The Colorado Birding Challenge is a fun, county-based birding and conservation event held during the most exciting time of the birding year. Each May several billion birds migrate into and through the United States and begin to establish their breeding territories. The Challenge was created to provide support for specific bird conservation projects. This year's we are grateful that the challenge has elected to support our work on the determination of breeding colony locations and the critical surrounding habitat for Pinyon Jays! Pinyon Jays are one of the most recognizable and enigmatic species of the pinon-juniper woodlands of Colorado and the west, but they are also rapidly declining and poorly known. The species has declined approximately 75% since 1970 and was petitioned for Endangered Species Act listing in April 2022. The causes of decline are poorly understood, but likely involve a combination of declining/dying pinon- juniper woodlands owing to climate change, reduced pinon pine mast production, changing woodland conditions (a shift to dense woodlands), direct woodland loss to fire, and woodland management that alters woodland age structure and tree density to levels that jays may not prefer. The direct and indirect effects of these threats on Pinyon Jays is poorly understood. The new Pinyon Jay research starting in Colorado, led by the Bureau of Land Management and South Dakota State University in collaboration with Colorado Parks and Wildlife and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, is designed to assess habitat use and locate nest colony sites across the Royal Gorge BLM District. The project will assess questions about the effects of woodland management and woodland condition (e.g., tree density, health, etc.) on Pinyon Jays. This research is critical to providing science- based information on Pinyon Jays that can be incorporated into future pinon-juniper woodland management across the region. The 2023 COBC will support this important research on an imperiled species." Want to find out more about CFO's 3rd annual Colorado Birding Challenge (coming up on May 20th!) and how your team and you can make a difference for Pinyon Jays? Visit: https://cobirds.org/cobc/
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AuthorAmanda is an Assistant Professor at South Dakota Sate University. Her research focuses on conservation and management of wildlife and their habitats Archives
October 2023
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