If it helps, they make great neighbors. And they\u2019re very\ncute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rappaport, a master\u2019s student in the Sustainable Communities\nprogram at Northern Arizona University, is on a mission to save the American\nkestrel\u2014\u201cgorgeous, charismatic, adorable, colorful little falcons\u201d that live\nthroughout the western hemisphere and, though not endangered yet, are well on\ntheir way as their habitats and food supplies are wiped out. She\u2019s hoping to\nstop the dramatic decrease before the species reaches that point. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And she needs your help. Yes, you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn this era of changing climate, of ecological turmoil and\njust general confusion about what the future looks like, I think that\ncommunity-based groups and grassroots groups are going to be the thing that\nwins a lot of environmental protections and do a lot of the work of protecting\nspecies and habitats that are really at a disadvantage in this day and age,\u201d she\nsaid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, why should you care and what can you do? Let Maya\nRappaport explain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What are kestrels?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey are super cool important little critters that can\nteach us a ton about a ton of different things.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n American kestrels are a small bird that can live just about\nanywhere with grasslands. They\u2019re fairly noticeable if you\u2019re looking; they\nperch on overhanging features like tree branches and telephone wires.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In fact, that\u2019s how Rappaport initially became interested in\nthese birds. When she was 18 and struggling with where her life was going, she\nmoved to the western slope of Colorado and worked for an organic farm for nine\nmonths. Every day on her way in, walking along a dirt road with cows, sheep and\nhorses pastured alongside it, she\u2019d pass a pair of American kestrels on a\ntelephone pole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey just struck me as these beautiful little guardians,\u201d\nshe said. \u201cThey were there, watching over us. They were just living their lives\nnext to us, but it had this meaning for me\u2014something about seeing them together\nmade me feel safe in that area. So for me they\u2019re terribly sweet and lovely.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n They\u2019re fairly adaptable; the species, with a few genetic\nvariations, can survive in warm and cold, humid and arid, forest and desert\nenvironments. What they\u2019ve struggled to adapt to is the destruction of the\ngrasslands where they live and eat, which in urban and suburban areas have\nincreasingly been developed. In addition to their food supply drying\nup\u2014kestrels eat insects, lizards, small birds and rodents\u2014they\u2019re losing places\nto nest. Kestrels are secondary cavity nesters, which means they find holes in\ntrees, barns or canyon cliffsides that other creatures or nature have carved\nout and then abandoned. Those also are disappearing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBecause they have these teeny little beaks and teeny little\ntalons, they\u2019re really good at hunting and killing things, but they\u2019re not so\ngood at digging out nesting cavities,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the Flagstaff area, the kestrel population has dropped by\nabout 51 percent in the last 50 years. While that sounds bad\u2014and it is bad\u2014it\u2019s\nan improvement over much of the rest of the United States, such as parts of the\nNortheast, where about 90 percent of the once-thriving kestrel population is\ngone. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Why are they important?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n For one\u2014kestrels live in this area too. In fact, they\u2019ve\nlived here much longer than most of the human population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEvery creature has an inherent, sovereign specialness about\nit,\u201d Rappaport said. \u201cEvery part of the natural world has as much a right to be\nthere as any other part, but we as humans like things that are cute. We like\nthings that are recognizable. We connect really strongly to beautiful things.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Secondly, they are part of the ecosystem. They feed on\ncreatures that eat farmers\u2019 crops; a healthy kestrel population around a farm\ncan provide more effective and more organic pest control than pesticides. The\nkestrel population also is tied to the health of native grasslands and the\nwatershed. They also are a food source for other predators native to the area,\nsuch as Cooper\u2019s hawks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Third, they\u2019re not yet endangered. It is far easier\u2014and far\nbetter for a species\u2014to help rebuild it while it still has sufficient genetic\ndiversity to produce healthy offspring. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt is critical that we begin acting now while the kestrel\npopulation is still large enough to be viable into the future,\u201d Rappaport said.\n\u201cAction now is much more critical than it may feel. This is a major fallacy in\nconservation thinking: conserve what\u2019s about to die. Yes, do that, but also\nconserve everything else while you still can.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fourth, kestrels are a great way to get people interested\nin, informed about and taking part in conservation efforts. One of the\nproject\u2019s primary goals, both with the kestrels and in her work generally, is\nto educate people on the importance of the science being done in labs and\nfields throughout the world. People need to understand discoveries, concerns\nand problems, she said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf you do the science and are not able to share it with a\nbroad audience, what\u2019s the point of having done the science?\u201d Rappaport asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What is the Flagstaff Kestrel Project?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Once she conceived of the idea for the FKP, which she\u2019s\ndoing in conjunction with a national program led by the American Kestrel\nProject, Rappaport\u2019s first task was to find community partners. She needed\nfunds, building materials, permission to use land, person-hours and\nsubject-matter experts. More than that, though, she needed enthusiastic\nvolunteers. She doesn\u2019t care if they\u2019re bird lovers (which some are) or if\nthey\u2019ve never thought about the birds that share their ecosystem. Rappaport\nwants anyone interested in learning more and being a part of this hands-on\nconservation effort to join.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Over the summer, she collected donations, oversaw volunteers\nbuilding nesting boxes and found places to install the boxes, which will happen\nlater this fall. The boxes will go throughout the city and surrounding lands. The\norganization has carte blanche to install boxes the Babbitt ranchlands and the\nDiablo Trust lands, which are about half a million acres combined. They\u2019ll put\nthe boxes up near the Flagstaff Arboretum and the Arizona Trail. Private\nproperty owners who want boxes installed on their property can also volunteer;\nthe biggest criterion is being in close proximity to a grassland habitat and\nhaving somewhere to install a box about 10 feet off the ground. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Next spring, Rappaport is expecting the first round of avian\ninhabitants in the nest boxes. Monitoring teams of three people will be\nassigned to each box; Rappaport wants those teams to include a community member\n(likely a member of the Audubon Society or similar group), a college student\nand a high school student. The team will check on the boxes at least twice\nduring the nesting season and more if they produce chicks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When the eggs have hatched and the young kestrels are older,\nRappaport\u2019s team will capture and band the birds. They want to track the birds\u2019\nmigratory patterns, where they go in the area, how they\u2019re interacting with the\necosystem. All of this information will give scientists a better idea of how to\nprotect animals whose homes have been irretrievably altered by humans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And human activity has to be taken into account as well when\nfiguring out the future of kestrels, said Peter Friederici<\/strong>, director of\nthe Sustainable Communities master\u2019s program, Rappaport\u2019s adviser and himself\nan avid birder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019re very unlikely to develop any real solutions to any of\nthose problems unless we really explore connections between humans and the\nenvironment,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition to gathering data about kestrel activity and\nencouraging them to stay in Flagstaff, Rappaport is hoping this project will\nbring together citizen scientists, get conversations started among different\ngenerations of residents and see knowledge moving through generations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Who can participate?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Anyone! No prior experience is needed, though it\u2019ll help if\none person in each group of three has a vehicle. Rappaport wants to involve NAU\nstudents as much as possible. She\u2019s hoping to work with the School of Earth and\nSustainability to offer internship credit for students who volunteer for the\nFlagstaff Kestrel Project. She wants future scientists who are interested in\nbirds or field science or conservation or science communication to come and get\ntheir first field experience. She also is hoping to get a documentary studies\nstudent from the School of Communication to do a documentary on the project for\na capstone or master\u2019s project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis is about getting as many people on the ground as\npossible, as many people in touch with kestrels and other species as possible,\nand really opening people\u2019s eyes up to these beautiful little creatures that\nare all around us that can be hard to see unless you develop the way of\nseeing,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is a great project for people who are worried about the\nchanging environment and want to help but feel overwhelmed by the sheer scope\nof the problem, Friederici said. He\u2019s spent years working in ecology and\nornithology and has often been assisted by volunteer citizen-scientists. More\npeople means more work gets done, more data collected, more species on the road\nto survival and more participants who then are empowered to go to their friends\nand neighbors and talk about the importance of clean water and healthy\necosystems. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Ideally, that shared passion not only leads to more\nvolunteers but to more citizens who educate themselves and their communities\nand hold their elected officials accountable, since much of the change to\nprotect the environment needs to come from policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cRight now, most people are probably being regularly\ninundated with what really amounts to bad news about the world, whether we\u2019re\ntalking about conservation specifically or climate change more generally, and\nhow that will change living conditions,\u201d he said. \u201cIt can all seem totally\noverwhelming, especially when you take the view from 30,000 feet. It\u2019s hard to\nknow what to do about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cA really important step is getting people to have some\nsense of empowerment: \u2018I can work toward solutions to develop a sense of place.\nI can contribute to what\u2019s going on around here, things I can see and hear, I\ncan measure water quality,\u2019 or whatever it is. Because it\u2019s local, it\u2019s\nvisible, it\u2019s definable and it puts a personal relationship with the issue on a\nwhole different level than a more abstract level.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n What\u2019s next?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Rappaport found out last month that she won a grant from the\nArizona Field Ornithologists\u2019 Gale Monson Research Grant Foundation. The fundraising\nprocess will continue even when outdoor work on the project has gone dormant\nfor the winter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Anyone who\u2019s interested in participating can follow the project on Facebook<\/a> to find out about future volunteering and donation opportunities. <\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"Female](\"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wordpresst\/uploads\/sites\/153\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/DSC_5438-819x1024.jpg\")
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Heidi Toth | NAU Communications
(928) 523-8737 | heidi.toth@nau.edu<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"