I couldn’t believe what I was looking at. A painted bunting in Chicago? In January?! These birds belong in the humid swamps of the Gulf Coast, not the frigid streets of the Windy City. Yet there could be no doubt of what I was looking at, as this painted bunting was lying dead in a tray at the Field Museum among 140 other species of birds that have been collected as window kill below the skyscrapers and apartment buildings of Chicago.

As neotropical migrants pour into Wisconsin and we celebrated International Migratory Bird Day this month (May 12th) I was reminded of this painted bunting.  I think we are all aware that windows pose a problem to birds, and we probably have all found dead songbirds below the windows around our bird feeders or at our work place.  Yet it is easy to view these as isolated events and lose sight of the larger impact that window collisions have on songbirds as a whole. According to the Bird Conservation Network (BCN), 100 million to 975 million songbirds are killed in window collisions in North America each year.  This startling statistic highlights a hard learned fact; birds do not recognize glass as a barrier.

Although the task of reducing 975 million songbird deaths may seem overwhelming, there are some very simple steps you can take to reduce the number of songbird window collisions at your house or work.  Windows that reflect the surrounding trees or sky are particularly deadly to birds, so eliminating the reflective quality of your windows is a good first step to reducing bird/window collisions.  The BCN recommends installing window decals or placing mesh across the outside of your windows to reduce glare, and moving house plants away from windows to make them less attractive to birds.  The BCN also recommends a simple step that we can all follow to reduce bird/window collisions; don’t wash your windows during the migration season.

Additionally scientists at The Field Museum of Chicago have documented that bright lights are disorienting to songbirds at night, and are the cause of large scale bird/window collision events.  Luckily the solution to this problem is simple. In a 2001 study, researchers found that turning off the lights at night in an area of high bird window kill density reduced songbird deaths by 83%!  This finding led to the start of the nationwide “Lights Out” campaign which encourages cities to turn off there their decorative lights during the summer months.  So turning off the lights when you leave work or in your house at night is a great way to reduce your energy usage and protect migrating songbirds!

Although the cranes species of the world are not threatened by window collisions (thankfully), we at ICF are doing our part to reduce our own impact on songbird populations. We have installed strips of non-reflective tape (we tried BirdTape available through the American Bird Conservancy) to the outside of the windows of the Field Ecology Lab (above) and on the large picture windows of the Ron Sauey Memorial Library (right).  It is our hope that we can enjoy the arrival of our warblers, thrushes and vireos (or maybe a painted bunting) without worrying about finding them below our windows.

A tradition at ICF is to follow our “Egg Score Card,” which tracks the Whooping Crane eggs from our captive flock and wild nests in Wisconsin. We’ll be posting updates to our score card on our website and Facebook, so check back often in the coming weeks to view our progress. Watch our video ICF’s Breeding & Reintroduction Program: Raising Crane Chicks to learn how we care for our eggs at ICF.

Beginning in May, watch live streaming video of ICF’s 2012 Whooping Crane chicks! Go behind-the-scenes into the world of raising endangered Whooping Crane chicks for reintroduction into the wild. No crane costume required!

Click here for a preview of our Crane Chick Cam

Whooping Crane eggs laid at ICF as of 5/15/12:

Total laid:  32
Fertile:  16*
Infertile:  6
Too young (or shell too dark) to determine fertility:  6
Broken (unknown fertility):  4
Hatched for rearing at ICF:  1
Hatched elsewhere after transfer: 4

* Of this total 5 fertile eggs transferred to other captive facility and 4 unviable embryos

Active wild Whooping Crane nests in Wisconsin as of 5/09/12:  13
Read our updates on the first confirmed wild chick hatch and the hatching of wild twins!

Visit ICF on Facebook for updates on the 2012 Whooping Crane spring migration and breeding season.

Zambia is the third leg of my travels in Africa and a perfect final destination for a crane and wetland tour. Zambia is truly a wetland paradise, with eight “Wetlands of International Importance” under the Ramsar Convention covering a surface area of nearly 40,000 square kilometers. These include some of the most important wetlands in Africa for cranes and other biodiversity. More than 90% of the global population of Wattled Cranes depends on six large floodplains, for example, and four of those are found in Zambia – Kafue Flats, Bangweulu Swamps, Liuwa Plain, and Busanga Swamps (learn more about ICF’s work in the Zambezi River basin).  Another Ramsar site, the Luangwa plains, is the stronghold for Grey Crowned Cranes in Zambia.  Each of these sites is formally protected but faces substantial conservation challenges—present and future.

The Zambezi River basin in southern Africa (click on the map to enlarge)

The first part of my trip to Zambia focused on the future of the Kafue Flats. The flats, a rich mosaic of grasslands, blue lagoons, and palm savannas, are home to the Kafue lechwe, a semi-aquatic antelope found nowhere else on earth, as well as Africa buffalo, zebra, wildebeest, hippo, and more than 400 bird species. Kafue Flats once supported the largest concentration of Wattled Cranes ever recorded (more than 3000 individuals), and although their numbers have declined by 60-70% over the past two decades, the flats remains the most important site for the species. The flats are well-protected on paper – two national parks and a large game management area cover much of this landscape – but are seriously degraded by upstream water regulation, illegal hunting, fires, and (most pressingly) the invasion of the thorny shrub Mimosa pigra, which now covers thousands of hectares of prime feeding grounds for Wattled Cranes and Kafue lechwe.

Kafue lechwe

In partnership with the WWF-Zambia Country Office and the Zambian Wildlife Authority, our plan is to aggressively attack mimosa over the next few years, until we reduce it down to a level where park scouts can keep it at bay. We will hire about 80 local community members to aid in the effort. I was eager to share an exciting break-through with my Zambia colleagues. ICF’s Southeast Asia Program Manager, Tran Triet, and his colleagues have just discovered that a concentrated salt water solution is effective at killing Mimosa pigra at Tram Chim National Park in Vietnam, where it also has invaded large areas.  This would be a much lower-cost and less toxic alternative to spraying herbicide on the mimosa clones here, and we make an immediate plan to begin testing salt spray on the flats.

Water release from the Cahora Bassa Dam, Mozambique

During the final week of my stay in Zambia, we held our twice-yearly stakeholders meeting for our Joint Zambezi River Basin Environmental Flows Programme. This is an exciting, ambitious initiative of WWF, ICF, and other partners. The program is the largest scale effort in the world to implement basin-wide environmental flows (or “eflows”) that specify the quantity, timing, and quality of water flows required to sustain freshwater and estuarine ecosystems and the human livelihoods and well-being that depend on these ecosystems. We are joined at this meeting by representatives from all the major dams in the Zambezi River basin, as well as those responsible for water allocation, management, and flood forecasting. We have long focused on water releases from large dams in Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique, which affect the Kafue Flats, Zambezi Delta, and other vital wetlands for people and wildlife, and with this meeting we also expand our focus to include the vital Zambezi headwaters regions of Angola, Zambia, and Malawi.

Local human populations, as well as wildlife, depend on the wise management of rivers in the Zambezi River basin.

Dr. Jackie King, one of the founders of the science of environmental flows, and I gave a half-day presentation on global progress with eflows and the history of and prospects for sustainable water management in the Zambezi basin. This included considerable focus on the efforts ICF has led to release waters from Cahora Bassa Dam for the Lower Zambezi River and Delta in Mozambique. Later in the workshop, our attention focused on two key actions – setting a plan and timetable for a series of stakeholder workshops over the next two years that will be used to specifically define the water needs and management alternatives for the Zambezi basin, and launching a basin-wide monitoring and adaptive management plan. I was responsible for the latter – preparing and presenting the monitoring and adaptive management plan to stakeholders- and I spent much of my time sharing a vision for basin monitoring that will clearly demonstrate the ecological and socio-economic benefits of environmental flows for decision-makers and all who use or care about Zambezi waters. We reached broad agreement on the plan as a three-way partnership between the water authorities and dam operators (monitoring hydrology), government agencies (monitoring social and economic indicators), and conservation NGOs such as ICF and WWF (monitoring key ecological variables and species of concern). Wattled Cranes, a key flagship species for Zambezi eflows, figure prominently in our monitoring system.

Next year I will lead a trip back to Zambia to visit some of the extraordinary places we are working to save, including the Kafue Flats, Busanga Plains, and South Luangwa National Park. I hope you will join me on this next adventure to the wetland capital of Africa (learn more about this exciting opportunity!).

As Kerryn Morrison, ICF’s African Crane Conservation Program Manager, and I drove across the border from Uganda, I was thrilled to experience Rwanda for the first time. Rwanda is the 20th African country I have worked in for ICF, and I take joy in learning about the unique cultural, political, and ecological characteristics of each country I visit. Rwanda is the most densely settled country in Africa (with one of highest population densities in the world). The steep volcanic slopes of the Albertine Rift Valley are 100% blanketed with terraced agricultural plots from top to bottom — it’s a scene more reminiscent of the Nepal foothills than most of Africa. Everywhere you look, impoverished farming families are crouching over at back-breaking angles to till and weed these plots. The forests have long since been cut down, some replaced by eucalyptus plantations, and erosion of these fragile, nutrient-rich slopes is everywhere in evidence. With agricultural productivity in decline, and a rapidly increasing population, the conservation and human development challenges here are daunting.

The steep slopes of the Albertine Rift Valley are blanketed with terraced agricultural plots (left),
and many valley bottom wetlands are converted to tea plantations (right).

Two major exceptions to this transformed landscape lie in the north of Rwanda. One is Volcanoes National Park, which protects magnificent highland forests of the Virunga Mountains, the richest biodiversity hotspot in Africa and home to the world’s only Mountain Gorillas. We are all deeply indebted to the dedicated wildlife scouts of Volcanoes and neighboring national parks in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, who risked their lives to protect the gorillas through the reign of Idi Amin in Uganda, the Rwandan genocide, and now prolonged civil war in DR Congo.

Mountain Gorillas in Volcanoes National Park, Rwanda.

The other is the 1200 hectare Rugezi marsh, a spectacular acidic peatland that serves as a headwater source for the White Nile and one of the most important sites for Grey Crowned Cranes. Most of the valley bottom wetlands of Rwanda have been converted to farm plots or large tea plantations, but Rugezi Marsh has been spared by its unique geology: the outlet of Rugezi cascades over a spectacular waterfall that is directed through a hydro electric scheme into Lake Burera, and from there drains through another hydroelectric scheme into Lake Luhondo. These hydroelectric schemes generate more than a third of the country’s electricity. In the early 2000s drainage canals were dug to convert Rugezi Marsh into agricultural plots, and the steady year-round outflows naturally released by the peatland, so important to hydropower generation, were replaced by rapid storm runoff and decreased dry season levels.

Alarmed about the potential impact of these drainage works on national energy security, the Government of Rwanda declared Rugezi as Rwanda’s first Wetland of International Importance under the Ramsar Convention and banned all agriculture and other development activities (learn more about the Ramsar Convention and its impact on crane conservation in the May 2012 issue of The ICF Bugle). Rwandan Environment Management Agency (REMA) removed all people from the wetland and the planted a 20 meter buffer zone of trees extending around the entire wetland to mark the limits of settlement and agricultural activity.

Rugezi is the focus of our conservation efforts in Rwanda. Our key partners include Sam Kanyanibwa and Claudiene Nsabagasani of the Albertine Rift Conservation Society (ARCOS) and Marshall Banamwana of Kitabi College of Conservation and Environmental Management. I first met Sam, now Executive Director of ARCOS, at our 1993 African Cranes and Wetlands Workshop held in Maun, Botswana. Sam was the first conservationist to sound an alarm for Grey Crowned Cranes, noting they were in steady decline in Rwanda during the 1980s. Grey Crowned Cranes were considered to be a common and thriving species across East Africa at that time, but we soon learned that this impression was false. By the late 1990 it became clear that the species was declining in many Africa countries, and this year Grey Crowned Cranes likely will be formally listed as “Endangered” based on their precipitous population decline (about 80%) and the contraction of their range. About 100 Grey Crowned Cranes occur at Rugezi, and its importance is ever-increasing as the remaining valley bottom wetlands of Rwanda (and East Africa) are converted to agriculture.

Rwanda team members, Claudiene Nsabagasani of the Albertine Rift Conservation Society, Kerryn Morrison,
ICF/EWT African Crane Conservation Manager, and Marshall Banamwana of Kitabi College of Conservation and Environmental Management.

During our visit, we had the pleasure of hosting three program leaders from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, which is a major supporter of our efforts at Rugezi. The MacArthur Foundation invests deeply and strategically in the Albertine Rift, supporting also ARCOS, Kitabi College, and various forest conservation measures, including the forest gorillas, for many years. Our project marks the first time the MacArthur Foundation has supported wetland conservation in the Rift, a new landscape connection from mountain to marsh. Together, we traveled the length of the wetland, following its natural drainage path from south to north. We viewed the southern end of the marsh from the bluffs above – here the wetland is deeply inundated due in part to a rock dam that was erected across one of its outlets, and we can see vast expanses of floating peat. We spot a pair of Grey Crowned Cranes flying low over the marsh. Development pressure on the marsh is relatively low here, as the deep water precludes most activity.

Rich (far left) with Stephanie Platz (Director for Strategic Planning), Jorgen Thomsen (Director of Conservation
and Sustainable Development), and Elizabeth Chadri (Program Officer for Conservation and Sustainable Development)
from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, a key supporter of ICF’s field activities in Rwanda.

In the central parts, the marsh is easily accessible and a long, low berm is used by local people to traverse the marsh. The spongy peak surface bounces under our feet, and water flowing through the marsh has a stunning “blackwater” appearance from dissolved peat tannins – closely resembling our sphagnum bogs here in Wisconsin. The wetland vegetation is rich, diverse, and teeming with bird life, including the rare and Endangered Grauer’s Swamp Warbler for which Rugezi is the global stronghold.

Native wetland vegetation, including tall stands of papyrus, is reclaiming abandoned agricultural plots in Rugezi Marsh.

The north end of the marsh is recovering from the aborted agricultural development.  Here, the future of the marsh likely hinges on the sustainable production of goods and services.  New expanses of papyrus are re-colonizing here, and give us hope for a large-scale papyrus restoration effort similar to what Jimmy Muheebwa accomplished across the border in Uganda.   A variety of products are produced from papyrus in this region—baskets, roofing materials, and floor mats, for example—and we see great potential in developing a cottage industry here in conjunction with conservation efforts.  In June, Marshall and Claudiene will travel across to exchange ideas with Jimmy and his team.

Rugezi offers a tremendous opportunity for ecotourism, especially in conjunction with visits to the picturesque waterfall that cascades down from the marsh outlet to the idyllic Lake Burera far below, and to the mountain gorillas of the Virungas that tower above us to the north. Perhaps the most important service provided by Rugezi is its role in sequestering carbon in the fight against global climate change. Long-term commitments to conserve these vast expanses of peat may provide an important opportunity for generating sustainable support for marsh conservation and restoration through the global carbon markets.

In addition to saving critical marshlands like Rugezi, the future of Grey Crowned Cranes here depends on our ability to stop the global crane trade. As we saw across the border in Uganda, crane trade appears to be rampant in this region and none of the crane pairs we observed in Rwanda had chicks. Many of these captured cranes likely stay in Rwanda—prominent hotels and wealthy families in Kigali and other parts of Rwanda have cranes in their possession as a kind of status symbol. Claudiene is undertaking his Master’s Degree on the crane trade in Rwanda, and we hope to gain new insights and solutions from his efforts. A national awareness campaign here, and in Uganda, is in the works.  Learn more about ICF’s Africa Crane Trade Project.

The Flame of Hope at the Kigali Genocide Memorial Center

Perhaps the most striking aspect of our visit was in witnessing how Rwanda has come to terms with the brutal genocide of 1994. Our trip marked the 18th anniversary of the “100 days” when more than one million people were massacred in an uprising that many of us still find unfathomable. I visited the Genocide Memorial in Kigali. It is an intensely emotional experience to share this memorial with grieving Rwandan families that travel across the country to place flowers on the mass graves that lie beneath us. As we have come to learn, very painfully, the roots of the massacre were deep in the colonial history of Rwanda, and the outside world knew what was happening as the genocide unfolded and did nothing to stop it. There were many unsung heroes at that time that saved people at great risk to themselves—such as Paul Rusesabagina who was famously portrayed in the movie Hotel Rwanda—but not enough to prevent the tragedy. The genocide will not be forgotten in Rwanda, but people are learning to forgive and move on. Ethnic groups are never referred to in the country – everyone is a Rwandan – and “A New Dawn” is the national slogan. We look forward to a productive partnership with our Rwandan colleagues to conserve this remarkable land.

Grey Crowned Crane flock in Kaku Kiyanja, Uganda.

ICF President Dr. Rich Beilfuss recently returned from a three-week field visit to advance ICF’s Africa Program in three important “crane countries” — Uganda, Rwanda, and Zambia. Following are Rich’s field notes from Uganda, detailing the community-based efforts to protect the remaining Grey Crowned Cranes and their habitats in this rapidly changing country. Read Rich’s field notes from Rwanda and Zambia.

I first met Ugandan crane biologist and community leader Jimmy Muheebwa back in 2000.  I am delighted to return to Uganda this year to see the fruits of our 12-year partnership with Jimmy and his colleagues at Nature Uganda.  Our team includes Kerryn Morrison, who ably heads our ICF/Endangered Wildlife Trust partnership for Africa, and my old friend Maurice Wanjala, who has spearheaded efforts to save cranes and wetlands in northwest Kenya for more than 25 years.  We are also joined by Rhett Turner and Greg Pope of Red Sky Productions, who are making a film about ICF and featuring the excellent community-based conservation work of Jimmy and Maurice here in East Africa.

Rich (center back) and Kerryn Morrison (center front), ICF’s African Crane Conservation
Program Manager, with the wetland conservation team in Uganda.

Of all the places in the world where cranes are cherished in local culture, Uganda is near the top of the list.  The Grey Crowned Crane is the national bird of Uganda and is featured in the center of the national flag, on Uganda’s coat of arms, and on the 5 shilling coin.  Uganda’s national bank is the “Crane Bank,” and there is a giant new crane statue in the capital city, Kampala.  But for all its cultural prominence, the Grey Crowned Crane has hit very hard times in Uganda.  Once considered the most secure of the African cranes, their population in Uganda has plummeted from perhaps 80,000 birds half a century ago to fewer than 10,000 today. This decline is mirrored in other countries throughout its range, and this June the Grey Crowned Crane will be formally designated as “Endangered”—an undesirable status shared only with the very rarest of cranes—Whooping, Siberian , and Red Crowned.  The source of this decline is all too familiar—loss of wetland breeding grounds, and capture for illegal trade (learn more about ICF’s Africa Crane Trade Project).

Historically Grey Crowned Cranes bred on small wetlands scattered across the agricultural landscape, but today their breeding grounds are increasingly concentrated in Uganda’s few remaining large papyrus swamps.  Kerryn and I discuss strategy for the region, and feel that our focus should now be on the 5-6 most important sites in East Africa that collectively sustain 10% or more of the population.  Uganda has some of these critical wetlands, and the strongest wetland protection laws in Africa.  Much of this protection was accomplished by Paul Mafabi, Commission of the Wetlands Program under the Minister of Environment.  Paul visited ICF back in 1987, and did his Masters degree on Grey Crowned Cranes of eastern Uganda.

Widespread poverty in Uganda, coupled with a rapidly increasing human population, puts enormous pressure on these wetlands and most can no longer sustain breeding pairs.  But this week we are visiting two important exceptions– Kaku Kiyanja and Nyamariru—where large numbers of breeding pairs still occur with occasional flocks of more than 300 birds.  Kaku Kiyanja is a gorgeous reed marsh in the Ugandan hill country, draining to nearby Lake Victoria.  Conservation efforts here are impressive—Jimmy has put together a wetland management team from among local community members, many of whom have committed to this effort for years.   We observe many pairs of Grey Crowned Cranes scattered throughout the wetland, and half of them have nearly full-grown chicks.  Kaku Kiyanja may be the most important breeding ground in the country, and a few surrounding wetlands show promise as well.

A Grey Crowned Crane pair and their chick (center) co-exist with local farmers in Kabale, Uganda.

Joseph of the wetland group hosts us for lunch, and we are given a tour of several demonstration projects the group is undertaking to improve human livelihoods around the wetland, including pig farming and bee-keeping hives made from wetland reeds.

Nymariru wetland is only a 100 miles or so to the southeast, but to reach there we cross into the Albertine Rift Valley–the most biologically-rich landscape of Africa and home to world’s remaining mountain gorillas, and also the most densely settled region in the world.  Here, narrow bands of wetlands wind along the base of steep valleys.  The surrounding landscape is a patchwork of small farm plots on incredibly steep slopes.  The Albertine Rift has rich, fertile soils well-suited to intensive cropping, but erosion is rampant and soil fertility—and human livelihoods—are in decline.

We are encouraged to see many pairs of Grey Crowned Cranes in these papyrus wetlands, but none has a chick.  In the uplands, a non-breeding flock of more than 80 cranes is gleaming seed and insects on farmlands—but all adults. Worrisome.  But there is reason for hope.  Jimmy has organized a community wetland management team here as well, and together they have restored a swath of papyrus six miles long by a hundred feet wide.  With luck, this effort will provide enough cover for the cranes to successfully raise their chicks once again.

Jimmy leads a tour of the papyrus wetland restoration in the Albertine Rift Valley.

Illegal trade may pose a bigger problem. Crowned Cranes are a popular target for the global bird trade—some remain in the region as peacock-like pets, others are exported in large numbers for private collections and zoos around the world.  Increasing human settlements around wetlands brings people closer and closer to crane breeding grounds, and the birds have nowhere to hide their nests and young chicks.  Year after year, the chicks are taken from the nests.  Some years ago, we did a study of the illegal trade of Black Crowned Cranes from the Inner Niger Delta in Mali – where, in a pattern that seems frighteningly similar to what we are now seeing in East Africa, the population crashed from tens of thousands in the 1970s to fewer than a hundred today.  Birds were captured from nests and roosts in the delta, and carried in burlap sacks over long-distances in the hot Africa sun to cities where they were held for shipment. Losses were very high, perhaps as many as 8-9 birds dying for every individual that was successfully exported.  Last year, we received word of a request from China for 500 wild-caught Grey Crowned Cranes.  Filling such an order could decimate the remaining population.

We have much work to do to save these endangered cranes and their homes, and I am grateful for colleagues like Jimmy and Maurice who have dedicated their lives to this cause.