Wisconsin, but some eggs broke. So, wildlife
officials scooped up two intact eggs and eventually sent them to a
wildlife center in Maryland. The eggs recently hatched. Wildlife
agencies say it’s a huge step for the effort to create a migrating and
reproducing flock of whoopers in the Eastern U.S.
Joan Garland of the International Crane Foundation says that’s even
though the chicks were not hatched in the wild.
“We did sort of have to help these eggs out a little bit. We did remove
them from the nests and raise them in incubators, but at least they were
produced and part of their life was there in the wild in the nests at
Necedah.”
Garland says the two chicks will probably be sent back to the wildlife
refuge this summer, and there, they’ll be taught to fly south.
The Kirtland’s warbler has been on the endangered species list since 1966. In that time, the population has grown from an all time low of 167 mated pairs to over 14-hundred. Now budget cuts are putting the recovery effort at risk. The GLRC’s Charity Nebbe has more:
Transcript
The Kirtland’s warbler has been on the endangered species list since
1966. In that time the population has grown from an all time low of 167
mated pairs to over 14-hundred. Now budget cuts are putting the recovery
effort at risk. The GLRC’s Charity Nebbe has more:
The comeback of the Kirtland’s warbler is largely due to an annual
trapping program aimed at cowbirds, but federal funding for the US Fish
and Wildlife Service program has now been cut.
Cowbirds lay their eggs in the nests of other birds. Species like the
Kirtland’s warbler raise the cowbirds at the expense of their own young.
Jim Bull is a past president of the Detroit Audubon Society. He says the
trapping program has been an inexpensive and effective way to protect
the warblers since 1972.
“Before the trapping program there was less than half a Kirtland’s
warbler fledging per nest. With the trapping program almost
immediately that went up to three young leaving the nest.”
Michigan Congressman Bart Stupak has introduced a measure to restore
the funding. In the meantime, a reduced program will be carried out with
the help of volunteers.
The sea lamprey drastically changed the Great Lakes ecosystem. (Photo courtesy of the Great Lakes Fishery Commission)
Researchers say they’ve discovered a migration pheromone
in sea lamprey. It’s a natural attractant that could boost efforts to
control the invasive parasite. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Stephanie Hemphill reports:
Transcript
Researchers say they’ve discovered a migration pheromone in sea lamprey. It’s a natural attractant that could boost efforts to control the invasive parasite. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Stephanie Hemphill reports:
Each lamprey can kill forty pounds of fish in its lifetime. Managers use a pesticide to keep the lamprey numbers down, but it’s expensive, and sometimes it kills other fish.
University of Minnesota biologist Peter Sorensen says he’s isolated a chemical signal put out by lamprey larvae. The larvae live in streams, and the signal apparently tells adult lamprey that the stream is a good place to lay eggs.
“We’ve got a cue that’s very powerful, very safe, we don’t need very much of it, and it can control the distribution of the lamprey in a way that other things can’t.”
Sorensen says the pheromone can be used to corral lamprey into areas where they can be trapped or treated with pesticide. The pheromone is being tested in a river in Michigan.
Salamanders are a good indicator of wetland health. (Photo courtesy of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife)
Government workers are slogging around in man-made wetlands.
looking for salamanders. Back in the 1950’s, the United States government
selected a plot of land to be the home of its newest uranium processing plant.
Since the end of the Cold War, the now-closed nuclear processing plant has
been undergoing the long and arduous task of returning to its natural wetland
state. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tana Weingartner reports on the search for salamanders at the site, and why
their presence is so important:
Transcript
Government workers are slogging around in man-made wetlands looking for salamanders. Back in the 1950’s, the United States government selected a plot of land to be the home of its newest uranium processing plant. Since the end of the Cold War, the now-closed nuclear processing plant has been undergoing the long and arduous task of returning to its natural wetland state. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tana Weingartner reports on the search for salamanders at the site, and why their presence is so important:
It’s a cold, windy day in late March as specialists from the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency head out to check their traps at the Fernald Nuclear Plant. The 1050-acre facility sits in a rural area just 18 miles north of Cincinnati. Although the EPA is in charge of cleaning up the uranium contamination here, today they’re on a different mission. Today they’re hunting salamanders.
“Salamanders basically are a sign of an established wetland usually, and in this case would show that we put a wetland in a location where salamanders need additional breeding habitat.”
In other words, Schneider says the presence of salamanders indicates the first level of success for these manmade wetlands. The wetland project is one of several ways the EPA is ensuring Fernald is properly restored to its natural state.
“Well, we’re looking forward to the day when we get the site cleaned up, and it can be like a land lab, and people can bring kids out here and do environmental education on the importance of wetlands, and it’s going to make a great contrast with what used to be here and the environmental contamination with the environmental benefit the facility is providing down the road.”
Today, the site is 70 percent certified clean, and officials expect to finish the cleanup by June 2006. Creating healthy wetlands full of insects, amphibians and salamanders is one of the first steps to success.
“So the method here is to set ten traps equidistant, hopefully, around the perimeter of the wetland. And they’re passive traps, whereby animals that are moving over the course of the 24 hours or so that the traps have been in, will bump into the traps and it’s a funnel that directs them into the center part of the trap, and they’re held in there until we release them.”
(splashing sound)
Schneider and his team laugh and joke as they pull the traps up by brightly colored ribbons. Train horns and construction noises mix with bird calls – one a reminder of what has been, the other a sign of what’s to come.
“That’s probably a one-year-old bullfrog there and then these big guys are dragonfly larvae and these other guys are back swimmers. Mayfly larvae and dragonfly larvae are both good indicators of high water quality.”
The third pond, or vernal pool, turns up 46 tadpoles and a tiny peeper frog, but no salamanders.
(truck door slams)
So it’s back in the truck and on down the dirt road to where several more wetland pools sit just across from the on-site waste dump. That dump will be Fernald’s lasting reminder of its former use. These pools are younger and less established, but they do offer hope. Last year, adult salamanders were found in the one closest to a clump of trees.
Each spring, as the snow melts away and temperatures rise, salamanders venture out in the first 50-degree rain to begin their search for a mate. Schneider had hoped warm temperatures in late February and early March prompted “The Big Night,” as it’s known.
“So, no salamanders today?”
“No salamanders today. I think we learned a little bit about the difference between wetlands that are three years old. We saw a lot more diversity in the macroinvertebrates, the insect population, than we have down here.”
Perhaps the salamanders haven’t come yet, or maybe they have already come and gone, leaving behind the still un-hatched eggs. Either way, the team will check back again in April and a third time in late May or June.
“And we have high hopes, high hopes, high apple pie in the sky hopes. That’s the kind.”
Some worry that the barrier to protect the Great Lakes from Asian carp may not be as effective as previously imagined. Asian carp eggs can be brought in with ships' ballast water. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)
By summer’s end, officials from the Army Corps of Engineers and the
state of Illinois hope to finish an underwater electric barrier in a canal just south
of Chicago. The barrier is designed to repel invasive fish such as the Asian Carp.
But some environmentalists fear the barrier won’t be enough to keep the voracious,
non-native species out of Lake Michigan. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shawn Allee reports:
Transcript
By summers end, officials from the Army Corps of Engineers and the state of Illinois hope to finish an underwater electric barrier in a canal just south of Chicago. The barrier is designed to repel invasive fish such as the Asian Carp. But some environmentalists fear the barrier won’t be enough to keep the voracious, non-native species out of Lake Michigan. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shawn Allee reports:
Some conservationists worry Asian Carp may someday enter the Great Lakes by simply hitching a ride.
These critics say leaky ships passing through the electric barrier could hold carp eggs inside their ballast tanks and deposit them on the other side. But local officials say that scenario is unlikely.
Steve Stuewe is with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources.
He says Asian Carp eggs need turbulent water, and if they do find their way into rusty ballast tanks…
“They will probably be dead because they’ve settled out into the bottom of the hull and they’ve either suffocated or they’re down there, mixed in with the iron oxidate. So, they sink. They have to float.”
The research on egg viability is still sketchy, but a federal study of the issue may settle the question once and for all early this summer.
Whooping cranes have been abandoning their nests, and eggs, in search of food (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
