East Tennessee part of effort to increase golden-winged warbler habitat

If you think you’ve had a bad day, consider the golden-winged warbler.

The little bird has a heck of a life anyway. It has to flap its little wings all the way from northeastern U.S. to winter in Central and South America each year.

Much worse is that this particular warbler has suffered one of the steepest population declines of any songbird. The American Bird Conservancy stated that since 1966 the species has been reduced by 66 percent.

The reason is a little weird. These birds crave young forests for nesting, and young forests are in short supply especially in Appalachia. Much like the canary in the coal mine, it makes the golden-winged warbler a wonderful indicator of the sad status of young forests here, but that doesn’t help the bird much.

Help from the feds

Assisting this warbler is where the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Tuesday that it is stepping in.

That department has released a five-year conservation strategy to support private landowners in an effort to bring healthier forests back to the Appalachian Mountains. Under the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) the strategy comes with a goal of helping landowners adopt bird-friendly practices on more than 15,000 acres of young forests and shrub lands during the next five years.

"Many of our nation's forests have fallen into poor health, and we have a tremendous opportunity in Appalachia to make a difference both for landowners and for wildlife," said Leonard Jordan, NRCS acting chief. "Our effort is to diversify the age classes of trees in forests, creating patches of forests of different ages, and for the golden-winged warbler, we're focusing on those younger forests with landscapes dominated by mature forests."

For Tennessee, it means NRCS is aiming to conserve 852 acres for golden-winged warbler habitat between fiscal year 2017 and 2012, which brings the total amount of conserved habitat in the state to 1,115 acres. The bird's territory in Tennessee is mostly east, Appalachia and Cumberland Plateau.

"This particular bird is mainly a higher-elevation species of the Appalachian mountains, and they use our region for summer breeding and nesting habitat," said Charles Kitts, USDA Tennessee East Tennessee area biologist.

Prime targets are abandoned coal mine sites where strip-mining cleared the land and new growth is possible.

Habitat restoration key

According to a release from the NRCS: “During the first two years, NRCS in Tennessee will primarily focus on projects with habitat restoration plans already completed. NRCS in Tennessee is looking for ways to build capacity and working with partners to help develop habitat restoration plans.”

Kitts said USDA Tennessee has been working on the project since 2014.

It has employed practices "used to create and restore habitat which, in this case, have been mainly forest stand improvement - to reduce overstory density - as well as some tree and shrub plantings," he said.

Overstory density refers to the highest layer of vegetation in a forest. A tight canopy of tree branches prevents sunlight from hitting a forest floor, inhibiting new growth.

The program is being expanded from 12 counties to 20, including Knox. The original list contains Johnson, Carter, Unicoi, Claiborne, Campbell, Scott, Morgan, Anderson , Greene, Cocke, Washington and Monroe. Added counties are Sullivan, Hawkins, Hancock, Union, Grainger, Roane, Sevier and Knox.