2012 Marks a Banner Year for Endangered Kirtland’s Warblers
Fledgling. Photo by Joel Trick/USFWS The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reports that 2012 has been a banner year for endangered Kirtland’s warblers. Survey results of the rare bird in Michigan and Wisconsin scored a new record, with 2,090 singing males, up from 1,828 last year. “It was only 1987 when we tied an all-time low of 167 singing males. This is a pretty remarkable recovery -- 12 times the population size from where it was just a short 25 years ago,” said Scott Hicks, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s East Lansing Field Office Supervisor. Biologists, researchers and volunteers in Michigan observed 2,063 singing males during the official 2012 survey period – up from 1,805 in 2011. In Wisconsin, volunteers and paid monitors found and tracked singing male Kirtland’s warblers and were able to monitor nesting. Kirtland’s warblers were recorded in five counties in Wisconsin (Adams, Douglas, Bayfield, Vilas, and Marinette), and at least 24 singing males wer...