Audubon Rockies and the staff of wildlife biologists from Precision Wildlife Assets accomplished this yr’s avian monitoring, spanning 545,000 acres throughout 13 Audubon Licensed Fowl-Pleasant ranches. With over 6,000 miles travelled by this superb staff of scientists, there have been only a few roads not pushed!
Vegetation sampling and chicken surveys had been carried out between mid-Could to early July throughout licensed ranches in Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana. Favorable climate then adopted all through the spring and summer time, and made journey between survey places environment friendly and the fieldwork particularly rewarding in 2025.
Birds had been counted at 634 survey places representing fourteen major habitats, starting from open grassland and sagebrush-steppe rangelands to pinyon-juniper woodlands. A complete of 129 chicken species and over 11,000 particular person birds had been documented. Grassland and rangeland chicken detections had been among the many most prevalent, with species such because the Western Meadowlark, Lark Bunting, Brewer’s Sparrow, Vesper Sparrow, Cassin’s Sparrow, and Grasshopper Sparrow composing 5 of the ten most recorded species. Though we didn’t see a Yellow-bellied Flycatcher, Grace’s Warbler, or a Crested Caracara this yr like another fortunate of us in Wyoming, distinctive species that had been recognized included Pinyon Jay, Black-throated Gray Warbler, Burrowing Owl and sage-grouse.
Clearly, the ranches enrolled within the Audubon Conservation Ranching Program function a bastion of hope and sources for ongoing and future conservation of those species, along with the multitude of different area of interest species that had been recorded in 2025 and in years prior. This long-term monitoring dataset is integral to evaluating and persevering with to implement efficient administration methods on these lands. With these science-based administration choices, avian populations can proceed to profit from concerted stewardship of the lands’ ecological richness.
Yearly, Audubon Rockies and Precision Wildlife Assets supply free trainings to employees and volunteers to be taught in regards to the complete Built-in Monitoring in Fowl Conservation Areas (IMBCR) protocols which are the spine of those surveys. To be taught extra, attain out to Audubon Rockies Conservation Ranching Director Dusty Downey at dusty.downey@audubon.org.
