How do we all know what conservation work must be tailored, expanded, or redirected to cease and reverse the inhabitants declines for the birds that want our assist most? This query and the planning work by Audubon workers, volunteers, and companions is what solid Audubon’s Flight Plan. This strategic plan considers precedence species inhabitants traits and strongholds, communities the place we’re dedicated to participating and the way local weather change is predicted to have an effect on these locations.
With losses throughout habitats and best concern for grassland birds and shorebirds, Audubon’s efforts in Texas have more and more centered on working lands reminiscent of cattle ranches and coastal habitats. Right here in Texas, for greater than a century, Audubon has labored on the coast to get better herons, egrets, spoonbills, and pelicans that had been practically worn out from plume looking, pesticides, and habitat loss. With Brown Pelican now recovered due partially to the locations that Audubon has stewarded, we’ve got expanded our scope to give attention to species which might be in freefall such because the Black Skimmer.
Audubon’s coastal staff has been awarded a grant to steward six former Black Skimmer nesting websites in Matagorda Bay. Alexis Baldera and Tim Forrester used many years of Texas Colonial Waterbird Survey information to establish these restoration and stewardship websites. The staff additionally will rent two seasonal technicians to assist monitor and restore these websites and preserve shut tabs on how they fare via the nesting season. Decoys shall be used to extend the possibilities of engaging new nesting skimmers.
One other approach we’re placing our information to work to drive stronger conservation outcomes is thru the event of a geospatial Coastal Texas Administration and Monitoring Database. Transferring ahead, we’ll combine many years of nesting information from coastal islands, with administration actions and stewardship and monitoring surveys. We’re additionally working carefully with companions to make sure these information immediately inform on‑the‑floor administration selections.
Final 12 months, our Coastal Warden, Tim Wilkinson, labored with volunteers to depend all of the nesting birds on Chester Island, as they do yearly. Volunteer Hank Arnold additionally carried out a depend utilizing aerial imagery captured by a drone flying above the colony. This allowed us to match the accuracy of our floor‑primarily based counts and consider how new instruments can enhance future administration selections. We’re excited to include applied sciences that scale back disturbance, present extra correct information, and higher inform our habitat administration actions.
On the grassland fowl entrance, ranchers are implementing the habitat administration plans developed with Audubon Vary Ecologists. Anita Gilson, Sarah Galvan, and Chantalle Vincent are making ready to assemble the baseline information for 13 (!) new Audubon Conservation Ranching properties licensed in 2025. By this work, we goal to raised perceive which land administration practices ship the best advantages for precedence grassland fowl species. That is adaptive administration in motion: a continuous, proof‑pushed course of that helps us refine our method for even stronger conservation outcomes.
