Valley Fire shuts down crucial Lucky Peak Research Center
BOISE, Idaho — Songbirds, hummingbirds, owls, and birds of prey — Heidi Ware Carlisle is the Education and Outreach Director for the Intermountain Bird Observatory at Boise State, which monitors and conserves breeding bird populations in six states. The Valley Fire changed all of that in one day.
(Below is the transcript from the broadcast story)
"This is a flock of Pine Siskens which is weird because it's a species that should be up at Lucky Peak," said Heidi Ware Carlisle, the Education and Outreach Director for the Intermountain Bird Observatory at Boise State University.
It's "weird" because the Valley Fire has forced many of the birds out of the area. The Intermountain Bird Observatory monitors and conserves breeding bird populations in six states, but Carlisle says the fire changed all of that in one day.
"Where we've been catching and tagging raptors for 30 years is pretty flat and gone," Carlisle said. That location is their Lucky Peak Research Station, high on the ridge overlooking Harris Ranch.
IBO chose the site because it's at the end of the Boise ridge, where it's a natural funnel for birds when they're heading south, so during fall migration it's a gathering point for the birds they study.
But the Valley Fire has actually given the I.B.O. a chance to study what the bird migrations do when a fire destroys a large area of their habitat.
Carlisle explains, "Birds can fly so hopefully they moved. It was a really key habitat for a lot of species and I'm hopeful they can divert and find a habitat that's suitable for them."
The Intermountain Bird Observatory is more than just about their research which is very important, but it is also to enhance the bird habitat to educate all of us about this beautiful place we live in. The Diane Moore Nature Center along the Boise River gives the IBO another spot to bring students and educate them in a natural setting.
