Tags: wildlife

Nature Find is an online tool provided by the National Wildlife Federation (NWF) to aid in finding local nature or nature-related amenities.   Users plug-in a zip code, and the software locates nearby events, city parks, science centers, zoos and other wildlife-related happenings.

The National Parks Conservation Association has drafted a 53-page report describing “a potentially catastrophic loss of animal and plant life” in national parks due to climate change. The report urges the National Park Service to develop an overarching plan to better manage habitat and population shifts.

We recently discovered that our neighbors at the New Jersey Meadowlands keep a nature blog full of amazing photos of the bird and insect life that lives within its 8,400 acres of wetlands and open space.  Lots of these photos have been taken at the 110-acre Richard W.

Ballistic Architecture Machine’s (BAM) concept for a green roof installation, called Biornis Aesthetope, is an aviary for migrating birds proposed for the 70,000 sq ft rooftop of Goldman Sachs in Lower Manhattan.  Ornithologists at Harvard and Cornell Universities provided BAM guidance on the resting and nutritional needs for 12 species of birds, including diurnal raptors, songbirds and owls, whose migration paths along the Atlantic Coast Flyway bring them through New York City regularly.

There are still seats available for this Sunday’s 10 am bird-focused bus and walking tour of the Freshkills Park site.  Our bird tours are held bimonthly and are jointly led by park planners from our office and naturalists from the Staten Island Museum. 

One of the environmental concerns surrounding the recent boom in wind farm development is the potential threat of large-scale bird mortality.  There’s nuance to the degree of potential threat related to factors like scale and siting (i.e., more threat when turbines are sited near migratory pathways, nesting areas and mountain passes, for example), but the risk remains. 

In a move to increase biodiversity within our urban jungles, the UK Green Building Council (the UK’s equivalent of the US Green Building Council) have put forth some biophilic design recommendations to policymakers, developers and urban planners that could enable wildlife to better integrate with the built environment. 

Nearly a third of the nation’s 800 bird species are endangered, threatened or in significant decline due to habitat loss, invasive species and other threats, according to a recent report from the Department of Interior.  Birds have been getting a bad rep recently, particularly because of the role of Canada geese in the Flight 1549 incident.