...are always a problem. Starlings, English Sparrows, Nutria, Cudzu, Phragmites.....

Now the British want to kill invasive Grey Squirlls.

Click to follow link...

I got my eardrums blistered a few times over there from locals cussing about invasive Canadian Geese.

The lake at Buckingham Palace was full of them, and the surrounding shoreline looked like it had snowed.

Sometimes good ideas aren't so good....

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...are always a problem. Starlings, English Sparrows, Nutria, Cudzu, Phragmites.....

Now the British want to kill invasive Grey Squirlls.

Click to follow link...

I got my eardrums blistered a few times over there from locals cussing about invasive Canadian Geese.

The lake at Buckingham Palace was full of them, and the surrounding shoreline looked like it had snowed.

Sometimes good ideas aren't so good....

We have a company up here called "The Geese Police"
Their motto on their trucks is creative. It reads: "We get the flock outta here."

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When I was Installation Environmental Program Manager for Naval Station Norfolk, we had a depredation liscense from VAFWS to kill 150 geese a year between NSN and NAS Oceana. In fact we'd hire VAFWS to preform the actual roundup and disposal. Geese went to a licensed processor in Richmond, and ended up in a food bank.

Spent a lot of time during the Spring chasing geese around the Golf Course and ponds in my truck to discourage nesting. Soon as the first egg hit the nest, they were off limits. Tried to get Installation Legal to establish a goose season that conformed to VA game laws. They wouldn't do it. Installation is in Norfolk, which doesn't have open season. Would civilians be allowed to bring guns on the installation to participate? Do we really want folks shooting shotguns near Navy aircraft? Just too hard. Those geese just didn't recognize aircraft as a potential hazard. Had to dispatch trucks from the tower to chase them off.

Here's a photo of some bewildered, injured birds sitting on Runway 5 at Elmendorf AFB. Poor things! What you don't see In the opposite direction, is the burning wreckage of an E-3 AWACS aircraft, with 24 dead aboard.

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Coyotes (or fox) would probably help with the goose issue - but create some others of their own. Since there are so many coyotes can they be considered invasive or are they just reclaiming their prior territory? Fox?

Rob, Give me the skinny on this evasive business so I understand. Are they only invasive if they were never native and accidentally, or otherwise, introduced from another ecosystem?

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Coyotes (or fox) would probably help with the goose issue - but create some others of their own. Since there are so many coyotes can they be considered invasive or are they just reclaiming their prior territory? Fox?

Rob, Give me the skinny on this evasive business so I understand. Are they only invasive if they were never native and accidentally, or otherwise, introduced from another ecosystem?

We had a deal with VAFWS that they would give us all the grey foxes and Oceana all the red foxes they picked up in Tidewater for release on our installations. You've never heard squawking until you've heard a fox get a goose by its neck! The foxes had sense enough to stay off the runways.

Some species like the nutria were introduced from South America for trapping. They're destroying the levees at Mackeys Island NWRA.

Something like wolves or coyotes that may have at one time lived here? Don't know, but the game people don't have problems with you shooting coyotes . They weren't introduced, they migrated.

Even piping plover weren't local to the area until 20-30 years ago. A few straggled in, and the birders have gone berserk making them feel welcome.

The house finches aren't local either. They're native to California. Some pet store owner on Long Island was selling them as Hollywood Finches before WWII. When he found out that was illegal, he released them. They quickly spread along the east coast, and eventually joined up with the western population, and now cover the US. Probably not considered invasive.

The Eurasian Collared Dove was accidently introduced to the Bahamas in the '70's. A hurricaine blew them into FL in the early '80's. Now they cover the continental US, except parts of New England. Definitely invasive. Some states have no limit on them. You have to study their flight pattern vs the mourning dove, or you're going over your limit.

Kill starling and English sparrows to your hearts delight. They're not protected in any fashion.

Kudzu was someone's good idea to stabilize road embankments in Georga.

Lots of interesting stories, most of them disaster stories..... Google the topic. You'll be amazed.

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Our Lab whacked a nutria on the bulkhead in Frisco over the Christmas break. You would of thought she was king of the world as she paraded around with her trophy.

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Coordinated the Day of Service for where I went to school for a couple of years. It was at a local Audubon site. Pulled garlic mustard for a while.

harvardforest.fas.harvard...

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... Nutria ...

Worked for a company that had a plant in, I think, Texarkana. Nutria were a problem. A colleague told me the plant hired someone with a .22; he was paid based on the number of tails he had nailed to a board.

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... Nutria ...

Worked for a company that had a plant in, I think, Texarkana. Nutria were a problem. A colleague told me the plant hired someone with a .22; he was paid based on the number of tails he had nailed to a board.

Guam had a problem like that with some brown tree snake that ate about every bird on the island. The military would drop dead mice stuffed with tylenol ( it is lethal to snakes) over the military bases I heard they were expanding the program to the entire island.

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Wanted: Dead or Dead

The NPS has my blessing to kill as many as they can. They have no place in our ecosystem. I wonder if PETA would approve of us wearing Nutria coats? Naaa.....

Click to follow link...

Click to follow link...

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Ya know, I think my mom did have a nutria fur coat! Never put it together till now.

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That's why the trappers imported them. Fast growing and easy to trap.. Things got a little out of hand.

Another fact. Tumble Weed. You see it in every western. But if the western is placed before the 1870's , it's historically inaccurate.

Tumble weed is Russian Thistle. Some immigrants brought over flax seeds with a few thistle seeds accidently mixed in. Didn't take long for it to spread throughout the West. Now you know.

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"Even piping plover weren't local to the area until 20-30 years ago. A few straggled in, and the birders have gone berserk making them feel welcome."

Where are you referring too?

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The Outer Banks.

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"Even piping plover weren't local to the area until 20-30 years ago. A few straggled in, and the birders have gone berserk making them feel welcome."

Where are you referring too?

I don't pretend to speak for others, but my OPINION is that the first documented research of PIPL (Great Lakes and East Coast) is generally attributed to John Loegering, University of Minnesota, in 1992. It is cited extensively by NPS, USF&WS and ACE.

Doesn't mean that was the first PIPL appearance, but perhaps the first time that someone took enough interest to do the research. I think Audubon wrote of harvesting PIPL and did works with their plumage, but I have found no documentation of that, nor that it may have occurred in the East Coast range (more likely Great Lakes).

I believe it is accurate to say, with the migratory patterns, VERY limited nesting, poor reproductive success, high natural predation (esp. ghost crabs predation), and being at the extreme end of their range, that PIPL are invasive or, at least, poorly suited and poorly adaptive to CAHA and CALO.

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If you look at the older bird books, there's a gap between the northern summer range, and the southern range.

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It is simple, piping plovers are not accidental or invasive species on the OBX. I am not even going to post a link, it is just to ridiculous. Piping plovers are birds at the southern end of their breeding range. 

Do you guys make this stuff up because it suits your political ideology and or personal recreational activities?. There is not an ornithologist in the world that would agree with you

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It is simple, piping plovers are not accidental or invasive species on the OBX. I am not even going to post a link, it is just to ridiculous. Piping plovers are birds at the southern end of their breeding range. 

You guys make this stuff up because it suits your political ideology and or personal recreational activities. There is not an ornithologist in the world that would agree with you

WOW. So much for civil discussion. I stand by and for my opinions and thoughts.

I did not bring up politics or the narrow realm of ornithology. My position is and always has been advocating a better access experience for ALL on our Public Lands while maintaining reasonable protection of the flora and fauna. I offered you an olive branch in another thread, respecting your opinions and requests for information, and this is your response?!

Thank you for your "learned" opinion. Make sure you adhere to your dogma and dismiss differing opinions. In the meantime, I will try to understand both sides of an issue before summarily dismissing differing views.

Be well.

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"You guys make this stuff up because it suits your political ideology and or personal recreational activities. There is not an ornithologist in the world that would agree with you."

Here we go again, lmao!!!

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No, southern breeding range, doesn't meet the definition of an invasive species. I assume questions are ok for discusion and civil discourse. ( )

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Agreed. A native species expanding its range is not technically invasive. Look at old ornithology texts and you will see a gap between the Northern Breeding Range and the Summer Range. the Outer Banks was in that gap. The ranges expanded. Ranges are always expanding or contracting. No problem.

But there is a reason these areas are marginal. A few birds have moved in. The NPS is making Herculean efforts to make them feel at home, and to breed. It's not working. Look at the statistics.

OTOH, look at how some invasive species have literally swept across the country in less than a generation. They like the environment and they lack natural predators. They do better than native species, and are changing the ecosystem by squeezing native species out. Good? Not usually.

Plovers are here. Are they thriving despite massive intervention? No. Are they in danger of extinction? No. Let's let nature take its course and see what happens. We've seen in other states that they coexist with human activity. Why not here?

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No, southern breeding range, doesn't meet the definition of an invasive species. I assume questions are ok for discusion and civil discourse. ( )

Seems fair.
Heaven knows I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed when it comes to ornithology

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"But there is a reason these areas are marginal. A few birds have moved in. The NPS is making Herculean efforts to make them feel at home, and to breed. It's not working. Look at the statistics."

I'll agree with Hatteras in that I don't have any training in ornithology. I don't think anyone knows if a few birds "moved in" or if the birds were always spread out (they are solitary nesters) in habitat that was considered a primative wilderness less than a 100 years ago and PP had just not been recorded. Which s not the same as what Rob is suggesting.

One of the goals of this Park, " the said area shall be permanently reserved as a primitive wilderness and no development of the project or plan for the convenience of visitors shall be undertaken which would be incompatible with the preservation of the unique flora and fauna or the physiographic conditions now prevailing in this area."

Is the Park spending to many resources on piping plovers? a fair question.

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Yes, but that's not exactly how it is. CHNSRA was established as a RECREATIONAL AREA. Under the establishing legislation, recreation was given priority over resource conservation. NPS has ignored this and given priority to birds. They can't do that. Under the Redwood Ammendment, the use of a Park can only be modified by Congress, and that hasn't happened. I'm for reasonable protection, but closing large stretches of beach because the PPs have exhibited mating behavior doesn't cut it. PINWR can close anything they want. That's in their charter. Not so with CHNSRA.

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" CHNSRA was established as a RECREATIONAL AREA. Under the establishing legislation, recreation was given priority over resource conservation. NPS has ignored this and given priority"

No where does it say that or imply that. The Organic Act has consistently been upheld by the courts that resource is always given priority over recreation. The General Authority Act say all units in the NPS will be treated the same with respect to the Organic Act.

The only reason the words , "and recreation area" were amended and added was so CHNS ould allow waterfowl hunting in the Park at that time.


CHNS EL
"Except for certain portions of the area, deemed to be especially adaptable for recreational uses, particularly swimming, boating, sailing, fishing, and other recreational activities of similar nature, which shall be developed for such uses as needed, the said area shall be permanently reserved as a primitive wilderness and no development of the project or plan for the convenience of visitors shall be undertaken which would be incompatible with the preservation of the unique flora and fauna or the physiographic conditions now prevailing in this area."

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