The Gnatcatcher Newsletter of Juniata Valley Audubon

―――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――― Vol. XLV, No. 1 — January / February 2013 ――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――

Jacks Mountain threatened by industrial wind development

B Y L A U R A J A C K S O N

t’s a beautiful fall day — bright blue October stone stairway is now a popular hiking trail called sky, colorful trees, warming breeze. My hus- “The Thousand Steps.” It actually has more than band, Mike, and I have most of the day to 1000 steps made of the hard sandstone carved Iexplore central . We plan to visit a from the mountain. Now, hikers climb the steps hawkwatch on Jacks Mountain, in Mifflin County. to enjoy the view, while Allegheny woodrats Appropriately enough, the hawkwatch is called (Neotoma magister), instead of quarry workers, Jacks Mountain Hawkwatch. Ron Singer, the main scramble over the extensive rock outcroppings. counter and coordinator, has assured us that it is This part of Jacks Mountain has been designated easy to find and that he will be there to meet us, as an Important Mammal Area, since the area all the while counting migrating raptors. Since provides ideal habitat for the Pennsylvania threat- we’re driving from Bedford County, we head ened woodrats. northeast into the middle of Pennsylvania’s Ridge As we drive northeast along the base of the and Valley Region. We see the most southern mountain, we can see why the Western Pennsyl- slopes of Jacks Mountain when we get to Three vania Conservancy stated, “The length of Jacks Springs, in Huntingdon County. From there we Mountain in Mifflin County is one of the largest head north to Jacks Narrows, a formed blocks of contiguous forest in the county.” Mile by the , bisecting Jacks Mountain and after mile of forested slopes rise to our west, in- forming an important east-to-west pathway for terspersed with many south-facing talus slopes — early settlers, before today’s railroads and high- jumbles of rock that create an excellent habitat for ways were built. The towns of Mapleton and the timber rattlesnake (Crotalus horridus). Since Mount Union were settled at the western and there are many sightings of timber rattlesnakes on eastern ends of the water gap, respectively. These Jacks Mountain, it is important that the habitat be towns have an industrial heritage, thanks in part protected from development. Unfortunately, very to the treasures on the slopes of Jacks Narrows. little research has been done to document the The treasures on Jacks Mountain were the populations and to identify den sites. Timber rat- hard ganister sandstone highly prized for brick tlesnakes are currently listed as a candidate species making in the early 1900s. A narrow-gauge railway by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, was used to haul the rock down the steep moun- which means they could be listed as threatened or tainside near Mount Union. Quarry workers did endangered in the future. not ride the railcars to work, but actually con- Just south of McVeytown, we turn west onto structed a stone stairway up the mountain to Jacks Mountain Road. This winding road crests shorten the long ascent to the quarry. the summit and then heads down the mountain Thousands of people were employed in the toward Belleville, a small town in Kishacoquillas ganister industry in the early 1900s, but it was Valley (locally known as “Big Valley”). There are short-lived and ended in the early 1950s. The [ Continued on page 3 ] 2 The Gnatcatcher Jan/Feb 2013

The Gnatcatcher Message from the VOL. XLV, NO. 1 — JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2013 Conservation Committee Chair

Published bimonthly (except for July and August) as a benefit for members of the… Let wind credit expire… JUNIATA VALLEY AUDUBON SOCIETY The U.S. House and Senate should not extend Charlie Hoyer, Editor the wind production tax credit (PTC) that has P.O. Box 42 subsidized the wind industry since 1992. This tax Tyrone, PA 16686-0042 expenditure was due to expire at the end of this The Juniata Valley Audubon Society (JVAS) is a chapter of the year, and it should be allowed to do so, perma- National Audubon Society and is dedicated to the con- servation and restoration of natural ecosystems, focusing on nently. birds, other wildlife, and their habitats for the benefit of humanity and the Earth's biological diversity. Juniata Valley Renewing the PTC would cost billions of dol- Audubon accomplishes its mission through advocacy, science, lars that our nation simply cannot afford. land stewardship, and education — working directly with Audubon Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania state office of the National Audubon Society. It has been evident for years that government support for wind energy development is very The JVAS is a tax-exempt, not-for-profit, educational organ- ization as described in section 501(c)(3) of the Internal costly and has failed to establish industrial-scale Revenue Code. Gifts are deductible for income tax purposes wind as a self-sustaining contributor to meeting (Tax ID # 25-1533496). our energy needs. After more than three decades OFFICERS of government subsidy, the wind industry cannot President ...... Dave Bonta 684-7274 support itself, does not make a significant contri- [email protected] bution to meeting our energy needs, and has no Vice President & realistic prospects for doing so in the foreseeable Programs Committee Chair ...... Laura Jackson 652-9268 future. [email protected] Secretary & Since the PTC was first introduced in 1992, Membership Committee Chair ...... Dr. Alice Kotala 946-8840 the government has provided $40 billion to the [email protected] wind energy industry in tax credits and cash grants Treasurer & Historian ...... Charlie Hoyer 684-7376 with these costs dramatically increasing in recent [email protected] years. In the last year alone, nearly $5 billion has

COMMITTEE CHAIRS been distributed. There is no plausible justifica- Conservation Committee ...... Dr. Stan Kotala 946-8840 tion for continuing this spending, and certainly [email protected] not when the nation is facing the huge debt and Wetlands Committee...... Vacant deficits prevailing today. Education Committee...... Ruby J. Becker 515-6312 — Stan Kotala [email protected] ―――― Field Trips Committee...... Deb Tencer 932-9183 [email protected] Publications & Publicity Committee ...... Vacant Visit us online at Hospitality Committee...... Marcia Bonta 684-3113 JVAS.org [email protected]

DIRECTORS-AT-LARGE If you’re registered on Facebook, become a fan of Juniata Valley Audubon, whereby you’ll receive Warren Baker 684-4549 our links and news notes in your feed. Mike Jackson 652-9268 [email protected] Elisabeth Kotala 949-3663 [email protected] Jan/Feb 2013 The Gnatcatcher 3

… Jacks Mountain [ Cont’d from cover page ] Jacks Mountain, running north from Jacks Moun- tain Road. two parking lots on top, one with a large shrine Even though Pennsylvania has only mediocre with a cross. What spectacular views! We park wind resources, our forested mountains are attrac- facing west, and find Ron right behind the shrine, tive for wind development because there are counting raptors. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a good numerous roads and power lines that cross the day for raptor migration — very little wind but we slopes. Industrial wind projects must be located have a lot to discuss. It isn’t good news, either. adjacent to both. Furthermore, industrial wind Volkswind, a German company with a subsidi- developers can get a better price for electricity ary located in Portland, Oregon, has approached generation in the eastern United States than in landowners on Jacks Mountain to lease land for other areas of the country, so the lack of con- an installation of thirty-seven wind turbines that sistent winds doesn’t pose a big problem — espe- would run along the crest of Jacks Mountain in cially if federal subsidies and state alternative Menno, Union, Brown, Oliver, and Granville energy mandates are available to prop up the wind Townships in Mifflin County. Company execu- market. tives gave a presentation to the Mifflin County Because Jacks Mountain is very narrow on top, Planning Commission in February 2011, where the industrial wind project would begin as a cut- they outlined their proposal. According to the and-fill project to bulldoze and blast the top of Mifflin County Planning Commission’s annual Jacks Mountain in order to construct a flat bench report for 2011, Volkswind is in the process of that is wide enough to support a crane with a signing leases with property owners on Jacks thirty-foot track width. This bench also will sup- Mountain. They hope to install 2.5-megawatt tur- port the thirty-seven turbines, almost 500 feet tall. bines that would span eight miles along the top of The turbines’ rotating blades pose a direct 4 The Gnatcatcher Jan/Feb 2013 threat to migrating raptors, songbirds, and bats, since the blades cover over an acre of migratory airspace. On the ground, the con- struction of the bench and road to connect the tur- bines poses a direct threat to the timber rattlesnakes and other wildlife species that depend on the talus slopes and forested habitat. Jacks Mountain is des- ignated as a Mifflin Coun- ty Natural Heritage Site of Notable Significance because it is a large core forest and one of the larg- est continuous blocks of forested land in the central part of Mifflin County. An industrial wind project Jacks Mountain in Granville and Union Town- that alters the top of Jacks Mountain, with its ships in a perpetual conservation easement with roads, transmission lines, accessory buildings, and the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy in 2009. wind turbines will destroy the core forest so im- The express purpose of the conservation ease- portant to the biodiversity of Mifflin County. ment is to protect the resident timber rattlesnakes A portion of Jacks Mountain in Brown Town- found on the rocky talus slopes, safeguard the ship, part of the proposed wind project, also is quality of the water resources, and to promote part of the Central Mountains Important Mammal biological diversity of the forest — no wind tur- Area (IMA). The Jacks Mountain Slopes overlook bines will be constructed on this part of Jacks the . Nests of a globally se- Mountain. It’s hoped that this large block of cure, state vulnerable species of concern were lo- forest, including significant acreage along the top cated at this forested site in 2002. How will an in- of Jacks Mountain, will effectively block industrial dustrial wind project on the mountain affect this wind development plans by Volkswind, since the protected species? Volkswind has not conducted easement creates a significant gap in the eight- any field surveys, so no wildlife studies have been mile span designated for the wind project. initiated. On the other hand, rumors are circulating that Research at the Mifflin County Courthouse in a different wind company is contacting Jacks October 2012 showed that fourteen landowners Mountain landowners in southern Mifflin County. have signed leases with Volkswind. One land- E.ON Climate & Renewables, another German owner lives in Lancaster County, but most are company, contacted landowners in Huntingdon farmers who live in the valleys on either side of County in 2010, hoping to develop industrial wind Jacks Mountain. Jacks Mountain Hunting Club projects on Shade Mountain and Tuscarora also signed a lease with Volkswind. Mountain — about forty turbines were proposed The leased land for the wind project starts at for each site. Many local residents opposed those Jacks Mountain Road (and probably includes the plans, and little progress has been made since Jacks Mountain Hawkwatch) and runs north for then. about six miles. Not all the leased parcels are Is the same company interested in a project on contiguous. It’s very fortunate that a landowner Jacks Mountain? Details on this proposal will be has protected more than 140 acres of land on shared in the next issue of The Gnatcatcher.  Jan/Feb 2013 The Gnatcatcher 5

Heller Cave springtail one step closer “And our descendants deserve a world as rich in to Endangered Species protection biological diversity as the one we inherited. Crea- tures large and small are all a part of that.” The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has an- The springtail belongs to a group of arthro- nounced an initial positive response regarding a pods that live in various underground environ- petition from the Juniata Valley Audubon Society ments. This particular species is a little over an to protect the Heller Cave springtail, a tiny cave eighth of an inch in length; like other springtails, it creature found only in a Catharine Township, is able to jump distances many times its body Blair County, Pennsylvania cave system recently length. Cave-dwelling springtails are highly de- threatened by a proposed limestone quarry. The pendent on the stable temperatures and high hu- Center for Biological Diversity and the JVAS midity found in caves, and the Heller Cave sought the springtail’s protection under the fed- springtail likely would not survive long if exposed eral Endangered Species Act in a petition filed in to outside surface conditions. Among other October 2011. springtails of its kind, the Heller Cave springtail is “The Heller Cave springtail will disappear for- a geographic outlier; no other similar springtail ever if its only home on the planet is destroyed,” species is found as far north and east in North said Mollie Matteson, a conservation advocate for America. the Center for Biological Diversity. “Today’s deci- The Fish and Wildlife Service will now con- sion is a hopeful sign that this little biological duct an in-depth status review of the springtail marvel will remain a part of Pennsylvania’s natural and decide whether or the species warrants listing heritage into the future.” under the Endangered Species Act. In 2010, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection issued a permit to Gulf Audubon Christmas Bird Count tally Trading and Transport for a proposed quarry ad- jacent to the Lower Trail and the Frankstown Steven Bonta, the compiler for the JVAS Branch of the Juniata River. However, the DEP Christmas Bird Count held on Saturday, failed to require adherence to a “total avoidance December 15, 2012, has reported the following area” around the caves to protect the eastern tally by species. The JVAS has an assigned area for small-footed bat, as stipulated by the Pennsylvania the bird count — within a 7½-mile radius circle Game Commission, which has listed the bat as a centered on the village of Culp, in Sinking Valley. threatened species. The bat, which hibernates in Mallard ...... 188 the Heller Cave complex, has declined dramati- Wood duck...... 2 cally in recent years due to the rapidly spreading American wigeon...... 2 bat disease known as white-nose syndrome, mak- Hooded merganser...... 50 ing protection of surviving populations even more Ruddy duck...... 6 Bufflehead ...... 7 critical. The Heller Caves area also is home to the Green-winged teal ...... 1 threatened Allegheny woodrat and the northern Lesser scaup ...... 1 long-eared bat, a species of special concern. Great blue heron ...... 3 The Heller Cave springtail, which was discov- Bald eagle ...... 1 Red-tailed hawk ...... 24 ered by biologists more than a decade ago, has no Northern harrier...... 2 special status under Pennsylvania law and was not Cooper's hawk ...... 3 included in the Commission’s requirements for Sharp-shinned hawk ...... 2 protection of state-listed species at the quarry site. Merlin ...... 1 Last year the JVAS and the Center for Biologi- American kestrel ...... 12 Common snipe...... 1 cal Diversity succeeded in halting the quarry Killdeer ...... 2 through a settlement agreement with Gulf Trad- Ruffed grouse ...... 1 ing and Transport and the DEP. Ring-necked pheasant ...... 8 “Even tiny life forms like the Heller Cave Belted kingfisher...... 7 springtail deserve a place to live,” said Matteson. [ Continued on page 9 ] 6 The Gnatcatcher Jan/Feb 2013

JVAS Programs — January and February gating wind and waves on the Great Lakes, the mighty Mississippi, a Gulf of Mexico crossing, JVAS programs are presented on the third and more. Bill and Cynthia’s far-ranging presenta- Tuesday of the month except for July, August, tion will cover the state of sustainable technolo- and December. Unless otherwise specified, pro- gies in America today, water quality and endan- gram meetings begin at 7 P.M. in the meeting room gered species issues, canal lore, and boating trivia of the Bellwood-Antis Public Library, 526 Main — with some bird photos for good measure. St., Bellwood. Directions: Take Interstate Rt. 99 to the Bellwood/Route 865 Exit (Exit 41). Follow Rt. 865 through the Sheetz/ Martin intersection. Proceed about four blocks and turn JVAS Field Trips — January and February right at the BUSINESS DISTRICT → sign. Turn left at the dead end and travel to the stop sign. Continue a short JVAS field trips are coordinated by board mem- distance; the library will be on your right. ber Deb Tencer. For more information about any JVAS programs, designed for a general audi- field trip, phone Deb at 932-9183 or send her an ence, are free and open to the public. e-mail at [email protected].

Members’ Night Winter hiking and camping at TUESDAY, JANUARY 15 Thickhead Wild Area – All JVAS members are encouraged to bring any SATURDAY & SUNDAY, JANUARY 12 13 nature-related items that they wish to share: We'll do a short hike into Thickhead Wild Area music, photographs, video, poetry, artwork, etc. and then stay overnight to practice camping skills This is an opportunity to share your adventures in cold weather and potentially snowy conditions. and/or discoveries in the outdoors — whether it Additional activities, such as other short hikes or is a trip to an exotic island or a cool collection of snowshoeing to explore the area, will be weather- rocks from central Pennsylvania. Please contact dependent. This field trip is a joint outing with the Vice President Laura Jackson at mljackson2 Moshannon Group of the Sierra Club. Meet at @embarqmail.com to let her know what you plan Alan Seeger Natural Area at noon on Saturday. to contribute to the program. Slide shows should RSVP for this outing by January 9 to Helena not last longer than 10 minutes. Kotala, [email protected], 880-0918. ―――――― ―――――― “Voyage of Sustainability: Groundhog Day snowshoe hike in Around America’s Great Loop State Park In a Solar-Powered Boat” SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 2 TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 19 Meet at noon at Chappells Field for a 2-hour This presentation is a photographic trip report hike along forest trails. If there’s not enough of an epic journey by solar-powered boat. Marry- snow, it will become a regular winter hike. Trip ing 19th century and 21st century technologies, a leader Dave Hunter, [email protected], 317- State College couple, Bill Carlson and Cynthia 7971. Berger, equipped a canal boat with a solar propul- sion system for a 6000-mile trip around America’s – JOIN AUDUBON – Great Loop. The Great Loop is the circumnavi- gation of eastern North America, a continuous Become a member of Audubon and join a waterway connecting inland lakes and rivers with community of people who care about nature. the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway and the Great Please go online to… Lakes. www.jvas.org/join.html The intrepid couple set out with just a week’s to view your options of Audubon membership. power-boating experience between them, navi- Jan/Feb 2013 The Gnatcatcher 7

On the trail of the black-legged tick

B Y M A R C I A B O N T A

ast January, I walked along the Black Gum once on a mammal and prefer white-footed mice, Trail. Since our son, Dave, constructed the although they will feed on other small mammals trail halfway up Laurel Ridge, back in the or birds if they can’t find a mouse. L1990s, I had never been able to take the trail in And it is white-footed mice that are the real winter. Usually, it was deep in ice and snow as culprits. They can get the Lyme disease bacteria was our north-facing hollow road. But on and pass it on to the ticks even though the that mild day there was not a smidgen of ice bacteria don’t seem to sicken them. Because or snow on the trail or road. nymphs are so small, no larger than a poppy I neither saw nor heard any creature de- seed, they are liable to bite and never be spite the warm day. The long-promised sun detected during the three to four days they was trying to shine through a matrix of need to take their blood meal. At least 70% puffy, white clouds drifting past patches of of Lyme disease cases are from those blue sky. At dawn it had been 34 degrees and nymphs that do not look like the black and red- breezy, and the thermometer had been slowly dish-brown adult female ticks. Instead, they have rising all morning. dark heads and bodies that appear to be translu- Then, as I descended the trail, I glanced down cent. Adult male ticks, which don’t feed but will at my pants and socks and pulled off seven adult attach to a host when searching for a female to black-legged ticks. I could hardly believe it. I had mate with in the fall, are either black or dark considered winter to be tick-free on our moun- brown. tain. Usually, they spend their winters buried un- Entomologist Thomas Say named the black- der leaf litter that should be covered with snow. legged tick — Ixodes scapularis — back in 1821. But they are tough creatures, and as soon as it But the first known case of Lyme disease wasn’t warms up they are out and about. At that time the identified until 1975 when several children in adult females are not carrying Lyme disease be- Lyme, Connecticut were diagnosed with juvenile cause they had had their last blood feeding on rheumatoid arthritis. It turned out to be what later white-tailed deer. Some even winter on the deer. was named Lyme disease. In 1982, scientist Willy But, as Dr. Richard S. Ostfeld of the Cary In- Burgdorfer isolated the bacterium causing the dis- stitute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New ease, and it was named in his honor: Borrelia York says, don’t blame deer if you get Lyme dis- burgdorferi. ease. The immune system of deer kills the bacteria Scientists also thought that a new species of that cause the disease. tick carried the disease and named it Ixodes “We don’t know why,” Ostfeld says, “but the dammini. It was only later in the 1990s that they deer immune system clears the infection. When realized the tick transmitting the disease had been they get bit, they wipe out Lyme. Deer play a tre- around and named long ago. But they did recog- mendous role in suppressing adult ticks from nize that the tick belonged to the family Ixodidae, spreading the bacteria.” He also dislikes the name the so-called hard ticks. They have a hardened “deer tick” and prefers “black-legged tick.” plate called a scutum on their idiosoma region, After all, like any arachnid to which ticks are which is a specialized part of a tick’s body that closely related, the nymphs and adult ticks have expands to hold its blood meal. eight black legs. But the larvae only have six. The Like ticks everywhere, the nymphs and adults larvae hatch from the several hundred to a few climb a shrub or blade of grass, hold out their thousand eggs each female adult tick lays in forelimbs, and wait for a victim to brush past. spring. She then dies. Both the larvae the first They also lurk on fallen logs, tree trunks, or even summer and the nymphs the second summer feed on the ground, especially the nymphs which can’t 8 The Gnatcatcher Jan/Feb 2013 climb as high as the adults. Since they arrived on material called “attachment cement,” which is our mountain, about six years ago, I no longer why a tick is so difficult to remove. have the pleasure of sitting on my hot seat on the During the first 24 hours it is attached, it is ground, my back against a tree, watching the life harmless. But later, when it is full, it takes water of the forest. They even reach me on our benches from your blood into its gut and spits it back into unless I pull my feet up onto them. you, which is when it can transmit Lyme disease Ticks have a Haller’s organ on each foreleg or two other diseases: babesiosis and anaplas- with spiny indentation packed with sensors and mosis. The parasite Theileria microti causes nerves capable of picking up a breath of carbon babesiosis, and Anaplasma phagocytophiolum causes dioxide, heat, sweat, or even vibrations from your anaplasmosis. As many as 2 to 12% of Lyme dis- footsteps. So no bird or mammal can escape their ease patients will have anaplasmosis and 2 to 40% sudden lunge. As I’ve discovered, the small huck- babesiosis. This complicates the diagnosis and leberry shrubs on Laurel Ridge Trail and the treatment sometimes because the tick might

White-tailed deer in Plummer’s Hollow (Photo by Dave Bonta) grasses of First and Far Fields, are ideal “quest- transmit one or the other or both diseases and not ing” posts for ticks, as well as the underbrush in Lyme to a patient. In rural New Jersey, for in- our forest off the trails where I rarely venture stance, the Center for Disease Control studied anymore. 100 black-legged ticks and discovered that 55 of Once a tick arrives on its host, it probes them had at least one of the three pathogens. around for a soft, bloody site to attack, often in Both babesiosis and anaplasmosis have flu-like private crevices. Normally, you won’t feel a thing. symptoms similar to those of Lyme disease but As David George Haskell writes in The Forest without the telltale bull’s-eye rash. Some folks Unseen, “I suspect they charm our nerve endings, don’t recognize or even have symptoms of taming the cobra-like neurons with the hypnotic babesiosis, yet they can pass it on to others music of their feet.” through donated blood. So far, Pennsylvania The tick presses its mouthparts into your flesh seems to be almost free of those two diseases, but and saws an opening. Then they lower a barbed they are more prevalent in New York and New tube, called the hypostome, to draw out blood. Jersey. Unfortunately, it is probably only a matter Because it takes several days to get a full blood of time until these diseases increase in the meal, it cements itself to your skin with a glue-like Commonwealth. Jan/Feb 2013 The Gnatcatcher 9

Last year was supposed to be especially high in acre where barberry is contained, and only 10 Lyme disease cases. That was because in 2010 ticks where there is no barberry,” Worthley says. there was a bumper crop of acorns, followed by Unfortunately, our neighbor’s old 100-acre 2011 when there were practically none. Dr. property that we were able to purchase only after Ostfeld, forest ecologist Dr. Charles D. Canham, it was poorly logged, is filled with Japanese bar- and colleagues at the Cary Institute first worked berry and other invasives. It’s also moved into the out the connection between the amount of acorns edges of our fields and even into the edge of por- and the population size of white-footed mice. In tions of our older forest. Eliminating all of these abundant acorn years mice numbers soar but they bushes will take many manpower hours. But our crash when the acorn crop fails. According to caretaker hopes to experiment with a few of his Ostfeld, that leaves a large number of infected own ideas for removing them over the next sev- ticks looking for hosts. Without the mice, they are eral years. after us instead. In the meantime, I’ll continue to follow most At least one hunter friend of ours contracted of the suggestions for avoiding tick bites, includ- Lyme disease last June. Although he did get the ing super vigilance of my clothes and body, even rash, he never saw the tick. I suspect it was a in winter, when I take my daily walks. nymph that bit him. He also listed four places where he could have picked up the tick — turkey- … CBC tally [ Cont’d from page 5 ] hunting at our place, at a friend’s country prop- erty, on his own country property, or in his back- Great horned owl ...... 3 Eastern screech-owl...... 2 yard at the edge of Altoona. Pileated woodpecker ...... 10 If Ostfeld’s research is right, his backyard was the Northern flicker ...... 1 most likely habitat. In a paper for Conservation Biol- Hairy woodpecker...... 8 ogy, Ostfeld and other colleagues titled “Effect of Downy woodpecker...... 31 Red-bellied woodpecker...... 22 Forest Fragmentation on Lyme Disease Risk,” Rock pigeon ...... 300 they wrote, “Our results suggest that efforts to Mourning dove ...... 80 reduce the risk of Lyme disease should be Common raven ...... 13 directed toward decreasing fragmentation of the Common crow ...... 92 Blue jay ...... 26 deciduous forests of the northeastern United White-breasted nuthatch ...... 34 States into small patches…. The creation of forest Red-breasted nuthatch...... 2 fragments of 1–2 hectares should especially be Golden-crowned kinglet ...... 12 avoided, given that these patches are particularly Brown creeper...... 1 prone to high densities of white-footed mice, low Black-capped chickadee ...... 70 Tufted titmouse ...... 44 diversity of vertebrate hosts, and thus higher den- Eastern phoebe...... 1 sities of infected nymphal black-legged ticks.” Northern mockingbird ...... 2 Given both the size of our forest and the diversity Eastern bluebird ...... 7 of vertebrate species, we should have less Lyme American robin ...... 1 Common starling ...... 325 disease here. Winter wren ...... 1 On the other hand, another study by Tom Carolina wren ...... 20 Worthley and other researchers at the University House sparrow...... 52 of Connecticut Forest in Storrs claims that elimi- Northern cardinal ...... 33 nating the invasive Japanese barberry shrubs ( Red-winged blackbird ...... 50 Ber- American goldfinch...... 40 beris thunbergii) will help control the spread of Red crossbill...... 1 Lyme disease, anaplasmosis, and babesiosis be- House finch...... 63 cause white-footed mice favor the barberry’s hab- Song sparrow...... 20 itat. White-throated sparrow...... 22 White-crowned sparrow...... 1 “When we measure the presence of ticks carry- Fox sparrow ...... 1 ing the Lyme spirochete, we find 120 infected Dark-eyed junco...... 118 ticks where barberry is not contained, 40 ticks per Tree sparrow...... 12 10 The Gnatcatcher Jan/Feb 2013

JVAS THANKS ITS CORPORATE SPONSOR…

JACKSONS JOURNEYS PHOTOGRAPHY

Mike & Laura Jackson 8621 Black Valley Rd. Everett, PA 15537 (814) 652-9268 [email protected] JacksonsJourneysPhotography.com

– Nature Photography – – Fine Art Prints – – Nature Programs – – Environmental Education –