The elfin has landed: How military aircraft helped a rare butterfly

This story was originally published on our new Medium blog platform

What do frosted elfin butterflies have in common with Blackhawk helicopters?

Both can hover in place, maneuver erratically in flight, and are secured behind locked doors by the New Hampshire Army National Guard.

And if not for the Blackhawks, the elfin there might have remained under the radar.

A male and a female elfin linked up to mate. (Heather Siart)

In 2000, the New Hampshire Army National Guard was preparing to replace its 1970s era UH-1 helicopters (“Hueys”) with modern equipment: nine Blackhawks and a C-12 fixed-wing turboprop plane. But there was a problem. “The existing facility couldn’t support the new aircraft,” explained Arin Mills, conservation specialist for the New Hampshire Army National Guard.

That meant they needed to build a new facility, which demanded more square footage than was available on the state military reservation in Concord.

When the Guard identified a suitable place to build on the corner of the nearby Concord Municipal Airport, they encountered another problem: the parcel contained pine barrens, a rare type of habitat characterized by sandy soil and fire-dependent conifers. Another butterfly of interest, the endangered Karner blue, had been spotted there before.

“As a federal entity, we need to consider impacts to pine-barren species like moths and butterflies,” Mills said.

And so the Guard worked with other federal entities — the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is responsible for endangered species, and the Federal Aviation Administration, which is responsible for airports — as well as with New Hampshire Fish and Game and the city of Concord, to land on a solution. The Guard would build a new aviation facility at the municipal airport, and build 15 acres of new pine-barren habitat on the grounds of the state military reservation. The habitat would support the state endangered frosted elfin butterfly, and the federally endangered Karner blue butterfly.

The Army Aviation Support Facility: the building that initiated the consultation leading to the 15-acre habitat restoration project on the state military reservation. Can you spot the Blackhawk helicopter? (N.H. Army National Guard)

It was no small task. “We tore down some barracks, tore up roads, and reconfigured the entire reservation to get to the 15 acres,” Mills said. “Construction was still happening when I started here in 2004, and it wasn’t complete until 2006.” It’s worth the effort for the National Guard. Moving the butterflies toward recovery may lead to less stringent mitigation requirements in the future.

When the heavy equipment was finally hauled away, they broke out the tree spades and started planting: first pitch pines, later lupine, which frosted elfin and Karner blue need to survive. Then they started annual surveys, watching and waiting for both butterflies to arrive.

New recruits

In the meantime, some butterflies had already moved in. Not to the barrens — to the barracks.

At the same time the Guard was looking for a new place to house helicopters, New Hampshire Fish and Game was looking for a new place to house butterflies.

In the 1990s, surveys showed New Hampshire’s population of Karner blue butterflies was experiencing a long-term decline. Scientists feared that without direct intervention the species could disappear from the Concord area, so the state worked with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to explore the possibility of starting captive-rearing program.

Among the needs was a secure place to raise them.

Cue the Army National Guard. As part of the mitigation plan for the new aircraft facility, the Guard gave New Hampshire Fish and Game funds for 300 acres of habitat restoration, and a 1,600-square-foot space on the state military reservation.

The view in 2003 down the road on the state military reservation that now leads to the captive-rearing facility. (N.H. Army National Guard)

The same view as in the photo above, a decade later. You should notice significantly more pine trees. (N.H. Army National Guard)

“They had an old barracks on the reservation that they were no longer using,” said Heidi Holman, project lead for species programs at New Hampshire Fish and Game. “We put a greenhouse roof on top, and began propagating and releasing butterflies.”

At first the primary emphasis was on Karner blue. To date, more than 30,000 have been released into the wild as a result of New Hampshire’s captive-rearing program. However, the state had also been monitoring frosted elfin periodically since the early 2000s, and had attempted to breed them in captivity as well. “They are very territorial and tricky in captivity,” Holman explained.

But with growing concern about elfin throughout the region, biologists have doubled down. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will be reviewing the butterfly’s status in 2023, leaving a small window to determine whether it may need similar federal protection to the Karner blue butterfly.

“Building off many years of experience, techniques, and protocols that we have used to re-establish a population of Karner blue in Concord, we wanted to use our lab to contribute to frosted elfin recovery as well,” Holman said.

I love the smell of lupine in the morning

A sprig of wild blue lupine, which both frosted elfin and Karner blue butterflies depend upon to survive. (Heather Siart)

Now with funding from the Service’s Wildlife and Sport Fish Restoration Program, New Hampshire is helping to fill in some of the blanks about elfin.

“Wing measurements, larval measurements, sexing, what exactly they are eating — our main focus is collecting life history information that hasn’t been collected before,” explained Heather Siart, who was hired by Fish and Game with WSFR funding to spearhead the elfin reconnaissance effort.

While they still haven’t figured out how to get elfin to mate in captivity, they have figured out how to get them to lay eggs. “We use a red Solo cup with one cotton ball soaked with honey, one soaked with nectar, and a sprig of lupine, which spurs them to lay,” Siart said.

From just 15 females collected this spring, they got more than 1,000 eggs, 80 percent of which hatched, 50 percent of which they released back into the wild. “That’s a good hatch rate, and now we have well over 500 that we will overwinter until they emerge in the spring,” Holman said.

A few good elfin

The elfin raised on the military reservation are likely to find good homes nearby, as are their offspring. Last May, more than 70 elfin were captured and marked in a single day at the Concord airport, a high for the species at this site.

More than a record, it’s an indication; the habitat restoration work is paying off. It’s also catching on. Since 2001, the partnership between the state, the Guard, the Service, the FAA, and the city, has expanded to include the neighboring industrial gas company, Praxair, Inc., which has restored habitat and planted lupine on their land too.

A frosted elfin caterpillar on a lupine pod in front of the Joint Force Headquarters on the state military reservation. (N.H. Army National Guard)

Someday, elfin will no longer need to be sheltered in the barracks, but they might be able to live right in its footprint. “It’s standing in the middle of our habitat area,” Mills explained. “When the facility is no longer needed, we’ll tear it down.”

In the meantime, the butterflies are well protected. You need security clearance just to get onto the reservation.

Not to mention elfins’ built-in security system. Just like Blackhawk helicopters, they are camouflaged to blend into their surroundings.

“For a long time, I think frosted elfin were overlooked,” Mills said. “Now you can’t go out on the reservation on any day during flight period and not see one.”

Thanks to coordination and collaboration with public and private partners, more than 185 species in the eastern United States have recovered, been downlisted, or did not need listing under the Endangered Species Act. The effort to conserve at-risk wildlife and recover listed species is led by the Service and state wildlife agencies in partnership with other organizations. Our use of conservation incentives and flexibilities to protect wildlife, reduce regulations and keep working lands working has drawn bipartisan support from Congress.

A new reality for plovers on the Jersey Shore

This story was originally published on our new Medium blog platform

This year’s severe storms underscore the power of nature and the vulnerability of our coasts. While nature can destroy, it can also defend. Supported by federal funding for Hurricane Sandy recovery, we’re working with partners to restore and strengthen natural systems that provide not only habitat for wildlife, but also protection against rising seas and storm surge. This is one in a series of stories highlighting results of our ongoing efforts to build a stronger coast.

On October 29, 2012, Hurricane Sandy plowed ashore near Atlantic City, N.J., with sustained winds of 75 miles per hour. In its wake, state officials declared it the most destructive natural disaster in the history of New Jersey. It changed communities dramatically.

There were flooded roads, fallen power lines, and 346,000 damaged homes.

Storm damage along the New Jersey coast after Hurricane Sandy. (USGS)

Natural features of the coastline underwent significant changes too, but in some cases, those changes presented new conservation opportunities that could protect people and wildlife in the face of future storms.

“We were able to identify places where piping plover habitat had been enhanced by the storm,” explained Todd Pover, a senior biologist for the Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey who has been involved in monitoring the federally threatened shorebird for 25 years. Places like Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge, where the storm erased the dunes in a three-quarter mile stretch of beach, creating an open expanse from ocean to bay.

Senior biologist for the Conserve Wildlife Foundation of New Jersey Todd Pover releases a piping plover, a species he has helped monitor for 25 years. (Jim Verhagen)

“It’s what we refer to as an overwash fan,” Pover said. “The most desirable habitat for plover.”

It was a good sign for the future of these birds in New Jersey. Although the number of nesting pairs along the Atlantic coast has nearly doubled since piping plover was placed on the Endangered Species List in 1986 — the species has since been downlisted from from endangered to threatened — New Jersey’s breeding population has failed to launch by comparison. There were 94 nesting pairs in the state in 1986. In 2017, there were 105.

Piping plover with a chick on sandy beach. (USFWS)

More nesting habitat meant the potential for more nesting pairs.

It was also a good sign for the New Jersey shore. Those overwash fans where piping plover like to nest are the product of wind and wave action continually reshaping the coastline, sometimes dramatically as in Sandy. Allowing coastal processes to play out naturally in areas like these helps absorb impacts of future storms.

“In a sense, piping plover represents coastal resilience,” explained Brooke Maslo, assistant professor of ecology at Rutgers University.

But although the creation of habitat gave biologists a reason for hope in the wake of this storm, it also gave them a reason to plan ahead next time. Agencies that typically respond to natural disasters, like the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, follow standard operating procedures — a sort of playbook that identifies roles, responsibilities, and actions to make sure all the bases are covered.

Assistant professor of ecology at Rutgers University Brooke Maslo focuses on developing science to support habitat for beach-nesting shorebirds, including piping plover, black skimmer, and American oystercatcher, the bird in her hands in this photo.

“There wasn’t a similar protocol for biological conservation,” Maslo said. If there was a way to quickly assess and communicate benefits for endangered species, they could incorporate that into the response process too.

Now, thanks to collaboration between Rutgers and CWF New Jersey, there is.

With support from U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Hurricane Sandy resilience funding, the partners have developed a standard assessment protocol for identifying opportunities to protect functional beach habitat after big storms based on what they learned from the last one.

They started by comparing nesting habitat for four beach-nesting species — piping plover, American oystercatcher, black skimmer, and least tern — before and after Sandy.

An example of the modeling results showing suitable habitat for American oystercatcher, black skimmer, least terns, and piping plover in Avalon and Stone Harbor, N.J. (Maslo et al. 2016)

“Where did habitat persist? Where was it lost? Where was it newly created? We wanted to be able to quantify habitat changes that occurred as a result of the storm, and to quantify the new habitat areas that could be prioritized for conservation,” Maslo said.

The results have already proven useful as a screening tool when working with communities to develop beach management plans — mandatory for towns that receive federal funding to protect piping plover.

“We suggest what could be the most suitable habitat based on the results, and they give us feedback about what they know to be true about that site on the ground,” Pover said.

It also helps natural resource managers plan for constant change. “The beach will change, so creating set-aside areas interspersed throughout the state gives the birds someplace else to go when it does,” Pover said.

A map showing habitat suitability for piping plover at the Holgate unit of Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge after Hurricane Sandy. Any area in color in the above image is considered “suitable”, with warmer colors indicating higher suitability. (Maslo)

It’s like habitat insurance for plover, and it’s clear they will make the most of their safety net. Although most of the new habitat created by Hurricane Sandy was stabilized to pre-storm conditions, resource managers were able to let nature take its course at the site at Forsythe — a wilderness area where no human infrastructure was at stake.

And?

“In the years after Sandy, we went from 12 to 25 pairs at that site,” Pover said. With a secure place to nest, the birds became more productive, with twice as many fledglings as a typical pair in New Jersey.

“Forsythe is a poster child for what could happen if we protect these sites,” he said.

Biologists now know what to look for in potential nesting sites. With the protocol, resource managers, landowners, and town officials can look for these opportunities in their own communities as well.

And because it was developed with input from agencies like NOAA and FEMA that are on the front lines after a natural disaster, the protocol will help factor benefits for wildlife into the existing response process. That will benefit people too. Wildlife tend to good indicators of threats to communities, or as in New Jersey, a sign that they have reason to hope.

Haunted haven for bats

This story was originally published on our new Medium blog platform

When the world turns orange and red and the cold winds begin to howl, an ominous chill ushers in the Halloween season.

What is it about October that gets us just a little more spooked?

Is it the devilish expression that glows from the jack-o’-lanterns at dusk? Or the way that a bump in the night sounds more like a poltergeist than a raccoon getting into the trash?

As the daylight hours become shorter, and the cloak of night grows, I can’t help but wonder:

What’s really lurking in the dark?

My superstitious nature makes me think that it could be ghosts. The naturalist in me thinks it’s probably bats.

At historic Fort Delaware, it’s both.

When water is constantly dripping, icicles form in the tunnels during the winter. Good thing ghosts don’t get cold. Credit: DE Division of Fish & Wildlife

When water is constantly dripping, icicles form in the tunnels during the winter. Good thing ghosts don’t get cold. Credit: DE Division of Fish & Wildlife

Constructed in 1859, Fort Delaware has been called one of the most haunted places in the world.

Located outside of Wilmington, in the middle of the Delaware River, it once housed as many as 12,595 Confederate prisoners of war, of whom about 2,500 spent their final days imprisoned here.

Popular with paranormal enthusiasts, strange noises and mysterious apparitions color this historic site. Visitors have claimed to hear the soldiers’ voices and footsteps sneaking through the halls.

Here, bats and ghosts live side by side, hiding in the damp, dark nooks and crannies that this Civil War era former prison camp offers them as shelter.

Bats wedge in between bricks in Fort Delaware’s walls. Credit: DE Division of Fish & Wildlife

However, something else spooky but far more sinister is also lurking at Fort Delaware — white-nose syndrome.

White-nose syndrome is a disease that affects hibernating bats and is caused by a fungus, Pseudogymnoascus destructans, or Pd for short. Sometimes Pdlooks like a white fuzz on bats’ faces, which is how the disease got its name. The fungus grows in cold, dark and damp places and attacks bats while they’re hibernating. As it grows, Pd causes changes in bats that makes them become more active than usual and burn up fat they need to survive the winter.

White-nose syndrome has killed millions of bats throughout the northeast and beyond since 2007, making any place that continues to house bats, including Fort Delaware, critical to the fight against WNS.

Biologists from Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control’s Division of Fish & Wildlife are hard at work to prevent the spread of WNS and study the bats that hibernate at Fort Delaware every winter.

Northern Long-eared bat held by a state biologist during surveys at the fort. Credit: DE Division of Fish & Wildlife

A little brown bat nestles into a secluded corner. Credit: DE Division of Fish & Wildlife

Supported by federal grant funding from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, biologists are persevering to protect bats through research and education.

Combining natural and American history, the Division of Fish & Wildlife has collaborated with DNREC’s Division of Parks & Recreation to provide Fort Delaware State Park visitors with a unique experience that covers both bat conservation and the history of the fort.

“Visitors for the ghost tours are well aware of the bats lurking in dark places and I imagine it adds to their spooky experience,” said Holly Niederriter, Delaware Division of Fish & Wildlife biologist.

This team has also worked to design and implement protocols to prevent the spread of WNS from Fort Delaware.

Visitors to Fort Delaware wear foot coverings during their tours to prevent the spread of WNS. Credit: DE Division of Fish & Wildlife

Educational signs on site discuss bat conservation. Credit: U.S. Fish & Wildlife

Their research has informed the timing of seasonal ghost tours that conclude in late October to prevent disturbance to hibernating bats.

“The bat program at the fort has reached thousands of people to teach them about the impacts of WNS, the importance of bats and what they can do to help bats,” said Niederriter. “Far beyond the boundaries of the Fort — throughout the state — the federal grants have funded critical surveys, monitoring and protection efforts.”

A Haunting in Connecticut

Further north, another former prison with a storied past has become a haven for bats.

Prisoners of the oldest surviving state prison in the nation spent their nights underground in the tunnels of the first operating copper mine in the North American colonies.

When it was still an operating prison, more than 800 prisoners were incarcerated over a period of 54 years, starting in 1773 and ending in 1827, when the state decided it was costly and inhumane.

Water dripped constantly from the surrounding rock and prisoners wrote that “armies of fleas, lice, and bedbugs covered every inch of the floor,” which itself was covered in “five inches of slippery, stinking filth.”

A view from where former prisoners spent their days and nights, surrounded by darkness. Credit: CT DEEP

A view from where former prisoners spent their days and nights, surrounded by darkness. Credit: CT DEEP

Nowadays, bats are the only inhabitants of Old New-Gate Prison (potential ghostly roommates aside).

Little brown, tri-colored and northern long-eared bats have all used the copper mine to hibernate during the winter months.

In recent years, less than a dozen bats over-winter in the prison. Connecticut was hit hard by WNS and these low numbers are consistent throughout the state.

“The counts at all of our sites are small since WNS arrived,” said Jenny Dickson, wildlife biologist with Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. “For us, any number of bats still found in hibernacula is good news.”

Recently, grant funding from the Service was used to improve a gate in place at the mine to protect the bats from being disturbed while they are hibernating. The existing gate at the site was updated to allow bats to enter the mine more easily, and more cool air to flow in as well.

Every time a bat is woken up during hibernation it has the potential to burn as much as ten days worth of stored body fat. When that happens multiple times over the winter, the chances of surviving until spring are greatly reduced.

“Not only does the new design allow bats to enter and exit the mine more easily, it also helps protect an important historic site,” Dickson said.

Now open as a museum and preserved as a national landmark, tours and events are hosted for curious visitors. CT DEEP and the Department of Economic and Community Development, are strong advocates for their resident bats and work together to bring programs about bat conservation to the public.

On bat appreciation day, visitors to Old New-gate learn about bats and why they are important. Credit: CT DEEP

On bat appreciation day, visitors to Old New-gate learn about bats and why they are important. Credit: CT DEEP

“This partnership has allowed many people, who may not know much about bats or their current battle with white-nose syndrome, to learn how important they are to our everyday life and how they can help our conservation efforts,” Dickson added.

These projects were supported by federal grant funding from the White-nose Syndrome Grant program, State Wildlife Grant program, and the Wildlife Restoration Grant Program provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Wildlife and Sport Fish Restoration Program. These programs help to support important conservation initiatives throughout the Northeast region.