Nature Canada presents at the Earth Day 2011 EcoMentors Youth Conference

This past weekend, Nature Canada had the pleasure of taking part in the Earth Day 2011 EcoMentors Youth Conference in Ottawa.

The EcoMentors program provides training and resources for youth ages 15-24 looking to become community leaders for the environment. This year’s conference welcomed youth from across the country for a day of interactive workshops and activities designed to inspire participants to promote positive change for the environment. Nature Canada was pleased to be on-hand to present our Nature Explorers program model and share with participants how we use on-line tools to inspire off-line, nature-based action in Canadians.

The ultimate goal of the Nature Explorers program is to connect one million Canadian youth and their families with multiple positive experiences in nature over the next three to five years. We look forward to building this relationship with EcoMentors and being a part of this exciting opportunity to empower Canadian youth to become environmental leaders in their own communities.

Photo by EcoMentors

Connect with Nature: Set up a backyard bird feeder

As the weather gets colder and some birds prepare for a long winter at home, this is a perfect time to set up a backyard bird feeder. Backyard feeders provide birds with a good source of energy for the cold winter months and create excellent bird watching opportunities. Here are a few tips to help you make the most of your backyard birding experience.

Choose the right feeder: There are lots of feeder types to choose from. Depending on your region, you could be visited by dozens of different bird species. The ideal feeder is sturdy enough to withstand winter weather, easy to clean and tight enough to keep bird feed dry. Suet bird feeders can be particularly good for birds this time of year because of the high energy content in suet mix, made from hard fats and other ingredients like peanuts or cornmeal. Hopper, or “house” feeders, offer good protection from the winter weather and are attractive to a wide range of feeder birds. Want to attract as many bird species as possible? Provide several different feeder styles and types of feed to maximize the species you see in your yard.

Pick a good location: Place your feeders in a quiet area where they are easy to see and convenient to refill. If you can, offer birds a refuge by placing feeders close to trees or shrubs where they can wait their turn to feed. Another factor to consider when choosing a location is the risk of window collisions. Birds can perceive a reflection in your window as a pathway through your house, so make sure to choose a location that will reduce this risk. Monitor your feeder to assess its location and if collisions become a issue, consider consulting Cornell's Lab of Ornithology for tips on how to mitigate the problem.

Keep it clean: Birds can become ill from leftover bits of seed and bird droppings that accumulate on feeder trays. Give your feeder a thorough wash with soap and water every few weeks or more often if necessary during heavy feeding periods. If you are setting up a suet feeder, make sure to be extra vigilant about keeping it clean. Suet mix can spoil easily in warmer weather.

Get to know your visitors: Bird watching continues to be one of the most popular pastimes around. Keep an eye on the birds that frequent your feeder and spend some time observing their size, shape, colour and behavior. If you’re having trouble identifying the species, snap a quick photo and use a field guide or allaboutbirds.org to narrow the possibilities. Don’t forget that you can always share your photos with fellow nature lovers through our Flickr pool or Nature Explorers community!

Make your observations count: Once you’ve got your bird feeder up and running, consider joining Project Feederwatch. Participants in this project periodically count the birds that appear at their feeders and submit their data to Bird Studies Canada, Nature Canada's co-partner in delivering the Important Bird Areas Program. By submitting your data, you’ll be helping scientists determine how bird populations are changing across North America. It’s open to all skill levels and is a great way to contribute to an international bird conservation effort.

Photo by Dbarronoss

Unlikely Partnership Paves the Way for Grasslands Conservation

Fernando Adauto is a cattle producer in Lavras and a key figure in leading collaborations between cattle producers and conservation groups

Grasslands are arguably the most threatened ecosystem globally. In North America less than 20 percent of native grasslands remain intact. The Southern Cone of South America has seen the conversion to agriculture, plantations or urbanization of around 50% of its grasslands and conversion continues at an alarming rate. Grasslands biodiversity, including birds, and the gaucho culture are at risk.

Cattle born and raised on natural grasslands

But an unlikely partnership between local producers and conservationists is trying to turn this around.

I had the opportunity this past week to participate in the fifth gathering of the Alliance for the Grasslands, known as the Encuentro de Ganaderos de Pastizales Naturales (Gathering of Natural Pasture Cattle Producers) in the town of Lavras do Sul, in southern Brazil.

These unique Encuentros have been bringing together Aves Argentinas, SAVE Brasil, Guyra Paraguay and Aves Uruguay - the BirdLife Partners from the region - with a growing number of landowners, experts, government officials and other groups and individuals interested in the conservation of natural grasslands, biodiversity and the traditional gaucho way of life.

Among the many ambitious and exciting projects of the Alliance is a certification system for beef produced on native grasslands, for which they've agreed on the overall guidelines and are working out the implementation details. The Alliance is also working with rice producers and on recognizing the ecosystem services provided by natural grasslands and providing economic incentives to conserve them.

As it celebrates five years of these Encuentros, the Alliance asked Nature Canada to carry out an evaluation of its progress. I had the opportunity to do this analysis and participate in the V Encuentro to share the preliminary findings and conduct a workshop to gather feedback from participants. I hope that this evaluation will be helpful to the Alliance in identifying gaps, opportunities and in planning its priority actions for the coming years.

I led a workshop with producers to gather feedback on the preliminary evaluation findings where participants identified the need to bring technical expertise to producers so can they improve the productivity of ranches based on natural pastures. The group has proposed creating an international training program to build on and share existing knowledge and know how.

Facilitating a workshop with ranchers from the Pampas of South America

At the same time, the exercise has been a fabulous opportunity to learn about this groundbreaking initiative supported by the BirdLife partnership and for bringing lessons back to North America.

Nature Canada, along with our BirdLife partners National Audubon in the US, and Pronatura in Mexico are looking forward to taking part in a project of the Commission for Environmental Cooperation that seeks to strengthen links in support of healthy ecosystems and communities in the grasslands of North America.

Many of these efforts will benefit the same birds because many of "our" declining grassland birds (including Bobolink and Swainson's hawk, to name but two) migrate to the grasslands of the Southern Cone of South America.

An opportunity still exists to save the grasslands of the Americas, but we urgently need to step up the effort. Despite the many challenges, the Alliance of the Grasslands of the Southern Cone of South America gives me hope that we can do this both in North and South America!