Two decades of Klamath Bird Observatory science have informed the establishment, management, and expansion of the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument.
KBO and our satellite organization Humboldt Bay Bird Observatory operate 16 long-term demographic monitoring stations throughout the Klamath-Siskiyou Bioregion. Each year, we capture and release around 10,000 individual birds representing over 80 species. These efforts track population abundance, reproductive success, and survival of birds in the region.
KBO’s long-term monitoring program also trains tomorrow’s conservation leaders. Since the start of the student volunteer internship program in 1996, KBO has hosted over 170 interns from 18 different countries. Of these, more than 30 have earned or are now pursuing advanced degrees related to conservation. Of the 36 international interns we have hosted, 18 are active banding trainers and some are establishing their own bird monitoring and research programs in their home countries. KBO takes pride in strengthening conservation capacity with those who share stewardship responsibility for our shared migratory birds.
KBO has been collaborating with a diverse group of partners through the Central Umpqua Mid-Klamath Oak Habitat Conservation Project, a Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) funded Cooperative Conservation Partnership Initiative, in order to better understand bird-habitat relationships and the response of birds to restoration in oak woodlands. We are working with the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the Lomakatsi Restoration Project to implement and monitor oak restoration on private lands in Douglas and Jackson Counties in Oregon, as well as in Siskiyou County, California. Around 2,000 acres have been restored and we completed pre-restoration monitoring in 2012. The US Department of the Interior honored this collaborative project with the Partners in Conservation Award.
The Ashland Forest Resiliency Stewardship Project is designed to reduce the risk of severe wildfire in the Ashland Watershed while protecting ecological integrity. KBO is studying the effects of density management (i.e., fuel reduction using commercial harvest techniques) on birds and their habitats as part of a multi-party monitoring project. KBO has been implementing monitoring in the Ashland Watershed since 2005 and baseline results show a diverse coniferous forest bird community. In 2012, we initiated a new study design and collected a single year of pre-treatment data. We will revisit the same sites following treatment to assess changes in the bird community and the effectiveness of density management in reaching desired ecological conditions.
Riparian (streamside) vegetation provides habitat for breeding, migrating, and overwintering birds, and is also critical to the quality of the in-stream habitat on which salmon fisheries and other aquatic species depend. In the western United States, riparian zones make up less than 0.5% of the total land area, yet they support the most diverse bird communities of any habitat type in arid and semi-arid regions. Riparian habitats are also highly imperiled due to human impacts, and now cover only a fraction of their former range. Their relative rarity on the landscape, yet high biodiversity, makes riparian zones one of the most important habitats for the conservation of birds and other wildlife in the West.
KBO works with the Western Hummingbird Partnership to revise content on the program’s website. The mission of the Partnership is to maintain thriving populations of hummingbirds in western North America through habitat restoration and enhancement, population monitoring, research, and education and outreach projects. KBO works with the Partnership’s coordinator and Steering Committee to identify priority website needs and update the website accordingly. The WHP website is a clearinghouse for hummingbird information and includes a species database, a forage plants database, maps, outreach materials, and lists of threats, research needs, and ongoing hummingbird projects. (Photo at left compliments of Lowell Whitaker.)
From 1997 to 2010, KBO implemented a Black Tern monitoring project in the Upper Klamath Basin of southern Oregon. The study has helped us understand local population distribution and trends for this emergent wetland obligate that is endangered, threatened, or of conservation concern in much of its range.
From 2009-2011 KBO gathered historic Great Blue Heron colony data and implemented colonial waterbird surveys throughout Oregon and parts of Washington to contribute to the Western Colonial Waterbird Survey, a West-wide U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service effort. Data will be incorporated into an atlas to help understand regional baseline population information and distribution patterns.
Copyright (c) 2017 Klamath Bird Observatory. Image credits: Jim Livaudais, Gary Bloomfield, and many contributing artists.