A FIELD TRIP FOR THE BIRDS

A FIELD TRIP FOR THE BIRDS

By Leonard Shapiro

On a recent gorgeous morning, about 20 members of the Fauquier and Loudoun Garden Club gathered near the Mt. Zion Baptist Church not far from Gilberts Corner for an informative and fascinating field trip.

Amy Johnson at Roundabout Meadows

In fact, it was a trip to a field, specifically what is known as Roundabout Meadows, a rolling pristine Virginia landscape filled with native plants, shrubbery, grasses and wildlife. That includes a wide variety of birds—quail, Eastern meadowlarks, Bobolinks, among many others—who call this pretty place home.

Middleburg’s Missy Janes has been spearheading the club’s conservation efforts with the help of other club members. She described the project as “part of a community effort for the benefit of all to learn and enjoy what our area has to offer and why it’s important to preserve land.”

With contributions from the Garden Club of America and Garden Club of Virginia, the Journey Through Hallowed Ground and the Oak Spring Foundation, “we created a 30-page report about the geology, cultural history, and flora of this piece of land and the many stories it can tell,” Janes added. “We planted a tree buffer at the edge of the traffic circle and planted a swath of native plants along the entry path and boardwalk that leads to the kiosk we also funded.”

Dr. Amy Johnson offered a passionate presentation to the group on the importance of preserving such wide-open spaces, assuring the continued presence of wildlife large and small, up in the air or burrowed down in the ground.

Johnson is the program director for the Virginia Working Landscapes (VWL), a Smithsonian-led research initiative and also is affiliated with the Piedmont Environmental Council. She cultivates a network of private landowners, citizen scientists, national governing organizations, state agencies and research scientists to collectively investigate the impacts of conservation management and land use on biodiversity.

In addition to research, VWL has a strong outreach program that communicates research findings and best management practices through landowner meetings, lectures, workshops and farm tours.

Johnson’s research is raising awareness on the importance of bobwhite quail conservation initiatives for conserving habitat for steeply declining species and is also providing insight into the benefits of native warm-season grasses for overwintering bird communities.

“My research on is about how we can have grazing and adjust the timing of making hay to optimize their reproduction,” she said. “We also don’t want to do any harm to the farming process and what they have to do to maintain their fields.”

Roundabout Meadows attendees received an illuminating handout on what landowners and farmers can do to assure the well-being of native grassland and shrubland bird species.

For example, it’s recommended to delay field maintenance until mid-July, the better not to disturb nesting birds. If circumstances require an earlier cut, it’s recommended for late May, with a 65-day waiting period before the next cut.

Other recommendations include increasing cutting height to a maximum of 6-8 inches to leave protecting cover for nesting grassland birds; incorporating native grasses and legumes in fields to provide foraging opportunities and protective cover, and hanging nest boxes for cavity-nesting species like American Kestrels, Barn Owls and Eastern Bluebirds.

“These working grasslands are home to some of our nation’s most threatened species of birds throughout the year,” the handout reads. “With over 80 percent of Virginia’s grasslands currently held in private hands, the survival and well-being of these vulnerable species depends entirely in the decisions made by private landowners.”