In the Works...

Montour Preserve, Montour County, Pennsylvania

The Montour Environmental Preserve includes 5,000 acres surrounding a central-Pennsylvania power plant operated by Pennsylvania Power & Light. In 2008, volunteers with Woodcock Limited of Pennsylvania worked alongside Pennsylvania Game Commission employees to plant 3,000 aspen and alder seedlings on 3 acres of old-field habitat. In winter 2010, 14 acres of invasive shrubs were treated mechanically, and in April volunteers planted 10,000 aspen cuttings and 2,000 seedlings of various native trees and shrubs. A 100-acre demonstration area has been identified, with additional habitat work to begin there in 2011. Partners: Pennsylvania Power and Light, Woodcock Limited of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Game Commission, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Ruffed Grouse Society, National Wild Turkey Federation, Wildlife Management Institute.

Barron Tract, Somerset County, Pennsylvania

In 2008 the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy conveyed timber rights on this 2,300-acre property in Somerset County, southwestern Pennsylvania, to the Ruffed Grouse Society. RGS is working with Appalachian Forestry Consultants to develop a cutting plan that, over the next 15 years, will create hundreds of acres of young-forest habitat. After the timber is harvested and saplings begin to push up, relatively flat areas at higher elevations will see use as feeding habitat by migrating woodcock, while lower-elevation sites along Sandy Run and Laurel Hill Creek will provide nesting and brood-rearing habitat. Cutting began during winter 2008-2009. The tract is part of the Forbes State Forest. Partners: Ruffed Grouse Society, Richard King Mellon Foundation, Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Nescopeck State Park, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania

This northeastern Pennsylvania park’s 3,550 acres include fallow fields, wet meadows, mature forest, and 200 acres of high-quality wetlands along Nescopeck Creek. Hunting is permitted in the park, and the Pennsylvania Game Commission gives habitat management advice. Parts of the park have traditionally been managed as woodcock habitat. Volunteers and Game Commission workers have begun cutting out invasive shrubs (mainly honeysuckle and autumn olive) on 73 acres of reverting fields, while sparing native shrubs such as hawthorns and crabapples to encourage their growth and expansion. Managers have identified three units for a future woodcock and young-forest habitat demonstration area. Partners: Pennsylvania Department of Conservation of Natural Resources (Bureau of State Parks), Pennsylvania Game Commission, Natural Resources Conservation Service (Wildlife Habitat Improvement Project funding), National Wild Turkey Federation, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

State Game Lands 252, Lycoming and Union Counties, Pennsylvania

This 3,018-acre parcel is managed by the Pennsylvania Game Commission. It lies about 3 miles west of the Susquehanna River; soils are deep and moist, and the area is currently being used by woodcock. The Game Commission has designated SGL 252 as an early successional habitat demonstration area, with woodcock a focal species. Using mechanical means and herbicides, land managers are removing invasive shrubs, particularly honeysuckle. When the non-native species are under control, managers plan to begin logging operations and will seed areas with aspen to create young-forest habitat beneficial to woodcock and other wildlife. Partners: Pennsylvania Game Commission, Natural Resources Conservation Service (Wildlife Habitat Improvement Project funding), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Wallace Tract, Bath County, Virginia

The Wallace Tract is in the George Washington National Forest along the Cowpasture River in western Virginia. Four old fields contain about 170 acres of open land growing up in hawthorn, buttonbrush, St. Johnswort, wild crabapple, and autumn olive. Much of the area is already prime woodcock habitat. To improve the tract for woodcock and other wildlife, managers will plug tiles currently draining parts of the fields; break up thick sod to open the soil for native shrubs; plant shrubs including alder, buttonbrush, and silky dogwood; and conduct logging operations to create young forest. Ruffed grouse, golden-winged warblers, and wild turkeys will benefit, along with amphibians that will breed in vernal pools that should form in restored wetlands. Partners: Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, U.S. Forest Service, Ruffed Grouse Society, National Wild Turkey Federation, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Crooked Creek Wildlife Management Area, Carroll County, Virginia

This 1,796-acre property is owned and managed by the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries. Crooked Creek WMA is in the gently rolling mountains of southwestern Virginia at an elevation of 2,400 to 3,000 feet above sea level. The tract was formerly farmland, with several old homesites on the property. Forested areas are mainly mixed hardwoods with scattered white pine stands and rhododendron thickets bordering streams. Open areas are abandoned pasture. Land managers will preserve and potentially expand a wetland area; maintain and improve grassy openings as singing and roosting habitats; and increase the acreages of shrubs to provide feeding and nesting cover for woodcock. Partners: Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. Geological Survey, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, Wildlife Management Institute.

Swatara Gap State Park, Lebanon and Schuylkill Counties, Pennsylvania

The 3,500-acre Swatara Gap State Park includes woodlands and old fields on moist soils along Swatara Creek in southeastern Pennsylvania. Invasive shrubs – multiflora rose, tatarian honeysuckle, and autumn olive – are taking over many of the old-field acres. Starting in 2011, managers will use mechanical and herbicide treatments to convert 160 acres of invasive shrublands back to predominantly native vegetation. Strip cuts will be made in four project units. In years to come, cuts will take place on a continual rotation, to supply daytime feeding habitat, nesting cover, and singing grounds for woodcock. (Roosting fields are currently present in the park and on adjacent lands.) In 2009 and 2010, wildlife scientists conducted research into the effects of exotic invasive shrubs on woodcock nest-site selection and nesting success. They found that hens preferred to nest in native rather than invasive shrubs, and that the presence of invasives negatively affected nesting success. (At the time of this writing, manuscripts are being drafted for submission to peer-reviewed ornithological journals.) Partners: Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, Ruffed Grouse Society, Woodcock Limited of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Game Commission, Wildlife for Everyone Foundation, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Wildlife Management Institute.

Upper Santeetlah Project, Graham County, North Carolina

As one component in a landscape-scale forest management effort, around 320 acres of young woodland will be created on the Cheoah Ranger District of the Nantahala National Forest in western North Carolina. Elevations of treatment areas range from 2200 to 4000 feet. The overall project is designed to improve forest diversity and wildlife habitat. Animals that will benefit include black bear, white-tailed deer, ruffed grouse, wild turkey, Eastern towhee, chestnut-sided warbler, and golden-winged warbler. To provide display perches for male golden-winged warblers, residual trees will be left in an even distribution across stands in one half of the 320 acres scheduled for harvesting; in the remaining harvest areas, residual trees will be grouped in 0.5-acre clumps. Within three years of tree harvest, managers will use prescribed burning on selected portions of the new young-forest areas. Wildlife scientists will study population changes in golden-winged warbler and other species in response to these management techniques. Habitat work should start in 2011 and will take five to ten years. Partners: U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, University of Tennessee, North Carolina State University.

Wayne National Forest, Ohio

Wayne National Forest takes in more than 250,000 acres in the hill country of southeastern Ohio. Many management efforts are being planned or are underway on the Forest to improve and create habitat for woodcock and other young-forest wildlife. They include planting native trees and shrubs to provide edge transition zones between grassy openings and mature forest; harvesting non-native white pine plantations and letting the sites regrow as young forest or developing them as wildlife openings; planting trees and shrubs along streams and rivers; and maintaining 6,500 acres of permanent openings and developing another 500 acres of new openings in key areas. Habitat managers have as a longterm goal maintaining approximately 3 percent of the landscape in openings and 12 to 16 percent in “Forest and Shrubland Mosaic,” which consists of woodlands 20 years old and younger. Habitat enhancement work will help wild turkey, ruffed grouse, golden-winged warbler, yellow-breasted chat, prairie warbler, Eastern towhee, whippoorwill, brown thrasher, indigo bunting, cottontail rabbit, bobcat, black bear, and many other wild species that need young forest during part or all of their life cycles. Portions of the Pleasant Bear Vegetation Management Project, 11,200 acres in the Forest’s Marietta Unit, may be designated a woodcock habitat demonstration area; this project would create around 500 acres of early successional forest habitat. Partners: U.S. Forest Service, Ohio Division of Wildlife, National Wild Turkey Federation, Ruffed Grouse Society, Hocking College, Ohio University, Vinton Experimental Forest, Wildlife Management Institute.

State Game Lands 297, Washington County, Pennsylvania

This 654-acre property in southwestern Pennsylvania, owned and managed by the Pennsylvania Game Commission, includes areas of damp soil along Little Daniels Run. Partners will use a range of techniques to develop a 123-acre Woodcock Management Area. Approximately 30 acres of old fields will be taken out of active farming (sharecropping) and allowed to grow up in weeds and native shrubs. Workers will control exotic invasive vegetation, particularly tree-of-heaven, multiflora rose, and autumn olive. Apple trees in an old orchard will be daylighted and pruned to keep them healthy. (Woodcock often forage in rich soil beneath apple trees.) Woodcock will use existing grass fields, as well as gas and electric utility corridors, for springtime singing and displaying. Commercial logging will set back areas of mature woodland to a young-forest stage. In addition, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation will build 18 small impoundments along Little Daniels Run to create 12.4 acres of wetlands as part of a regional mitigation project; the impoundments will lead to additional damp-soil acreage, where native shrubs will be planted. On the game lands just outside the woodcock management area, a 25-acre commercial timber sale will yield even more young regrowing forest. Woodcock will benefit, as will white-tailed deer, cottontail rabbits, wild turkeys, ruffed grouse, songbirds, and reptiles such as box and wood turtles and black racers. Partners: Pennsylvania Game Commission, Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, Ruffed Grouse Society, and Wildlife Management Institute.

State Game Lands 247, Armstrong County, Pennsylvania

Before the Pennsylvania Game Commission bought this 452-acre tract in 1963, it was a commercial hunting preserve. It lies north of the Allegheny River near Ford City in southwestern Pennsylvania. In an area of damp soil along a stream drainage, managers will cut down large trees and remove or herbicide invasive exotic shrubs to encourage a dense regrowth of native trees and shrubs including spicebush, hawthorn, and dogwood. These activities will create 40 to 50 acres of young-forest and shrub habitat: about 10 percent of the Game Lands’ total area. Woodcock will find good brood-rearing and feeding cover on the treated units. (Timberdoodles already sing and breed on nearby grassy and weedy cover strips that are mowed every several years.) Managers will daylight older, established apple trees and plant additional apple seedlings. As well as woodcock, the following species should thrive in the new young-forest habitat: white-tailed deer, wild turkey, willow flycatcher, yellow-breasted chat, indigo bunting, and wood turtle. Partners: Pennsylvania Game Commission, Ruffed Grouse Society, and Wildlife Management Institute.

Pennsylvania State University Experimental Forest, Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania

In Penn State’s 6,775-acre Experimental Forest in Stone Valley, central Pennsylvania, foresters and wildlife biologists are teaming up to suppress invasive non-native shrubs and trees; diversify forest-stand age structure and create young forest across the tract; and restore an aging woodcock demonstration area that no longer provides ideal habitat. In March 2011, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service used machines, and a private contractor applied herbicides, to knock back non-native invasive shrubs on 26 acres in Muthersbaugh Swamp, giving native shrubs an edge. Regeneration cuts elsewhere on the Experimental Forest will create hundreds of acres of young woodland. Managers also are planning to restore a Woodcock Management Demonstration Area that is now more than 20 years old; at one time, the area featured an interpretive trail to educate people about woodcock habitat needs. Rejuvenating the 36-acre demonstration area will help woodcock, box and wood turtles, ruffed grouse, wild turkeys, many kinds of songbirds, white-tailed deer, bobcats, and black bears. Many people visit the Penn State Experimental Forest to hunt, hike, cross-country ski, and watch wildlife. The Woodcock Management Demonstration Area is about a mile from Shavers Creek Environmental Center, which attracts and educates thousands of visitors each year. Partners: Pennsylvania State University, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Partners for Fish and Wildlife Program), Ruffed Grouse Society, and Wildlife Management Institute.