DEM SALUTES AQUATIC RESOURCE EDUCATION COORDINATOR KIMBERLY SULLIVAN ON RECEIVING PRESTIGIOUS AWARD

Posted by Wayne G. Barber

PROVIDENCE – The Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management (DEM) salutes Aquatic Resource Education Coordinator Kimberly Sullivan of DEM’s Division of Fish & Wildlife, this year’s recipient of the Rhode Island Environmental Education Association’s (RIEEA) Environmental Education Award. DEM Director Janet Coit nominated Kimberly and had the pleasure of presenting her with the award during RIEEA’s annual event at Rhode Island College on January 19.

 

“Kimberly inspires what Rachel Carson called ‘a sense of wonder’ in the people with whom she interacts,” said DEM Director Janet Coit. “She has reached thousands of Rhode Islanders, connecting her with the wonders of nature. Through her Traveling Tidepool, children see up close the incredible marine life surrounding us, creatures like northern puffer, spiny dogfish, pipefish and skates. Her work in Central Falls brought the joy of fishing to Spanish-speaking families, in both freshwater and saltwater environments. Whether teaching adults how to dig for quahogs, or students to count river herring going up a fish ladder, Kimberly changes lives through her work, opening people’s eyes to the natural world. Her special combination of enthusiasm and scientific acumen have allowed Kimberly to successfully influence people across Rhode Island, creating a ripple effect that leads to better stewards for our precious environment.”

 

As the leader of DEM’s Aquatic Resource Education (ARE) program for the past 15 years, Kimberly has been instrumental in expanding opportunities for Rhode Islanders to get outside, enjoy nature, and experience the joy of fishing in a variety of aquatic environments. Last year alone she organized Come Clam with Me classes, expanded opportunities for youths and families from Central Falls to learn to fish, and hosted tidal seines to help participants learn about local aquatic species and reinforce conservation and aquatic stewardship. Among the many programs offered by DEM’s ARE program are marine and freshwater ecology programs for children; State Record, Game Fish, and Children’s First Fish Awards; the Traveling Tidepool for pre-school children; and marine and freshwater Aquaculture in the Classroom programs where Atlantic salmon, trout, and horseshoe crabs are raised and released into the wild.

 

As the primary contact for fish hatchery and fish ladder tours for school groups, Kimberly has taught countless children about freshwater and migratory fish. She also helps coordinate the summer children’s saltwater fishing camp at Rocky Point State Park hosted by the RI Saltwater Anglers Association. A principal fisheries biologist, Kimberly also serves as the lead investigator for the US Fish and Wildlife Service Federal Aid Program for Aquatic Resource Education. Her outreach and educational work extend to cooperative ventures with the knowledgeable staff of the US Fish and Wildlife Service at their Kettle Pond and Sachuest Point facilities, Audubon Society of RI, Save The Bay, and watershed and municipal organizations.

 

A resident of Richmond, Kimberly graduated with honors from Roger Williams University with a B.S. in Marine Biology with minors in psychology and environmental biology. She currently serves as secretary of the national Aquatic Resource Education Association, and is the RI Project WILD State Coordinator, the RI Project WET State Coordinator, and the RI angler R3 representative on the R3 regional committee.

“Kimberly is held in high esteem by state, federal, and non-governmental partners,” Director Coit noted. “She is very generous and always brings a host of resources and expertise to the table, sowing goodwill and new discoveries wherever she goes. That RIEEA has recognized her means so much. DEM appreciates all the ways that RIEEA is increasing environmental literacy across Rhode Island.”

Trapping in Massachusetts answer to our weekly E-Mails on the Outdoor Scene

Posted by Wayne G. Barber

Photo of Jeff Traynor, a 3 time guest on the award winning, Outdoor Scene

In November of 1996, Massachusetts voters approved a ballot initiative titled the “Wildlife Protection Act”. The initiative was launched by the Humane Society of the United States, along with a group calling themselves the ProPAW Coalition (Protect Pets and Wildlife), which spent considerable funding on TV ads depicting house cats in foothold traps and dogs missing legs. The slogan “Ban Cruel Traps” evidently resinated with 64% of the state’s citizenry - securing the initiative’s passage. Prior to 1996, MA Fish & Wildlife would contact licensed trappers to help remedy beaver conflict situations. The system worked well; as trappers would make a little money off pelts and beaver glands, the state would collect a little license revenue from trapping licenses, and residents would be relieved of beaver conflict (in the form of flooding to property, compromising septic systems and polluting wells, just to name a few).

In two and a half years following the ban, Massachusetts’ beaver population expanded from 18,000 to almost 55,000 according to reports from Audubon Magazine. Lawmakers scrambled to make amendments to the ban when impatient residents, who had become completely dependent on MA Fish & Wildlife to handle beaver complaints, began breaching beaver dams in the dead of winter (when beavers don’t repair them, and endangered reptiles and amphibians are vulnerable to fluctuating water levels). Whatever negative picture animal rights activists tried to paint of trappers before the ban, it paled in comparison to what unfolded in the state’s ponds, rivers and streams after the ban.

Years earlier in the late 1980s, a national animal rights group became successful getting trapping ban initiatives passed by town, county and state governments. Attempts were made by these groups to disguise regulated trapping as a public safety/animal welfare issue. Expectedly, an article to ban trapping was introduced at a Chelmsford, Massachusetts town meeting in 1988.

According to The Northeast Association of Fish & Wildlife Agencies, “State wildlife experts reminded residents that regulated trapping was not a public safety issue, and warned that if regulated trapping were banned, there would be numerous undesirable consequences in the form of property damage and wildlife habitat degradation. Despite the warnings, the article was passed, and the trapping of furbearing mammals within the town was prohibited.

Prior to passage of the trapping ban, there were usually one to three complaints of beaver damage in the town each year. Following the ban, the beaver population, unchecked, began to grow rapidly, and the animals began to move into many previously unoccupied wetlands. Beaver dams began to flood houses and roadways. In 1992, state wildlife biologists working at the request of town officials investigated 25 beaver complaint sites. Two of these complaint sites were municipal wells which had been shut down (at a cost of $25,000) because of beaver flooding, and four other municipal wells were threatened. Individual landowners in town had incurred tens of thousands of dollars in damages to private wells, septic systems, lawns and roadways. The increasing beaver population and increasing property damage were directly related to the decision of the town's citizens to ban regulated trapping and allow uncontrolled beaver population growth to commence.”

The residents of Chelmsford were duped further by animal rights activists who had promised in 1988 and again in 1992 to install beaver “flow pipes”, as well as a proposal to "sterilize" beavers in the town (a technique that is not biologically feasible on a free-roaming rodent population). During the four years that the trapping ban was in place, activists never followed through on their promises and were never held accountable for the statements they had made.

At a special town meeting in September 1992, town citizens voted by a two-to-one margin to allow regulated public trapping to resume. During the regular trapping season later that fall and winter, four trappers working with homeowners and town officials removed 87 beaver. Source: Furbearers Conservation

King Penguin's are in trouble ......

Posted by Wayne G.Barber

Source: pewenvironment

The planet's largest colony of king penguins has declined by nearly 90% in the past thirty years. Researchers announced their stunning findings earlier this week after seeing recent aerial images of the colony, located on an island in-between Africa and Antarctica. Exact reasons for the collapse are unknown.
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Establishing additional marine protected areas around the world can help ecosystems be more resilient to changes in climate.
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New Dog Regulations in Mass.

Posted by Wayne G.Barber

Dogs still welcome on Mass Wildlife’s Wildlife Management Areas, but new rules require owners to use a leash and remove waste.

MassWildlife protects and manages its WMAs to sustain wildlife abundance and to provide wildlife-related recreation such as hunting, fishing, and wildlife-watching. At the same time MassWildlife strives to provide a safe and enjoyable outdoor experience for all visitors.

Over the years, MassWildlife had received numerous complaints from WMA users about negative and unsafe encounters with unleashed dogs and issues with dog waste. The most common complaints included: dog attacks and bites on other dogs (both off- and on-leash) and people, and piles of accumulating dog waste: a nuisance and health concern for pets, people, and wildlife. Other incidents and complaints from WMA users involved: user conflicts between loose dogs with hunters, birders, field trial dog participants, naturalists and hikers; observations of dogs harassing or chasing wildlife; dogs chasing or killing livestock on abutting property; chasing/harassing neighboring property owners and families; dogs spooking horses, resulting in injuries to riders or horses; dogs trampling through posted endangered species restoration projects or newly planted agricultural crops.

The new regulations were drafted after a staff review and presentation to the Fisheries and Wildlife Board. A public hearing was held in February 2018. After considering written and oral comments submitted during the public hearing process, amendments were made and the final regulation package was approved by the Fisheries and Wildlife Board March 14, 2018. The regulations will go into effect on January 11, 2019.

Though many municipalities have leash or animal control bylaws, they do not have legal standing on state lands; the new WMA regulations address this disparity. Enforcement of these regulations, as with all Wildlife Management Area Regulations, is carried out by the Massachusetts Environmental Police. State and municipal police departments also have authority to enforce Wildlife Management Area regulations.

Record-Breaking Year for Raising, Releasing Rare Rabbits

Posted by Wayne G. Barber

More rare New England cottontails were raised at Roger Williams Park Zoo in Providence and the Queens Zoo in New York City and released into the wild than ever before, according to conservation officials. The success is a positive sign for populations of the region’s only native rabbit, which had declined precipitously in recent decades because of habitat loss, hunting, and competition with the introduced eastern cottontail.

Seventy-seven New England cottontails were raised and weaned at the two zoos in 2018, almost double the number weaned in each of the past few years. Including animals taken from a breeding colony on Patience Island in Narragansett Bay, about 100 cottontails were released into the wild in Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Maine last year.

“Our goal is to breed as many rabbits as we can throughout the breeding season, but it’s challenging,” said Lou Perrotti, the director of conservation at the Roger Williams Park Zoo and the coordinator of the zoo’s cottontail breeding program. “They don’t always breed like rabbits.”

The reason for the tremendous breeding success in 2018 is still a mystery, however.

“I wish I knew why it was so successful,” Perrotti said. “We didn’t do anything different.”

“We’re somewhat baffled ourselves,” added Heidi Holman, a wildlife biologist for the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department and chair of the New England Cottontail Population Management Working Group. “We’ll continue to review our data in more detail to see if we can tease out a variable, but there doesn’t seem to be any particular thing we can put our thumbs on just yet to explain it.”

The breeding program began in 2010 with six cottontails collected from a wild population in Connecticut. Since then, 163 litters have resulted in 301 weaned cottontails, mostly raised at Roger Williams Park Zoo. The Queens Zoo joined the effort in 2015.

Once the rabbits are about 35 days old, they are removed from the zoos and brought to what the biologists call “hardening pens” at Ninigret National Wildlife Refuge in Charlestown, R.I., or the Great Bay National Wildlife Refuge in New Hampshire to become acclimated to natural conditions. After they spend several weeks or months adjusting to the environment, gaining weight, and learning to hide and forage, they are released into the wild.

Decisions about which animals are released in which location are based largely on their genetics.

“We’re trying to diversity the gene pool and track who’s successfully mating so we’re not over-representing particular genes in any one population,” Holman said.

Representatives from each state in the region submit what Perrotti called “a wish list” of how many cottontails they would like to release in their state annually, and based on the number of animals available and their genetic makeup, the rabbits are divvied up and delivered.

New Hampshire and Maine have experienced the largest decline in their New England cottontail populations, so they receive animals each year for release. Cottontail populations in Massachusetts and Connecticut are more robust, and wildlife officials there believe they may be able to increase the populations by manipulating habitat rather than augmenting the population with captive-bred rabbits.

In Rhode Island, New England cottontails were initially released on Patience Island, which at last count had between 56 and 90 animals, according to T.J. McGreevey, a researcher at the University of Rhode Island who serves as the wildlife geneticist on the cottontail project. A total of 51 rabbits from Patience have been released elsewhere in the past three years, including in the Great Swamp Wildlife Management Area in West Kingston.

“The Patience Island population is being managed to prevent it from reaching carrying capacity,” Holman said. “It could crash from disease or starvation if it grew too high, so we’re managing it to keep the population healthy. That’s why we remove some animals from there.”

Another sign of the success of the breeding program is documentation that some of the released animals are reproducing in the wild. New England cottontails released at the Bellamy River Wildlife Management Area in New Hampshire have been reproducing since 2013. Reproduction was documented among the cottontails released at the Great Swamp in 2017.

As successful as the program has been during the past eight years, it’s still well below its target of releasing 500 cottontails annually. To increase breeding capacity, the researchers plan to establish a new breeding colony this year on Nomans Land, a 612-acre uninhabited island off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard. Other islands are being considered for similar colonies in the future.

In addition, the Bristol County Agricultural High School in Dighton, Mass., has offered to provide assistance in rearing cottontails for the project. The school has successfully raised several varieties of rare turtles for release in the wild since 2012. Other partner organizations will likely be added in the future.

“We’ve set the bar at 500 per year, and we’ll see if we can get there,” Holman said. “But we’re just getting started. The conservation strategy we’re following will continue through 2030. We’re still out there actively trying to create more habitat, and some of that habitat is just getting ready to have rabbits. We should have more places to release them very soon. And we’re continuing to collect information on how they survive and make sure we adapt our protocols to improve that success as much as we can.”

Source: Rhode Island resident and author Todd McLeish runs a wildlife blog.

Rhode Island Special Trout Stocking....

Posted by Wayne G. Barber

Are you cool enough for some wintertime fishing?!

RI DEM is stocking one to one and a half-pound, hatchery-raised trout in the following waterways from Tuesday, January 15th through Thursday, January 16: 

• Meadowbrook Pond, Richmond
• Silver Spring Pond, North Kingstown
• Big Round Top Pond, Burrillville
• Upper Melville Pond, Portsmouth

A current fishing license and a Trout Conservation Stamp are required to keep or possess a trout. The daily creel and possession limit for trout is two from December 1, 2018 through February 28, 2019. 

Source: Rhode Island Fish and Wildlife Media Press Release

Vermont Deer Hunters Had a Good Year in 2018

Posted by Wayne G. Barber

MONTPELIER, Vt. – The Vermont Fish & Wildlife Department says preliminary numbers show 18,845 deer were taken during Vermont’s 2018 deer hunting seasons, the highest total since 2000.

Photo from VTF&W

Jason Lewis of Randolph, VT with the nice 221 lb. buck he took in Orleans County during Vermont’s 2018 November deer season. 

 

Reports from big game check stations indicate hunters had successful deer seasons in 2018, taking 3,980 deer in archery season, 1,341 in youth season, 7,458 in rifle season, and 6,066 in muzzleloader season. 

“The legal buck harvest of 9,993 was 8 percent more than the previous three-year average of 9,267, and the second highest buck harvest since 2002,” said deer project leader Nick Fortin.  “Harvest numbers increased during the archery, rifle and muzzleloader seasons.  The muzzleloader harvest of 6,066 is an all-time record.”

“The relatively high harvest was due to several factors.  First, recent mild winters have allowed the deer population to grow throughout Vermont.  Additionally, lack of fall foods caused deer to be more concentrated and snow helped hunters locate them, resulting in increased success.  The department also issued more muzzleloader antlerless deer permits this year to provide more harvest opportunity and to limit population growth or reduce deer numbers in some parts of the state.”

The 18,845 deer brought home by hunters yielded more than 3.7 million servings of local, nutritious venison.

The primary goal of Vermont’s deer management strategy is to keep the deer herd stable, healthy and in balance with available habitat.  “Maintaining an appropriate number of deer on the landscape ensures deer and the habitats that support them remain in good condition and productive,” said Fortin. 

Each year the department operates biological check stations during deer hunting seasons to gather information on the age, sex, field-dressed weight, antler characteristics, and overall health of Vermont’s deer herd.  In 2018, biological data were collected from more than 900 deer examined during the two-day youth season and November rifle season.  Hunters also submitted more than 2,700 teeth from bucks harvested during the rifle season, which will provide additional age information.

The 2018 White-tailed Deer Harvest Report with final numbers will be on Vermont Fish & Wildlife’s website (www.vtfishandwildlife.com) in February.