| Managing a Boreal Owl Population in B.C. |
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| Investigators |
| Stephen Bennett and Peter Corbett, Mirkwood Ecological Consultants Ltd.
Associates/Partners:
Stewart Clow, Ministry of Forests, Arrow Forest District, BCDr.
Gregory Hayward, Department of Zoology and Physiology, University of Wyoming
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What is the Issue? |
| LANDSCAPE LEVEL FOREST HABITAT REQUIREMENTS OF BOREAL OWLS |
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Significant populations of boreal owls have only recently been discovered in the southeastern BC. Little is known regarding their habitat requirements and their response to habitat alterations. Global Forest is supporting ongoing research to understand these interactions. The Ministry of Forests, Arrow Forest District (MOF) and Innovative Forest Partnership Agreement (IFPA) have also been supporting local owl research. Global Forests has been working since 1999 to expand ongoing research and help produce guidelines to assist forest managers in protecting boreal owl populations in southeastern BC.
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What is our goal? |
| DETERMINING HABITAT REQUIREMENTS OF A MAJOR BIRD OF PREY.
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| Managing a recently discovered Boreal Owl population in the Kootenay Region of British Columbia. |
Where we currently stand. |
| The MOF and local volunteers discovered the presence of a significant population of boreal owls in the Arrow Forest District between 1995 and 1999. In 1999, the MOF and Global Forests expanded the ongoing volunteer research with the establishment of 13 owl nest boxes and expanded boreal surveys to non-roaded portions of the Arrow Forest District. Unfortunately, 1999 coincided with a year of heavy, continuous snowfall, resulting in poor call/playback response and no use of nest boxes. Boreal owl data from 1995-1999 was also summarized with funding provided by MOF. During the 2000 survey year, more surveys were conducted and nest boxes were monitored. Members of the Global Forest research group also participated in an extensive owl survey of three landscape units in the Arrow Forest District funded by the IFPA. Many new boreal owl locations were discovered during the IFPA work. One nest box was used by boreal owls and three boreal owls were successfully fledged in 2000. Blood samples were collected from the young and submitted to the University of Wyoming for analysis. In 2001, boreal owls were documented in another four new drainages in the Arrow Forest District as a result of Global Forests ongoing research and four more nest boxes were erected. By the end of 2001 we hope to have all boreal owl locations collected to date digitized, and begin a spatial analysis of the distribution of boreal owls in the Arrow Forest District. Our plans for the 2002 survey season are to test hypotheses about boreal owl distribution generated from the spatial analysis and continue monitoring nest boxes and collecting blood samples to learn more about the metapopulation status of boreal owls in southeastern BC. |
You can help this project - find out how. |
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