[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Robin Carter's book, Re: Song Sparrow habitat, and so on...



Hi C-birders,

This list is regularly beseiged by requests from birders seeking a copy 
of Robin Carter's birder's guide to South Carolina. Well, this afternoon, 
while helping my mall-o-phobic girfriend visit Northgate Mall in Durham, 
I noticed a copy for sale there in the Great Outdoor Provision Co. Only 
one copy was on the shelf, so it'll be a race among Triangle-area birders 
to grab it, unless they have more copies in the back...

On the topic of Song Sparrows: not only do they seem to nest in suburban 
and even urban habitats, as Kent Fiala suggested, but they nest rarely 
elsewhere! I can't remember seeing one in even remotely natural habitat 
during the breeding season around here. The most reliable spot I know for 
breeding Song Sparrows in Durham is along the railroad tracks on the 
south side of Brightleaf Square.

A couple of political actions with which folks should be concerned, in 
addition to those that Derb Carter and Sidney Maddock posted (a 
conservationsist's work is never done, sigh...):

In response to Virginia's ongoing refusal to regulate the uncontrolled 
and catastrophic horseshoe crab harvest, the National Marine Fisheries 
Service has proposed a horseshoe crab sanctuary in federal waters at the 
mouth of the Delaware Bay. Most of the unregulated fishing takes place 
here, and is then landed in Virginia; the increasingly few crabs that 
avoid capture breed on the shores of Delaware Bay and provide food for 
millions of migrating shorebirds, in particular 80% of this hemisphere's 
population of Red Knots. The notice of the proposed sanctuary in the 
Federal Register is at 
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/fedreg/a000503c.html
NMFS is asking for comments on the proposal by Friday, June 2; you can 
fax them to 301-427-2313 or mail them to:

Richard Schaefer, Chief
Staff Office for Intergovernmental and Recreational Fisheries (Fx2)
National Marine Fisheries Service
8484 Georgia Avenue
Silver Spring, MD  20910

On a more general note, CARA (which we've discussed here before) has 
passed the House and is being considered by the Senate. I imagine that 
John Edwards is probably already supporting it, and I doubt that 
petitioning Jesse Helms will do much good, so maybe there is little for 
NC birders to do; I have no idea if the SC Senators are perhaps more in 
need of phone calls and faxes...

Good birding,

Josh



Joshua S. Rose
Duke University
Department of Zoology

jsr6@acpub.duke.edu
http://www.duke.edu/~jsr6/