The United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) confirmed the presence of highly pathogenic (HPAI) H5 avian influenza in wild birds in Whatcom County, Washington on Dec. 16.  Two separate virus strains were identified: HPAI H5N2 in northern pintail ducks and HPAI H5N8 in captive Gyrfalcons that were fed hunter-killed wild birds.  Neither virus has been found in commercial poultry anywhere in the United States. There is no immediate public health concern with either of these avian influenza viruses.

Both H5N2 and H5N8 viruses have been found in other parts of the world and have not caused any human infection to date.  While neither virus has been found in commercial poultry, federal authorities emphasize that poultry and wild birds are safe to eat even if they carry the disease if they are properly handled and cooked to a temperature of 165 degrees Fahrenheit.

The Whatcom County finding was reported and identified quickly due to increased surveillance in light of HPAI H5N2 avian influenza outbreaks in poultry affecting commercial poultry farms in British Columbia, Canada.  The northern pintail duck samples were collected by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife following a waterfowl die-off at Wiser Lake, Washington, and were sent to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Wildlife Health Center for diagnostic evaluation and initial avian influenza testing.  USGS identified the samples as presumptive positive for H5 avian influenza and sent them to USDA for confirmation. The gyrfalcon samples were collected after the falconer reported signs of illness in his birds.

Following existing avian influenza response plans, USDA is working with Federal and State partners on additional surveillance and testing of both commercial and wild birds in the nearby area.

Wild birds can be carriers of HPAI viruses without the birds appearing sick.  People should avoid contact with sick/dead poultry or wildlife. If contact occurs, wash your hands with soap and water and change clothing before having any contact with domestic poultry and birds.

Federal officials emphasize that all bird owners should continue practicing good biosecurity. This includes preventing contact between your birds and wild birds, and reporting sick birds or unusual bird deaths, either through your state veterinarian or through USDA’s toll-free number at 1-866-536-7593.

Avian influenza (AI) is caused by influenza type A viruses which are endemic in some wild birds (such as wild ducks and swans) which can infect poultry (such as chickens, turkeys, pheasants, quail, domestic ducks, geese and guinea fowl).

Read the complete joint press release here.

Wildlife Services is a Strategic Partner of The Wildlife Society

Perth Zoo recently released 14 zoo-born numbats (Myrmecobius fasciatus), also called banded anteaters, into Dryandra Woodland in Western Australia as part of an ongoing effort to bolster wild populations of the endangered marsupial that’s found only in Australia. Thus far, Perth Zoo, which has the world’s only breeding center for numbats, in collaboration with Western Australia’s Department of Parks and Wildlife has reared 195 numbats through its breeding program. Those numbats will eventually help establish new populations and support already existing wild populations.

Habitat loss in addition to predation from birds of prey, carpet pythons, foxes, and cats have reduced the number of numbats to fewer than 1,000 individuals. “The breeding program is critical to increasing numbers and getting populations out there. It’s one of the only options that we have,” said Dani Jose, a keeper and numbat researcher at the Perth Zoo. “It has to be done that way or they’d be gone.”

Many zoo breeding programs for threatened or endangered species try to help by maintaining or increasing the size and genetic diversity of populations, according to the American Zoological Association. In fact, the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute in the United States credits captive breeding programs for saving Guam rails (Hypotaenidia owstoni), black-footed ferrets (Mustela nigripes), California condors (Gymnogyps californianus), Przewalski’s horses (Equus ferus), scimitar-horned oryx (Oryx dammah), Partula snails, and Spix’s macaws (Cyanopsitta spixii) among others from extinction.

Occasionally, a breeding program’s ultimate objective will be to release or reintroduce animals into their original habitat or, in some cases, new ranges in the wild. For example, the Toldedo Zoo in 1998 and Detroit Zoo in 2005 began breeding federally endangered Karner Blue Butterflies for release into the wild, while a group of organizations such as U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Ohio State University has worked to reintroduce and establish populations of federally listed freshwater mussel species into the Ohio stream and rivers. Similarly, in 1984, the Smithsonian’s National Zoo began reintroducing zoo-born golden lion tamarins to their natural habitats into Brazil rainforests, and, by 2003, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) downlisted the species from critically endangered to endangered.

The released numbats have been fitted with radio collars, and the Department of Parks and Wildlife will track their movements and monitor females to see if they breed.

Controversy over the management of feral horses and burros has heightened with Wyoming suing the federal government and the Western Governors’ Association issuing a resolution on the topic this month.

Feral horses and burros are managed by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) under the Wild Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act of 1971. The population of feral horses on federal lands continues to increase well above appropriate management levels, along with increasing costs to manage those animals. Lack of funding coupled with a decrease in demand for adopted horses and burros caused the BLM to remove fewer horses and burros from the land in fiscal year 2014 – only 1,863 animals, compared to 4,176 last fiscal year – stirring controversy over their management.

The decreased removal of feral horses has led Wyoming to sue the federal government for failing to properly manage the feral horse population. Wyoming is currently home to 3,771 horses, more than seven times the defined appropriate management level of 475 horses. Wyoming Governor Matt Mead said that the large amount of horses in the state are degrading lands and harming important wildlife habitat.

The Western Governors’ Association is also concerned that the overpopulated feral horses on federal lands are degrading the land, including grazing lands and habitat for greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus). In their resolution, the association states that the federal government’s inability to control feral horse and burro populations is an immediate concern and argues the BLM needs to be appropriated the resources to properly manage feral horses and burros in the western U.S.

The Wildlife Society actively supports the scientific management and removal of excess feral horses and burros from western rangelands. TWS is a founding member of the National Horse & Burro Rangeland Management Coalition and regularly provides testimony to the BLM’s National Horse & Burro Advisory Board.

For more information on the ecological impact of wild horses and burros refer to TWS’s Feral Horses and Burros: Impacts of Invasive Species Fact Sheet and Position Statement.

Sources: Bureau of Land Management (December 11, 2014), E&E News PM (December 8, 2014), Greenwire (December 9, 2014), and Western Governors’ Association (December 6, 2014)

The recovery of lynx, brown bears, and grey wolves in a continent that has seen hundreds of years of development is showing that humans may not have to keep out of the path of predators and their prey.

“What we find is very good news. Carnivores are doing well in an unexpected place — Europe,” said Guillaume Chapron, an associate professor at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and the lead author of a study released today in the journal Science. “We have twice as many (grey) wolves in Europe than in the 48 lower U.S. states.”

Chapron’s study was the result of an “exhaustive and comprehensive” study that gathered “the most up-to-date numbers” from 26 European countries and 76 authors about the distribution and range of grey wolves, brown bears, wolverines, and the Eurasian lynx. Chapron said the study was also one of the first ones to use data from nations like Bosnia, Macedonia, and other places and made use of a wide variety of techniques such as snow-tracking, camera traps, and genetic micro-captures.

The study found that the numbers of carnivores have either remained steady or greatly increased in European countries. In some cases the animals have recovered robust populations that were extinct at some point between 1950 and 1970. For example, the Eurasian lynx has recovered in countries like France, Switzerland, and other places from extinction to numbers sometimes reaching the dozens. Similarly, brown bears — little smaller in Europe than North American grizzlies — and grey wolves also face recovery from extinction or near extinction in a number of countries and huge increases in populations in others. Wolverines have increased to the order of three to five times their populations around 45 to 65 years ago in the monitored countries of Sweden, Norway, and Finland.

The results of the study show that the way humans and predators share land in the European Union, which doesn’t employ the North American system of parceling off land into national parks or wildlife refuges and urban or agricultural domains, has contributed to the successful recovery. “We don’t have this concept of wilderness where the wild beasts are supposed to be out there in the mountains,” Chapron said, adding that the most abundant populations aren’t always in remote wilderness areas, as brown bears are doing well in some more populous parts of Sweden and grey wolves are doing better in some of the farmlands of Spain.

But Chapron cautioned that there are still a number of problems in Europe between human and predator interaction. “Coexistence isn’t a peace and love story,” he said. Brown bears aren’t doing well in the Pyrenees, wolves are faring badly in the Sierra Morena region of Spain and the lynx sits on the edge of extinction in the Balkans. While the coexistence model has helped improve the overall situation, according to Chapron, on a smaller scale there is no silver bullet that will lead to easy recovery of species and conservation. “Things have to be adapted to the local context,” he said. Things that have led to increased predator tolerance include trophy hunting programs and electric fences to stop livestock predation.

According to Chapron, states in the U.S. could make use of these models. “For North America there are questions about what will happen when the wolf comes back in California,” he said. But, through land-sharing programs, predators could make a comeback in some areas.

“If people wanted they could have a lot of wolves.”

The $1 trillion spending bill approved by Congress last week will keep the government running until the end of the Fiscal Year (FY), October 2015. The “Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2015” has been nicknamed the “CRomnibus” because it combines an omnibus appropriations bill for most agencies with a continuing resolution (CR) for the Department of Homeland Security. TWS provided testimony to Congress earlier this year on appropriations for programs within the Departments of the Interior and Agriculture.

The Department of the Interior was appropriated $10.7 billion in the CRomnibus, slightly higher than the $10.5 billion the agency received in FY2014. Programs within the Department of the Interior fared differently, with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the National Wildlife Refuge System being appropriated increased funding from FY2014, with programs like the State and Tribal Wildlife Grants staying at level.

The CRomnibus appropriates $474.2 million for the National Wildlife Refuge System. This is $2 million less than the President’s and TWS’s request of $476.4 million; however, it is a $2 million increase from FY 2014. USGS was appropriated $1.045 billion – less than TWS’s requested $1.1 billion – but still received an increase above FY 2014 levels. The ecosystems program within USGS, which contains programmatic resources for fisheries, wildlife, environments, invasive species and the Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Units received a $4.2 million increase to $157.0 million total.

The State and Tribal Wildlife Grants program was appropriated the same amount of funding as FY 2014. SWG was appropriated $58.695 million, which is equal to TWS’s request and above the President’s request of $50 million. TWS works with Teaming with Wildlife to ensure adequate funding for the State and Tribal Wildlife Grants program.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) was appropriated $871.3 million, a $49 million increase above FY2014 levels. The Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) and the Conservation Stewardship Program were appropriated fewer funds for FY 2015. The 2014 Farm Bill authorizes $1.6 billion in mandatory funding for EQIP, but the CRomnibus only appropriates $1.3 billion. The Conservation Stewardship Fund was appropriated funding for the conservation of 7.7 million acres in the CRomnibus, a 2.3 million acre decrease from the 2014 Farm Bill. The Farm Bill authorizes mandatory funding for programs, but Congress can choose to appropriate fewer funds for specific programs each year.

In addition to the funding appropriations, some policy riders – legislation unrelated to the overall bill – have been attached to the CRomnibus. Read the TWS article, CRomnibus: Conservation Riders to learn more.

Sources: Environment & Energy Daily (December 10, 2014), TRCP Blog (December 10, 2014), and U.S. Government Printing Office (December 9, 2014)

The $1 trillion spending bill approved by Congress last week will keep the government running until October 2015. The “Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2015” has been nicknamed the “CRomnibus” because it combines an omnibus appropriations bill for most agencies with a continuing resolution (CR) for the Department of Homeland Security.

In addition to the funding appropriations, some policy riders – legislation unrelated to the overall bill – have been attached. These riders often place additional restrictions on the use of appropriated funds by federal agencies.

A rider prevents the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) from writing or issuing any Endangered Species Act (ESA) listings for the greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus), the Columbia basin distinct populations segment of greater sage-grouse, the bi-state distinct population segment of greater sage-grouse, and the Gunnison sage-grouse (Centrocercus minimus). The ESA listing of sage-grouse has been controversial because the bird’s habitat often coincides with ranching, mining, and energy development. It is uncertain if this rider simply prevents the FWS from issuing a rule or goes further by prohibiting any action by FWS that advances the decision-making process; such a restriction could delay a final decision substantially. FWS listed the Gunnison sage-grouse as threatened under ESA in November; it is unknown how this rider will impact that previous decision.

A provision on preventing funding for the regulation of lead (Pb) ammunition and fishing tackle under the Toxic Substances Control Act was also included in the appropriations bill. The U.S. banned lead ammunition in the hunting of waterfowl and coots in 1991, but there are no federal regulations on hunting or fishing other wildlife with lead tools. This rider prevents the Environmental Protection Agency from issuing new regulations on lead, upsetting some environmentalists who are concerned about the impacts lead has on wildlife. The Wildlife Society has a Position Statement and a Fact Sheet that address the impacts of lead (Pb) on wildlife.

Although the riders only limit agency actions for one year, some are worried that some of the riders may be carried over into future appropriations bills. Appropriators tend to use the previous year’s bill as a basis for drafting new legislation, allowing policy riders to stay relevant.

Sources: Greenwire (December 10, 2014),

Africa’s iconic giraffe may be in trouble — its population numbers have plummeted by more than 40 percent in the last 15 years, according to estimates from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the Giraffe Conservation Foundation (GCF).

For the past five years, a team of GCF researchers has been looking at historic and current giraffe ranges and assessing giraffe genetics to get a better picture of what giraffe populations look like from country to country and across the continent. “It’s a who’s who of the Big African Blue,” said Julian Fenessy, executive director of the GCF and co-chair of the IUCN Giraffe and Okapi Specialist Group. To date, researchers recognize nine subspecies of giraffe, of which only two are listed endangered on the IUCN red list.

Still, the world’s tallest mammals face many challenges; habitat loss, habitat fragmentation, poaching, and hunting threaten the remaining 80,000 giraffes roaming Africa’s woodlands, deserts, and savannas. Urbanization and the conversion of natural landscapes to agricultural lands not only reduces the amount of habitat available, it can also cut larger areas into smaller fragmented habitats. This can be particularly problematic for giraffes that need large areas to forage and find mates, explained Fenessy.

Giraffes, which can weigh more than 2,000 pounds, are also hunted for their meat. On illegal hunts, poachers will sometimes eat giraffe and other bush meat. And poachers aren’t the only people at the table. Localized tribes and communities have been hunting giraffes for years, according to Fennesy. “For countries in civil unrest, giraffe are large animals and they provide a hell of a lot of food,” he said. Fennesy also noted communities sometimes use giraffe tails for whips and the tough leather for sandals, clothes, and water carriers.

Growing threats have reduced population sizes and pushed some subspecies to near extinction. Fewer than 250 West African giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis peralta) live in the wild, and new census data from the Rothschild Giraffe Project have Rothschild’s giraffe (G. c. rothschildi) populations hovering around 1,100 individuals. In war-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo, conflict has decimated giraffe populations and giraffes are locally extinct in at least seven African countries, according to GCF.

“I can’t image the world without them,” said Zoe Muller, a research associate of the GCF studying the endangered Rothschild’s giraffe subspecies. “When a kid learns his ABC’s he learns G is for Giraffe. If they were to disappear, it would be a travesty, really.”

Historically, Rothschild’s giraffes roamed throughout the Rift Valley in Africa from western Kenya north to Sudan; now, they live on protected reserves or parks in Kenya with one wild population in Uganda. Surrounding cities, towns, farms, and agricultural lands isolate these populations from one another, making it impossible for the populations to interbreed without human interference. “Some of the parks are within five to 50 kilometers of each other, but they are fenced in. Even if the giraffe wanted to migrate, they can’t,” said Muller.

But the future isn’t so grim for all subspecies. In South Africa and Namibia, giraffe populations are on the rise, and in Tanzania “the numbers are strong,” said Fenessy. He credits conservation and management efforts. “We need to place good conservation practices and good monitoring practices so we can make a difference straight away before it’s too late,” said Fenessy.