The Wasps Are Out!

The Cerceris wasps are beginning to emerge at St. Anthony's Cemetery! We hope to begin monitoring these wasps during the first week of July, after the remainder of the individuals emerge.

One of the first wasp burrows of the year

Cerceris wasps are a native genus of stingless insects that hunt for beetles from the Buprestidae family.  After finding and stinging a beetle, these wasps bring the beetle back to their burrows.  The invasive emerald ash borer is one of the wasp's prey species, so groups across North America have found it helpful to monitor Cerceris colonies in order to detect the presence of this pest.  When a wasp returns to its burrow with its prey, we net it and identify it.  This way, we can determine if the wasps are catching any emerald ash borers in the area.

As part of a statewide effort to detect the emerald ash borer, White Memorial is monitoring the Cerceris colonies at St. Anthony's Cemetery, Wamogo High School, the Morris Town Beach, and Litchfield High School.

Claire Rutledge of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station is hosting a training session for volunteers who would like to help monitor the wasp colonies.  The session is scheduled for 11 AM on Tuesday, July 2 in the Ceder Room.

2013 Wetland Bird Surveys Completed


                                    



Virginia Rail (Rallus limicola)
Courtesy of Utah Department of Natural Resources

Over the past few weeks, Mary Hawvermale and I have been searching around the property for evidence of rails, bitterns, and other wetland birds.  Rails are a type of secretive marsh bird that probe for invertebrates among plants in shallow water, while bitterns stalk fish and amphibians among dense reeds.  Both types of birds tend to remain deep in the vegetation and are very difficult to see. The Connecticut DEEP and similar organizations across the country are concerned about rail populations because of habitat loss.  The marshes these birds call home are increasingly subjugated to pollution and development.  As a result, rail populations have decreased, but we would like more information on their populations as we proceed with conservation projects. White Memorial's vast expanses of marsh makes this the ideal location to gather data for rail conservation.

Mary was kind enough to sample the Bantam River by kayak between Whites Woods Road and Bantam Lake, while I sampled the remaining locations by foot.  The protocol was relatively straightforward:  we would arrive at a predetermined site, listen silently for rails calling for five minutes, and then play calls on a boom box to elicit calls from the rails.  Rails are difficult to see, but they tend to call back to a recording of their voice.  This habit made it easier for us to determine the presence of rails. 

In Connecticut, we have six rail species, several of which are State-listed:

-King rail (Rallus elegans) breeding population State Endangered
-Black rail (Laterallus jamaicensis) breeding population State Endangered
-Sora (Porzana carolina)
-Virginia rail (Rallus limicola)
-Clapper rail (Rallus longirstris)
-Yellow rail (Coturnicops noveboracensis), very rare in Connecticut

In addition to the rails, we also surveyed for the presence of least bittern and common moorhen, two other State-listed wetland species.

Over the course of the past few weeks, Mary and I have heard Sora, Virginia rail, and King rail.

Virginia rail was our most common species, being heard in eight out of our sixteen study points.  These rails were consistently around Little Pond and Mallard Marsh.  One interesting observation was that these birds shifted locality during last week's heavy flooding.  Last Saturday, there was about a foot of water covering the boardwalk at Little Pond, and the Virginia rails were nowhere to be found.  However, we observed Virginia rail at Duck Pond and near Catlin Woods, two places we have not seen them this year.  The flooding also brought the rails out of the marsh onto puddles on the trails.  Here it was easier for the rails to forage.  We observed a total of seven rails, as opposed to the four or five rails we observed when the water levels were closer to normal.

Mary heard a single Sora along the lower Bantam River, but we did not hear any Sora near Cranberry Pond, where they were last year.

In addition to these species we expected to find, we were pleasantly surprised by a King rail calling from the marsh northwest of Little Pond.  We first received reports of this King rail from the first week of June during our BioBlitz. Apparently this individual has continued to live around Little Pond.

 
                                                                
Altogether, we observed a total of about six individual Virginia rails, one Sora, and one King rail.  We hope that continuing research can help us shed more light on wetland bird conservation.
 
You can read more about the State's wetland bird project here and at the December 2012 edition of Connecticut Wildlife.  You can learn more about King rail in Connecticut here.

Introducing Our Summer Interns


We have several college students who will helping us this summer.  This provides them an opportunity to learn daily professional activities.  They learn a variety of techniques and methods, while also being exposed to critical species and habitats.  This also exposes them to critical conservation issues.

Oliver Loud-Stubbs, Unity College, is our Alternative Energy/Energy Conservation  Intern


Rebecca Pope, University of Connecticut, Natural Resource Management Intern

Sam Slowikowski, Unity College, Natural Resource Management Intern

Introducing Our Seasonal Research Technician -- Jared Franklin

Jared Franklin
We are pleased to introduce you to Jared Franklin, our Seasonal Research Technician.  Jared has had a wide variety of experiences that make him an excellent addition to our staff.  He recently graduated from Messiah College with a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science.  Jared grew up in Torrington, CT and graduated from Wamogo Regional High School in Agricultural Science Education Program.  During his academic studies, Jared broadened his perspective by traveling to several regions of the world including Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and Thailand.  Jared's travels have impacted his intellectual development greatly.  In Costa Rica, he examined the health of volcanic rainforest streams compared to size, elevations, and levels of human disturbance.  This research examined how this impacted water quality and macroinvertebrate species assemblages.  He was a project leader in Nicaragua that researched water filtration and purification systems, sustainable development, and implications on local human community water resources.  Jared recently returned from Thailand, where he examined the relationship of current agricultural practices and their impacts on soil erosion.  We are fortunate to have Jared with us this summer.  Jared is guided by his desire to explore the natural world.  His perspective will have important impacts on our program.

White Memorial BioBlitz 2013: The Grand Total is...

White Memorial BioBlitz 2013: The Grand Total is...: A total of 931 species were tallied in 24 hours!  Congratulations on a job well done!  Thank you to all of our Scientists and Volunteers for...