Conservation Spotlight: Steve Matthews, School of Environment and Natural Resources, OSU
Linking trees and birds to understand climate change impacts
Bird distributions are shaped by many factors. As we enter a time of a rapidly changing global climate that is draped on top of a markedly reshaped landscape, understanding how these factors shape distributions will be critical to inform biological conservation and management decisions with climate change. We have developed tools to better understand how potential habitat changes may affect 147 bird species in the eastern United States based at a coarse-scale (20 x 20 km) with predictor variables of climate, elevation, and the distributions of 38 tree species. Results highlighted the potential for marked changes in species habitats. In the end, our data show that by including information on the distribution of vegetation, we gain a higher resolution perspective of how suitable habitat for birds has the potential to markedly shift under climate change.
Featured Speaker: John Watts, Metro Parks Resource Manager
The Birds of Hocking County, Ohio
Please join us as we welcome John Watts of the Franklin County Metro Parks and co-author of the recently published Birds of Hocking County. Here in central Ohio, we know that Hocking County is one of the natural jewels of Ohio. The area is favored with impressive geological and biological diversity, and within that setting occurs one of the most diverse and accessible populations of birds to be found in the state.
John will discuss the recently published book that he co-authored with Paul Knoop Jr. and Gary Coovert: The Birds of Hocking County, Ohio. This volume documents 266 species of birds found in Hocking County and discusses the land use changes and county bird studies that have resulted in this extensive list — as well as public locations for birdwatching.
John Watts is the Resource Manager for the Columbus and Franklin County Metro Parks and has worked for Metro Parks since 1986. He previously worked for the Division of Natural Areas and Preserves on rare species monitoring and habitat restoration and management. John coordinates and administers the Resource Management Program for over 27,500 acres of natural area park lands in central Ohio, which has restored over 4,000 acres of native habitat. He takes most pride in the restoration of over 1,600 acres of native tallgrass prairie in the former Darby Plains Prairies.