Megan's Nature Nook
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These past few months I have been working at Oxbow Park and Zollman Zoo in Byron, Minnesota. Over the summer I have been helping to monitor two American Kestrel (Falco sparverius) nest boxes that were put up at the park earlier this spring. The boxes were provided by the Zumbro Valley Audubon Society as a conservation project to celebrate the Year of the Bird. The National Audubon Society, National Geographic, BirdLife International, and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology have come together in a yearlong celebration of birds, called the Year of the Bird. Joel Dunnette, the President of the Zumbro Valley Audubon, spearheaded the effort to install Kestrel nesting boxes throughout Olmsted county. A collaboration of volunteers, naturalists, and a falconer came together to build, install, and monitor 11 new nest boxes throughout the county. Boxes were put up at Oxbow Park, Chester Woods Park, Root River Park, Quarry Hill Park and other public and private lands throughout the county. The boxes were put up early this spring in areas with suitable Kestrel habitat. They were monitored about once a week throughout the nesting season to see if any Kestrels had utilized the boxes. When the boxes were checked, data like the number of Kestrels, number of eggs, number of adults and chicks, and if any other species was nesting in the box was collected then entered into a database on The Peregrine Fund website. There they collect data from all over the country to help learn more about Kestrels. The American Kestrel Partnership was started in 2012 because of the decline in the Kestrel population. Since the 1960s, their population has had an average declined of 50% across the continent due to unknown causes. The Partnership is a network of professional and citizen scientists who are trying to learn more about Kestrel demographics and help in the conservation of their species. At Oxbow, we did not have any Kestrel use our boxes this year, which isn’t uncommon since this is the first year they were up. Although we did not have any Kestrels, we did have a few successful clutches of Eastern Bluebirds! Even though Oxbow did not have any Kestrel chicks this year, there were two boxes in the county that were successful! A total of eight Kestrel chicks were raised and able to be banded before they left the nest. Next year we are hoping for more even successful nest boxes! Whether we have more chicks or not, the data collected from each box is helping us to better understand Kestrels and help their species in the long run. It was a fun experience to help in the monitoring of the boxes this year and I hope we will have more chicks next year! Learn more about building, installing, and monitoring Kestrel Nest Boxes by visiting the American Kestrel Partnership page but clicking here.
Thank you to everyone who contributed to the Kestrel Nest Box project in Olmsted County and to Joel Dunnette for more information about the project!
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