Pennsylvania gets $1 million to restore bird habitats
By Anthony Hennen | The Center Square
HARRISBURG, PA – Pennsylvania will receive about $1 million for habitat restoration to benefit two at-risk bird species in 2023.
The money is part of a $49 million spending project across 13 states and Guam to manage environmental risk and climate change.
Divvied out as part of the Joint Chiefs’ Landscape Restoration Partnership, the projects “mitigate wildfire risk, improve water quality, restore forest ecosystems, and ultimately contribute to USDA’s efforts to combat climate change,” according to a press release.
In Pennsylvania, the money will be spent to restore habitat for two at-risk species of birds, the ruffed grouse and the cerulean warbler.
The ruffed grouse, Pennsylvania’s state bird since 1931, is related to quail and turkey and is found across much of northern North America in brushy, wooded areas, according to the Pennsylvania Game Commission.
Ruffed grouse walk more than fly and have a high juvenile mortality rate, with few adults living to two years of age. Suburbanization has reduced their habitat and numbers, along with high deer populations, which erode the cover grouse rely on.
The cerulean warbler mostly lives in high treetops and is a species of high concern according to the Pennsylvania Wildlife Action Plan.
“Pennsylvania has a high stewardship responsibility for this species,” the Game Commission noted, and prefer large forests; they are generally found in “ridgetop and mountainside deciduous forests.”
“This project will provide benefits to communities by maintaining healthy, resilient forests through sustainable management while ensuring a consistent supply of ecosystem services,” the project description noted.
“Treatments will benefit the rural 10-county area as well as urban populations within the watershed.”
The focus area covers much of north-central and northwest Pennsylvania, from Venango to Potter counties.
“These Joint Chiefs’ projects are excellent examples of how federal, state, and local agencies can use targeted funding to achieve results that meet producers’ conservation goals, build drought resiliency, and mitigate climate change,” Natural Resources Conservation Service Chief Terry Cosby said in the release.
The funds were authorized from the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law; through the Landscape Restoration Partnership, more than $286 million has been spent over eight years on projects to restore habitat, mitigate the risk of fires, and other conservation projects
