I was walking along a trail at the Oakland Estuary today at lunch, something I do a couple of days a week. Out by the marsh restoration project I walked past a Dept of the Interior truck then a woman on the catwalk with a clipboard.
Once I reached the end of the catwalk I saw a dozen or so new habitat boxes out on the marsh edges. On the way back I asked the woman with the clipboard about them. She was a UC Davis grad and they were working on a very cool project.
California's wetlands have been seriously reduced, degraded and isolated. This has created genetic islands of non migratory species. Their project is targeting the Ridgeways Rail ( formerly known as the Clapper Rail) an endangered species. The habitat boxes have cameras and are designed to capture the rail so that they can be banded. The aim is to capture and relocate 5 or 6 young rails from this marsh and relocate them to a different marsh with a slightly different genetic makeup of rails and introduce rails from that marsh to this one to help reestablish genetic diversity in both isolated populations.
Once I reached the end of the catwalk I saw a dozen or so new habitat boxes out on the marsh edges. On the way back I asked the woman with the clipboard about them. She was a UC Davis grad and they were working on a very cool project.
California's wetlands have been seriously reduced, degraded and isolated. This has created genetic islands of non migratory species. Their project is targeting the Ridgeways Rail ( formerly known as the Clapper Rail) an endangered species. The habitat boxes have cameras and are designed to capture the rail so that they can be banded. The aim is to capture and relocate 5 or 6 young rails from this marsh and relocate them to a different marsh with a slightly different genetic makeup of rails and introduce rails from that marsh to this one to help reestablish genetic diversity in both isolated populations.
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