There are new signs each day that the COVID-19 pandemic is fundamentally altering public life in America. Many schools will be closed for the rest of the academic year. Several states have postponed presidential primaries. State and federal courts have put trials on hold. But the coronavirus crisis is not stopping the U.S. Department of […]
Tag: audubon
Federal Court Rules Against Massive Old-Growth Rainforest Logging Plan in Alaska
JUNEAU, AK – A federal judge rejected yesterday an enormous commercial timber harvest and road-building plan for Prince of Wales Island in the Tongass National Forest of Southeast Alaska. The judge ruled that project approval violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which sets standards for public engagement on federal projects that will alter the […]
Audubon Calls for More Resources and Attention (not Less) for Western Yellow-billed Cuckoo
This week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) proposed a 9 percent decrease in designated habitat for the western distinct population of the Yellow-billed Cuckoo (Western Yellow-billed Cuckoo) (Coccyzus americanus) even though it is found in only a fraction of its former range in the American West. Listed as a Threatened Species under the […]
California Pioneers a New Way to Manage Fish for Birds
This month marks the beginning of a sea change for California’s fisheries and the birds that rely on them. On March 1, the state of California finalized a new set of regulations protecting Pacific herring, a critical forage fish for waterbirds on the Pacific Flyway. Forage fish are tiny, numerous fish that serve as food […]
Spring is for the Birds and Birders!
As days get longer and temperatures begin to climb, birds and birders are anxiously waiting for that annual bliss that comes with the change in seasons. Yes—you know what I am talking about: Spring Migration. While some species are already on the move, we’re waiting for that burst of northward movement from the bulk of […]
In Virginia, a Race to Ready New Nesting Sites for 20,000 Returning Seabirds
Every spring since the 1980s, tens of thousands of seabirds have made their way from their South American wintering grounds to Virginia’s South Island to nest. Once there, raucous masses of Gull-billed Terns, Royal Terns, Common Terns, Black Skimmers, Laughing Gulls, and others combine to create the state’s largest breeding colony. But this April, when […]
Antarctica’s Most Numerous Penguin Has Suffered Huge Declines, Expedition Finds
One month ago, I arrived with a team of scientists at Elephant Island, Antarctica—a lonesome, 29-mile-long hunk of glacier and granite off the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. The island was chronicled by a member of Ernest Shackleton’s ill-fated 1916 expedition as “about as inhospitable as one could well imagine,” and it hasn’t changed much […]
President’s Budget Falls Short For Climate, Birds and the Environment
WASHINGTON (February 10, 2020) – The Trump Administration presented a budget to Congress today for fiscal year 2021 that includes dramatic cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of the Interior, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Department of Energy, the Department of Agriculture, and the Department of Commerce which houses the National Oceanic and Atmospheric […]
