Volunteer for our streams!

If you're tired of volunteering with just NAP, the Huron River Watershed Council is looking for volunteers on April 25th for help with its stream surveying- check out the blurb below!

Volunteer on Earth Day weekend with the Huron River Watershed Council - Check the health of the river and streams in our annual spring stream monitoring event on Saturday, April 25th.

Spend a day outdoors while you help to collect the aquatic bugs that scientists use to gauge the quality of the water and the health of the stream habitat. HRWC and the local communities use the information to make wise decisions concerning the future of the Huron River.

Collecting aquatic bugs is a fun, unique, and educational, social experience. Very few people are aware that an entire community of creatures lives beneath the water’s surface. These creatures can create sophisticated fishing nets, create homes out of sand, plants, and silk, and are able to thrive in an environment with fast flowing water and hungry fish.

Each volunteer or group is assigned to a team with a group leader who shows the team what to do and an experienced bug collector who handles the stream work. You do not need to enter the stream. No previous experience is necessary and children are welcome if each one is accompanied by an adult.

We will meet regardless of the weather.

IMPORTANT! Register before April 7th! Choose from two times: 8:45am-3pm or 10:15am-4:30pm. Contact Joan at jmartin@hrwc.org or (734) 769-5123, ext.11.

Water Quality

Washtenaw County's Division of Environmental Health recently put together this fine video on how each of us can help protect water quality! View it below, or go to their website at
www.ewashtenaw.org/green-media!


Water Quality: It's In Our Hands from Barbara Lucas on Vimeo.

Burning in the media!

As many of you know, we at NAP set some ecosystems on fire in the spring and fall. Literally. Concentrate Media has done a lovely little article on this passtime of ours- check it out at http://www.concentratemedia.com/devnews/annarborecologicalburns0049.aspx!

The city's Natural Areas Preservation Program is starting to use ecological burns to curb runaway vegetation and help the greenways renew themselves more naturally. So far the city has performed these burns in the Dolph Nature Area, Lakewood Park, Hansen Park, Leslie Park Golf Course, Leslie Park Nature and Science Center, Barton Nature Area and Black Pond Woods.

Furthermore- David Lewinski, local photographer extraordinaire, took some photos for the story. Not all of them made the cut to get in Concentrate's article, but they're definitely worth checking out! Visit his post at http://davidlewinskiphotography.blogspot.com/2009/03/burnanators.html.

Amazing Amphibians!

It's been a busy few weeks here at NAP- we've had the Frog & Toad Survey Kickoff, the Salamander Survey Kickoff, and of course, the burn season kickoffs!

Rather than waste precious minutes writing everything up, however, this blogger's about to head out and do some smoke monitoring. So, in the interest of brevity, here are a couple of links from our friend Monica's blog, The Garden Faerie, which describe some of the things going on with our local frogs and toads!

About the survey itself:
http://gardenfaerie.blogspot.com/2009/03/frog-and-toad-survey.html

Their first-run experience:
http://gardenfaerie.blogspot.com/2009/03/froggies.html

Thanks, Monica!

Safe Passage Resolution passed!

The Safe Passage Resolution was passed by City Council!

Read more about it at the Washtenaw Audubon Society website here: http://www.washtenawaudubon.org/safepassage.htm

NAP's taking over the airwaves...

Some NAPpers had their fifteen minutes of fame this morning on local radio station WCBN! This morning our Outreach Coordinator, Jason Frenzel-Wright, and our Ornithologist, Dea Armstrong, were interviewed about NAP's activities. Check out the mp3 of the event at WCBN's site, or go directly here for just today's show. Thanks to everyone who tuned in!

Project Safe Passage

Night Flight, by Brad Orr, from the 2007 Photo Contest

There's a great article over on the Ann Arbor News today about birds in urban environments, and how we can help them safely traverse cities during their migration period. Read the excerpt below, or go check it out!

Mid-March marks the beginning of a dangerous period for night-migrating birds flying over our area through an obstacle course of tall towers and buildings. Avian migratory navigation mechanisms are attuned to positions of the stars and moon. Birds have not evolved to beware of artificial lights on or in tall buildings, on towers or elsewhere. Tens of millions of songbirds will die across the continent this spring when their confused instincts lead them into the life-terminating surfaces of concrete, glass and steel of our illuminated towers and tall buildings.

Earth Hour is coming up!

Mark your calendar and prepare to hit the lights!

ANN ARBOR, Mich., Feb. 11, 2009 — The City of Ann Arbor encourages residents and businesses to voluntarily observe a world-wide “Earth Hour” and turn off unnecessary lights on Saturday, March 28, 2009, from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m. Participating residents and businesses may officially sign up for this effort at www.earthhour.org by pledging to turn off lights for one hour. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, lighting accounts for roughly 22 percent of U.S. electricity consumption and is a significant contributor to our nation’s greenhouse gas emissions. Earth Hour began in Sydney, Australia, in 2007 as a one-city environmental campaign and has grown into a grassroots initiative with participants across the globe. Last year, Ann Arbor joined 371 cities in 35 countries to participate in Earth Hour.

Street lights along one block of Main Street will be turned off during the 2009 Earth Hour as a demonstration of Ann Arbor’s commitment to fighting greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. However, for public safety, other street lights and traffic lights will not be turned off during the Earth Hour observation. Ann Arbor is a leader in the development of energy-efficient light emitting diode (LED) street lighting, which has reduced municipal energy use and significantly reduced light pollution. Municipal facilities will observe “lights out” procedures for non-essential illumination during this hour.

According to Ann Arbor Mayor John Hieftje, “Participating in the global Earth Hour demonstrates Ann Arbor’s commitment to supporting energy-efficient practices to reduce our reliance on foreign oil and help reverse the effects of climate change.” Ann Arbor businesses and residents wishing to display an Earth Hour flier (or Earth Happy Hour) in their windows to show their support for this event may download a local one at www.a2gov.org/green and click on Earth Hour. For ideas on organizing your own Earth Hour event, visit www.earthhour.org/action. Citizens organizing a local event for Earth Hour may choose to share and post information about their event on the local Web ArborUpdate at http://arborupdate.com. More information on the city’s energy and other environmental goals is available at www.a2gov.org/green.

Rapid field assessment of natural areas - HRWC training session

Rapid Field Assessment of natural areas training sessionSaturday, May 2, 10 - 14, Matthaei Botanical Gardens, Ann Arbor, MichiganHRWC is seeking interested people to volunteer with their Bioreserve Project , which aims to preserve high quality natural areas in the Huron Watershed.

As part of the Bioreserve Project, HRWC created the Bioreserve Map by drawing the boundaries of forests, wetlands, and grasslands on a computer, using aerial photos as a guide. Then they used a computer model to rank each natural area based on fifteen different measurements of its ecological value. These include the size of the area, whether wetlands, streams, or lakes are on the site, the diversity of the landscape on the site, the potential for the site to be a groundwater recharge area, the potential for the site to be connected to other natural areas, and how much native vegetation the site potentially still harbors.

Given that the map has delineated over 1700 natural areas in our watershed, it would be impossible to perform full-scale ecological assessments of every site. Using their newly-developed rapid assessment process, they hope to select out those sites with the greatest potential to be high quality natural areas most deserving of protection. The rapid assessment consists of walking the site and answering questions about the kinds of trees and other plants on the site, presence of damage from human activities, etc.

Volunteers are needed to participate in the roadside survey of the 1700 natural areas in the watershed. This involves driving to the natural areas and completing a short form that asks very general questions about the site. The purpose of the survey is to screen out sites that program staff can easily tell are not worth taking the time to perform the field assessment on. This survey will take place throughout the winter. Contact Kris at 734/769-5123 x16 or kolsson@hrwc.org if you are interested. Also check out the roadside volunteer web site at www.hrwc.org/bioreserve to find out more about what you would be doing.

This spring and summer, volunteers are needed to perform field assessments on the natural areas the roadside survey has determined have potential for being of high ecological quality. This will begin in May of 2009 and continue throughout the field season (through September 2009). See the announcement below to attend a training session for the assessments.
____________________________________________________________

Saturday, May 2: 10:00 am to 4:00 pm
Assessing Natural Areas: Rapid Ecological Assessment
Location: Matthaei Botanical Gardens
You can help identify high-quality natural areas for protection. At this workshop new volunteers for the HRWC will learn to conduct a rapid ecological assessment of grasslands, forests, wetlands, and aquatic habitats. Trained volunteers are then certified to be sent out in groups to work together on site assessments throughout the spring, summer, and fall (an expected time commitment of four hours per site). Participants will gain broadly applicable skills in ecological assessment. (Please bring a sack lunch. The workshop includes hands-on practice outdoors, so please come prepared for weather, mud, etc.).

Plant ID experts needed! If you are experienced in plant identification, we especially need your help! Every team will need at least one "expert" (someone who has some experience with identifying plants). If you have had a plant identification class, or have become familiar with wildflowers, grasses, and trees over time spent hiking this beautiful watershed, we'd love your help!

PARTNERING WITH LANDOWNERS
Take a look at the Bioreserve Map. Are portions of your property on the map? Do you think they should be? HRWC would be delighted to help you find out more about the natural areas on your property. This information can help you make decisions about maintaining your land, including developing options that could provide tax incentives for conserving high quality areas. An assessment will give you a base knowledge about what natural features exist and the benefit they may provide.

What is the field assessment?
HRWC, with the help of Michigan Natural Features Inventory staff and a distinguished Advisory Committee composed of professional ecologists and naturalists, developed the assessment worksheets and an accompanying training session and manual. Until now, natural area assessments in Michigan were conducted mostly by professional ecologists, and only performed as detailed, multi-day inventories. These thorough assessments are vital to understanding the ecological value of a parcel, but time consuming and expensive. Cost and time estimates range in the tens of thousands of dollars and an entire growing season for one township. With 1,700 sites throughout 63 townships to inventory, a more general, rapid assessment is required that:
1. identifies high-quality natural areas as candidates for the more detailed, "professional" inventory;
2. sets priorities about which natural areas to target for protection;
3. contributes to land-use planning efforts at the township and county level.

Volunteers will complete a 4-hour training session that covers the ecology of the watershed, some basic ecological concepts, and detailed instructions about how to fill out the worksheet. They will then team up and visit the sites, armed with a manual that will provide pictures of the kinds of plants and other features they will need to be able to identify in order to complete the worksheet. The rapid field assessment is meant to be general enough that volunteers with a half-day of training and a field guidebook will be able to complete it, but detailed enough that we will be able to glean meaningful information about the ecological quality of the site. Each site visit will take about 3 - 4 hours. A background in field ecology and plant identification is helpful, but not necessary to volunteer.

HRWC expects to make the rapid assessment methodology and training materials available to: local communities, which can use it to determine which natural areas in their jurisdiction are the most important to preserve as development encroaches; land trusts, conservancies, and parks departments, which can use it to assess their own properties as well as potential properties; private property owners, who can learn more about their own land; and natural area acquisition and purchase of development rights programs, such as the Ann Arbor Greenbelt and the Washtenaw County Natural Areas Preservation Programs, which can use it to assess potential areas and track the status of existing properties.

If you are interested in learning a new skill, helping preserve natural areas, or just getting outside and enjoying the watershed's woods and wetlands, contact Kris at kolsson@hrwc.org or 734/769-5123 x16.

For more information about the bioreserve program, go to www.hrwc.org/text/bioreserve.