Blue Ridge Parkway bird survey takes flight

By Scott Nicholson

nicholson@wataugademocrat.com

Blue Ridge Parkway officials are looking for fans of the feathered kind to conduct volunteer bird counts for the national park.

The parkway put out the call for volunteers because of limited resources and a desire to tap into local passion for the environment, according to Bob Cherry, resource management specialist for the parkway. Cherry hopes the bird surveys can become regular events that expand on other regional bird surveys.

It’s the second year of the Northern Saw-Whet Owl watch. Cherry said a seasonal employee was able to do some tracking of the nocturnal species last year. That effort was a follow-up to a 1980 book that documented owls on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Cherry said the surveys would help determine any change in habitat or habit of the owl since then.

“It’s time to check if the owls are still there, and if they are in the same places,” Cherry said. Surveys will begin in April and continue through May.

The saw-whet owl is designated a “Species of Concern,” and prefers a habitat of high-elevation spruce-fir forests. The surveys will be conducted during the night, using tape playback of owl calls. The surveys will be conducted in good weather, usually one to three nights per week. Because of safety concerns, volunteers will be paired with another volunteer or park employee, with surveys to begin a half hour after sunset on the designated days.

No special skills are needed, though volunteers may undergo some basic training. Volunteers will use compasses and global-positioning satellites, as well as a computer, but those skills can be taught to interested volunteers.

A grassland bird survey will run from May through the middle of June. The survey will use volunteers to study pasture lands belonging to the parkway that are possible nesting sites for some bird species. Some of those species may be declining due to agricultural practices, and some of the targeted areas may have had bobolinks, meadowlarks, and other species.

Cherry said grassland birds have been studied over the past three years as the parkway reviews its practices of agricultural leases, in which pastures are leased to private parties for hay fields or livestock grazing.

“We’re looking at the impacts,” Cherry said. “We’ll look at the biological resource instead of the cultural and scenic resource.”

Volunteers for the grassland bird count should know the calls of eight grassland birds targeted in the surveys. Volunteers should preferably be available for the length of the study. Cherry said enthusiasm is a more critical criterium than is wildlife expertise, providing the volunteer is willing to undergo some training.

A third survey will focus on the cerulean warbler, which is a rare and declining species. Only a few breeding and nesting spots are known on the parkway. Potential volunteers should be familiar with warblers and other woodland songbirds. Volunteers preferably should be available through the length of the project, from mid-April through mid-May.

Cherry said the parkway has worked with organizations such as the Audubon Society in past bird counts, but said there are more projects than there are available resources. In the past, people with wildlife interests or researchers for academic projects have helped catalog parkway resources, but Cherry said the planned volunteer effort will provide more sets of eyes for a short period of time.

“We’ve identified that this is something we need to do,” Cherry said. “Everybody has their own interests, and there’s been a lot of good research on the parkway.”

Cherry said it’s not just birds that need some attentive eyes. “We’re always looking for people to track amphibians, reptiles and plants,” he said.

For more information on the bird surveys or other parkway wildlife research, call Cherry at 295-7591 or email Bob_Cherry@nps.gov.