It takes a village to save a songbird
Posted onSeptember 18, 2024byJane Spero|Eastern Loggerhead Shrike, Eastern Loggerhead Shrike Recovery, Loggerhead Shrike, News and Events
What is the Eastern Loggerhead Shrike Recovery Program? After a precipitous drop in the wild eastern loggerhead shrike population in the 1990s, Environment Canada invited Wildlife Preservation Canada to join the multi-partner recovery effort in 2001. Since then, the wild population size has fluctuated. Studies have shown that although the recovery effort has prevented the species from disappearing from Canada, more work is required to identify and address the causes of the species’ decline. WPC works to prevent the endangered eastern loggerhead shrike from disappearing by building the wild population in Ontario, and studying the species to learn more about the threats they face.
2024 was my first official year as Lead Biologist for the Eastern Loggerhead Shrike Recovery Program, and although this summer was a fast-paced whirlwind of successes and challenges, I wouldn’t have changed it for the world! What stood out as making the 2024 field season special was the engagement with our program partners, an element of shrike recovery that is absolutely invaluable but rarely spotlighted!
Staff from our partner conservation breeding facilities travelled all the way from Pennsylvania and Quebec to join us for a morning of shrike releases on the Napanee Limestone Plain this year: this included staff from the National Aviary in Pittsburgh and Parc Omega in Montebello, Quebec. Both of these facilities are relatively new to the program; this was the first year Parc Omega housed breeding pairs as part of the program’s conservation breeding and release initiative, so it was very exciting to have them witness captive-reared young gaining access to the wide-open world and experiencing life in the wild for the very first time.
Partners at Napanee Release: Veronique Lettre (Parc Omega), Jane Spero (WPC), Vicky Carriere (Parc Omega), Lakesha Smith (WPC), Michael Faix (National Aviary), and Kurt Hundgen (National Aviary).
This release morning was unlike anything I had ever experienced: almost as soon as the release doors were opened, these birds eagerly flew out into the alvar, some of them flying right above our heads as we sat observing from a safe and unobtrusive distance. The birds were diving in and out of the red cedars to the left and right of us, would return to the release enclosure to hop on top of it, then fly up into the sky and into the blue.
Sharing this element of the program was a full circle moment for staff from partner conservation breeding facilities, who do not normally get to see the end result of all their hard work caring for breeding pairs.
The enthusiasm and energy from this field site visit reinvigorated our staff, who are always happy and eager to discuss the program with those who are interested. I am looking forward to involving more partner facilities in the field in years to come, since it really does take a village to save these amazing birds we know and love.
Jane Spero
Lead Biologist – Eastern Loggerhead Shrike Recovery
Jane holds a Master’s degree in animal biosciences from the University of Guelph, where she studied building collision injuries in migratory songbird species. Jane worked as a rehabilitation supervisor, where she was responsible for the care, treatment, and reintroduction of injured and orphaned wildlife, including many species at risk.
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