Chartiers Creek BioBlitz

October 02, 2017

Chartiers Creek BioBlitz

Charthiers Creek.

Allegheny Land Trust held a "BioBlitz" at Wingfield Pines Conservation Area, and I expected this might be a great way to begin to learn something about the natural world of Pennsylvania. We were not disappointed.

Coal was strip mined at Wingfield Pines in the 1940s, leaving the area with a bad case of "abandoned mine drainage". Coal mines create this problem by allowing buried minerals to come in contact with surface water and oxygen. The typical chemical reaction that results creates sulphuric acid, which is nasty stuff. Iron oxide also turns the water a bright orange color. After the mine closed, the land was used for a time as a golf and swim club. Signs of a filled in swimming pool can be seen in the metal hand rails for swimming pool ladders which seem to float out of the ground. Eventually Allegheny Land Trust acquired the land, and in 2009 opened a series of containment ponds that gradually filter the water and allow sediment to settle, so that the water flowing into Chartiers Creek is vastly improved. After 8 years, the 4 part BioBlitz series was designed to help measure how effective conservation efforts have been by documenting the natural diversity to be found there.

A "Bioblitz" is generally a 24 hour effort to document every species of plant and animal within a given area, which is usually only feasible with many well coordinated teams of volunteers lead by experts. The two surveys we observed were instead small scale surveys completed by experts that the public was invited to watch. Even though we didn't have a chance to actually participate, my son Jasper said that he definitely learned a lot! I agree.

Carolina chickadee.

The first survey we observed was a bird banding, conducted by woman from Powdermill Nature Reserve. They have a bird banding station where they have been banding birds for 55 years, so they must know what they are doing! She explained that Wingfield Pines is a new site for bird banding. We find bird banding to be really fascinating. "Mist nets" are set up carefully so that birds will fly into them and be held without any harm. The birds are carefully collected from the nets, and dozens of minute observations about each bird are recorded. A band is gently attached to each bird's leg. Its unique number is added to a database along with all the other measurements and observations. The more information in the database, the more complete a portrait of a bird species researchers can paint. We have seen spring bird bandings, but never one conducted in the fall. We learned that songbirds begin molting as soon as breeding is over, and replace their breeding plumage with feathers that often make it impossible to tell males from females. We watched her band 5 birds, which included two Carolina chickadees and four tufted titmice. One of the chickadees had been banded before, which she explained is something they find about 5% of the time. Finding a bird again gives them useful information, because it can help them learn about migration and longevity.

The electronic scale wasn't working properly, so the birds were
placed in a protective bag and weighed using a cool handheld gadget.

Tufted titmouse.

The next survey we encountered was electrofishing. We didn't know about this, and were planning to watch the whole procedure. But in talking to another attendee, we learned that the survey was pretty much over almost an hour before it was scheduled to begin. We hurried over to see what we could see. Electrofishing is considered the safest way to survey freshwater aquatic species because it stuns them for a few minutes at the most, allowing them to be carefully collected with much less trauma than nets would cause. Some fish are attracted to the electrical current without being stunned. The electricity comes from a backpack generator or battery pack, and the surveyor actually walks in the water while using it. (Interestingly, it totally doesn't work in salt water. Salt water is too conductive, so the current just passes right over the fish and doesn't affect them.) We were able to see their gear and many of the species they found, and ask a few questions before they left the survey area.

Electrofishing gear.

Carp. Carp are from Asia, and are considered a highly dangerous invasive species. They outcompete other fish for food, and as bottom feeders they uproot plants and keep new aquatic plants from growing, ruining habitat for many species including waterfowl. There is great fear they will reach the Great Lakes. We were surprised by the neutral tone of the surveyors towards the carp. They even said they would put this one back. There must be more to this story.

A yellow bullhead catfish. Jasper had never seen a live catfish outside of a grocery store tank, and we didn't know that you have to hold them very carefully because they have venomous spines.

Gambusia or "mosquitofish". These are an introduced species of guppies that love to chow on mosquito larvae.

They found several crayfish which were not a Pennsylvania species. Invasive crayfish are nasty because they can totally eat up all the aquatic invertebrates in their ponds that are the foundation of the food chain.

A lovely male green frog. They also found a tadpole which may have been a green frog. Most frogs lay their eggs in early spring and they mature very quickly from tadpoles to frogs. Green frogs and bullfrogs instead often overwinter as tadpoles.