[Bristol-Birds] Chris O'Bryan and the Red-cockaded Woodpecker
- From: "Wallace Coffey" <jwcoffey@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Bristol-birds" <bristol-birds@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 15 Jul 2011 22:41:31 -0400
Despite being involved in sophisticated GIS work with
the University of Florida and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service,
researching Gopher Tortoises population, Chris O'Bryan has
found himself up close and very personal on the frontline of
Red-cockaded Woodpecker research.
The Red-cockaded Woodpecker was Federally listed as
Endangered in 1970. Its decline is attributed primarily to the
reduction of pine forest with trees 9O years old and older and
to the encroachment of hardwood midstory due to fire suppression.
Roosting cavities are excavated in living longleaf pines.
The first day Chris reported to the St. Marks National Wildlife
Refuge in the Big Bend of Florida, 25 miles south of Tallahassee,
he was given the opportunity to go along with a Red-cockaded
research group called a "RCWC Crew" by the US F&W biologists.
It was the day before his official herpetology research technician
assignment field work studying Gopher Tortoises populations
hit the ground.
Chris reported that they were banding nestling Red-cockadeds
from holes in the living pines. But that was nothing compared to
what he experience late last night.
About 10 p.m., Chris was again afield on the Red-cockaded
research as his on-site boss, who is a biologist on the refuge,
was attempting to capture a male Red-cockaded that was known
to be color banded and they did not know anything about that
particular bird.
Chris says they used a telescopic pole which can reach maybe
a 100 feet up to insert a tiny camera in the bird's roosting
cavity. Then, with a video monitoring screen on the ground,
they are able to look at the bird right in the hole. The camera
rig is called a Sandpiper Peeper.
However, Thursday night, they needed to actually capture the
male woodpecker and get very definitive information about it.
Using a special type of net extended on a lengthy pole, they
placed it over the roosting hole and the woodpecker came out
into the net which was lowered to the ground.
The bird had been banded at Apalachicola National Forest
about 20 miles away. Apalachicolo is the largest forest in Florida at
571,088 acres.
The biologist told Chris that the males of the Red-cockaded
usually stay pretty close to one area but females will move more
widely.
Chris is working with the University of Florida as a herpetology
research technician in a summer research program and helping
study Gopher Tortoises with a study being conducted along
with Dr. Raymond Carthy, Florida Cooperative Fish and Wildlife
Research Unit of The University of Florida.
He said that every day, as they are afield with special camera
and remote sensing GIS equipment, running transects and
searching in known burrowing sites of the tortoises and
unknown sites, he hears the calls of the Red-cockaded Woodpecker.
In addition, he is in a world of wonderful herpetology including
all kinds of very southern and exciting species. Some include
Diamond-backed Rattlesnakes, Pigmy Rattlesnakes and alligators.
Before they made the 10 p.m. appointment with the Red-cockaded
trapping, Chris and crew hiked a mile into the refuge and snorkeled
an amazing and cold-water clear spring to search for fossilized bones
and teeth of prehistoric animals.
Chris has also spent a good many of his off-duty weekend hours
kayaking in out-of-the-way places to search for birds. He
has been very successful. This weekend he will camp on
his own at a state park near Panama City about a 100 miles
from his work station to again look for herps and birds from his
boat. On the side, he has had great opportunities to surf fish
and fish from boats as well as run crab pots to make recipes with
crab meat. One of his research team members from LSU has been
introducing him to Cajun recipes.
Chris has maybe two weeks of work left and has spent
considerable hours making arrangements to move in very
soon at Clemson University where he begins graduate school
and teaches GIS labs to incoming first-year students.
He has rented half a duplex and has been assigned his
office space and room numbers and already operates from
a Clemson University email address. He has been in close
communications with the faculty and staff.
Chris became associated with area naturalist in Northeast
Tennessee when he was about 12 years of age and living
in Shady Valley, TN. His family later moved to Piney Flats.
He graduated from Austin Peay State University where he
enrolled four years ago as an undergraduate research
assistant.
Wallace Coffey
Bristol, TN
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