Celebrating a Growing Refuge System

Celebrating a Growing Refuge System

The number of national wildlife refuges in the United States increased to 568 with the establishment of Green River National Wildlife Refuge in Kentucky. A ceremony was held in Henderson, KY to celebrate the 10-acre easement that is the beginning of a Conservation Partnership Area with a planning target to purchase or protect 24,000 acres. This is the second national wildlife refuge in Kentucky and will be located near the confluence of the Green River and the Ohio River in Henderson County, KY.

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Let's Celebrate Polar Bear Week By Protecting Polar Bears & Their Habitat

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Let's Celebrate Polar Bear Week By Protecting Polar Bears & Their Habitat

This week is Polar Bear Week - a great way to celebrate this iconic, magnificent, and unfortunately threatened species. Prior to my current job as the President of the National Wildlife Refuge Association, I served as the Alaska Regional Director for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. As part of that job, I was appointed by both Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama as the United States Polar Bear Commissioner.

Supplemental Feeding Imposes Risk To Wildlife At National Elk Refuge

Supplemental Feeding Imposes Risk To Wildlife At National Elk Refuge

The USFWS has recently opened up a public comment period for its National Elk Refuge (“NER”) Draft Bison and Elk Management Step-down Plan (“SDP”) and associated Draft Environmental Assessment (“EA”). Yesterday, The National Wildlife Refuge Association submitted their concerns with the SDP along with Defenders of Wildlife, the Sierra Club, and Earth Justice.

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NWRA Heads to Seattle and Olympia in Washington

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NWRA Heads to Seattle and Olympia in Washington

The National Wildlife Refuge Association’s staff and board members recently attended their biannual board meeting in Olympia, Washington and a fundraising event in Seattle, Washington. They ended the trip with a visit with USFWS staff at Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge. It was a very successful and productive trip!

Desert National Wildlife Refuge Supporters Storm Capitol Hill Asking For Protections

Desert National Wildlife Refuge Supporters Storm Capitol Hill Asking For Protections

Last week, supporters of the Desert National Wildlife Refuge in southern Nevada stormed Capitol Hill to ask lawmakers to continue the existing protections of this iconic refuge. The Air Force is proposing to expand their footprint into 1.1 million acres of the Refuge, essentially removing these acres from the Refuge System, totaling 5% of all refuge lands in the lower 48 states. 

Combating Kudzu With An Unlikely Management Technique

Despite woeful budgets, hundreds of staff vacancies, and the repeated weakening of many environmental safeguards, the work of the National Wildlife Refuge System goes on! 

The Kudzu Team by Joe McCauley

The Kudzu Team by Joe McCauley

On a recent September day, I joined Refuge System staff and one other volunteer, who happens to be my son, to combat kudzu at the Rappahannock River Valley National Wildlife Refuge in Virginia.  Kudzu is a highly invasive plant that if left unchecked will smother anything and everything in its path, and quickly.  Over the past three years, the Refuge has employed the full arsenal of control methods to combat this species.  These include mowing, hand cutting, herbicide application, prescribed burning, and, wait for it, goats! Turns out that goats love kudzu.  This should come as no surprise since one of the early promotions for this introduced plant was as cattle fodder.  It was also promoted by the Federal government to control erosion.  If only we knew then what we know now about the potentially harmful effects of introducing non-native species.  But what’s done is done, and Refuge staff continue to face the challenge head on, taking all the help they can get from volunteers and interns.

The spread of invasive species is but one of the challenges facing the Refuge System today and into the future.  This is no time to shrink from our responsibilities to protect our planet and our life-sustaining natural resources. 

The National Wildlife Refuge System is up for it, the National Wildlife Refuge Association is up for it, are you up for it?

Written by the Refuge Association’s own Joe McCauley, Regional Representative, Northeast Region

Photo: Kudzu at the Hutchinson Unit of Rappahannock River Valley National Wildlife Refuge by Joe McCauley

Sunset At The Refuge

Sunset At The Refuge

We all know that our National Wildlife Refuge system provides some of the finest opportunities for viewing wildlife and the plants and other biodiversity that make up their habitats, but I would argue that it can be a serious mistake to head home prematurely after a day of hunting, birdwatching, or photographing, as refuges also provide some of the best sunset watching opportunities anywhere.

Was There Storm Damage From Hurricane Dorian?

Was There Storm Damage From Hurricane Dorian?

This is a question that was asked by many supporters of the National Wildlife Refuge System. We too wanted to know the answer. We checked in with national wildlife refuges along the Atlantic coast from Florida to North Carolina and the answer was similar. Refuges were spared the brunt of this storm and damage was minimal.