A show of companionship and survival will play out live before the public in a DNR webcam that offers a peek into the lives of a barn owl pair raising chicks. The webcam is at wildlife.IN.gov/8183.htm.

Barn owls are a state-endangered species. The pair on this webcam has been living in a DNR-built nest box inside a metal pole barn in southern Indiana since 2009. These owls have nested every year since 2009. Read more

GW:  I was given a sneak preview of the new Bass Pro Shops facility in Missouri and this will become a worthwhile destination for sportsmen and women for years to come. 

MISSOULA, Mont. – The Boone and Crockett Club commends Club member and Bass Pro Shops founder Johnny Morris on his continuing conservation efforts and the upcoming opening of one of the largest, most immersive conservation attractions in the world – Wonders of Wildlife National Museum and Aquarium. The 315,000 square-foot exhibit sits adjacent to Bass Pro Shops flagship store in Springfield, Missouri, and will soon serve as the new home to North American conservation when it opens later in 2016.In 2015, Boone and Crockett Club joined more than 25 of the country’s leading conservation organizations to contribute to the creation of the attraction. The nationwide collaboration brought together conservation leaders to discuss fun and engaging ways to motivate public appreciation for wildlife and conservation efforts. The attraction will highlight past successes and share important conservation messages to a national audience.

“The museum and aquarium continues the legacy of dedicated professionals and individuals who truly care about ensuring the future of wildlife through conservation practices,” said Morrison Stevens, Club president. “It will serve many generations to come with an immersive, educational experience that focuses on the benefits of long-term conservation and the positive effects on wildlife. The motto ‘Conservation had a beginning, but has no end,’ is fitting to describe the opportunity presented by this attraction.” Read more

GW:  This information is from QDMA’s Sam Leatherman and provides some facts we may not have known.

The Michigan Department of Natural Resources provides an online interactive map that highlights the state’s 2015 wildfires and prescribed burns – each more than 10 acres in size – to help mushroom hunters in their quest for morels.

“Morel mushrooms are often found in locations where large fires occurred the previous year,” said Jim Fisher, resource protection manager for the DNR Forest Resources Division. “Each spring we get calls from people who are seeking details on those sites to hunt morels. We’ve enhanced the features of this map to give our customers the information they are looking for in a mobile-friendly, easily accessible package.”

The DNR’s interactive Mi-Morels map provides forest cover type information, latitude and longitude coordinates and state-managed land boundary information.

Morel mushrooms commonly sprout in locations burned by wildfires or prescribed burns with a tree canopy; grass or sunlit open areas are less likely to produce the tasty fungi. Read more

From SCI…

As Kenya prepares to destroy its entire wildlife products stockpile–an estimated 100 or more tons of elephant ivory, rhino horn and parts from other species–at the end of April, some are welcoming this move as a bold display of defiance against trafficking of wildlife products. Billionaires, Hollywood celebrities, and other ill-informed individuals are expected to attend and cheer as flames transform ivory into ashes. But beyond a grand gesture, what are the deeper implications of ivory stockpile destruction? The potential negative consequences of such stockpile destruction events deserve closer scrutiny.

Kenya was the first nation to publicly destroy ivory, back in 1989, in the lead-up to the global ban on commercial ivory trade. Since then several other nations have followed suit, and Kenya itself has followed up with additional ivory burns. Since 2011, at least 15 nations, including the United States, have held public events to eliminate ivory stockpiles–destroying an estimated 65 tons or more of ivory. Each has been touted as a public show of disdain for illegal ivory trafficking, a statement to ivory traders that the world will no longer tolerate the slaughter of elephants for their ivory. Defenders of stockpile destruction say that it takes ivory “beyond economic use.”

Yet how many of these events have been accompanied by a transparent and independent audit to verify that the amount claimed to have been destroyed was actually destroyed? Is it unreasonable to imagine a scenario in which criminal networks in countries that consistently rank among the world’s most corrupt nations could conspire to make a grand display of “destroying” 20 tons of ivory, but then burn only a token few pieces of ivory atop 10 tons of scrap wood? Such a move would then take 10 tons or more of ivory off the record books and free it up for sale on the black market. Without credible independent verification, who is to say whether the ivory has actually been destroyed versus having been shifted into the hands of corrupt officials to be sold for their own personal enrichment? Officials from the Convention on International Trade of Endangered Species (CITES) can inspect official ivory stockpiles at any time. If those stockpiles no longer “officially” exist, then there’s no longer anything to inspect.

The fundamental principle of supply and demand also poses a formidable challenge to the assertion that taking ivory “beyond economic use” somehow reduces demand for ivory. Ivory consumers are certain to perceive the loss of tons of ivory as a signal that their favored commodity is in increasingly short supply, thus driving up demand. Read more

GW:  I love this technology…unimagined only a few decades ago.

One of two eaglets has hatched at the eagle’s nest on the grounds of the Platte River State Fish Hatchery. It hatched in the early hours today, April 19.

Viewers may want to glue themselves to the Carbon TV Eagle Cam. The second eaglet hopefully will hatch at any moment, as pips (small holes pecked into the shell of an egg from a parent eagle’s beak) are now present on the egg in the nest on the grounds of the hatchery.

Viewers can watch the action unfold live in real time on CarbonTV.com. Read more