Monthly Sportsmen Magazine Articles

Silent Woods

Nearly a half century ago Rachael Carson’s book “Silent Springs” awakened a giant, the American public, to the environmental disasters caused by DDT and other chemicals. The awakened giant was quickly motivated to outlaw the use of this product in the United States an environmental movement hatched after a brief incubation period in the early 1970’s that included the first “Earth day”. A fledgling peregrine falcon restoration effort took off as well. These birds where vastly diminished in numbers across North America because DDT caused them to lay thin-shelled eggs that failed to hatch. New Hampshire is thankfully the residence of over a dozen pairs of nesting falcons because of the restoration efforts, ridding the dangerous chemicals and releasing falcons in the East.

Yet a more insidious disaster has infiltrated our wild lands across New Hampshire and much of North America. It is not poured from a barrel, is all around us yet is unseen and has caused an even more dramatic decline in bird numbers far greater than Rachel could have imagined. It is called urban sprawl and it’s result habitat fragmentation. The disaster is us. You and me, our shear numbers. It is our houses, roads, golf courses, malls, parking lots and what ever else we have deemed necessary for human civilization.

Our wanton ways of using this land we call New Hampshire has caused a significant decline in numbers of songbirds, called Neotropical migrants, in the last two decades. Neotropical migrants are the colorful songbirds that live and breed here through the spring and summer, yet must migrate vast distances to Mexico, Central and South American and the Caribbean in the winter. Less than ten percent of the songbirds we love to hear and watch in the spring actually winter hear. Most are Neotropical migrants. For instance blackpoll warblers migrate non-stop for 2,300 miles over an 86-hour commute from Eastern North America. Red eyed vireos, scarlet tanagers, song sparrow, meadowlark, ovenbirds; the list goes on and on, over twenty species have been recognized to be in decline locally.

Studies over the last two decades has laid much of the blame on the decline in loss of large tracts of land, over 500 acres, to development. Indeed urban parks protected decades ago have fallen silent to many of the wooded songbirds historically found in them. They have become “silent woods”. For a variety of reasons the fragmented woodlands have become sink holes to songbirds, particularly ground nesting birds like the ovenbird. Predators such as skunks, raccoons and even our lovely house cats efficiently sweep these smaller woodlots clean during their foraging. Skunk and raccoon numbers can explode with little natural control thanks to the availability of our trash and pet foods. The smaller lots also increase the “edge effect” which actually encourages several species which directly compete with the neotropical migrants, such as jays, starlings, cowbirds, orioles and even crows which also pray on the eggs and young of these species.

Most New Hampshire sportsmen see this ever-increasing encroachment on their favorite hunting or even fishing spot too. It seems like houses spring up like fall mushrooms in their local woodcock, grouse or rabbit cover. Indeed woodcock too are on a twenty-year decline thanks to diminishing habitat and likely similar losses to predators as the songbirds. In fact a recent study of the New England cottontail rabbit showed that habitat fragmentation along the coast and the Merrimack River basin have reduced their numbers. The New England cottontail will soon be listed as a Federally listed endangered species.

There is no easy solution to the loss of habitat but it is becoming increasingly obvious that the future of land protection in New Hampshire will primarily happen on the local level. State funding of the LCHIP land conservation program fell to a pittance for the current biennium. Local land trusts and town open space and conservation commissions have had to take the initiatives for land conservation. Sportsmen would do well to support these efforts. Will there be a local initiative in your town to place money in the town budget for conservation? Now is the time to get involved in your town to support or initiate these efforts. Study after study, nearly 20 right here in New Hampshire; clearly show that conservation land reduces the tax rate. Local conservation pays like never before and is needed more than ever right now!

 Local land trusts like the Bear-Paw Regional Greenway in Rockingham County can make a significant difference in New Hampshire by preserving large blocks of habitat over 500 acres and by adding additional acreage to existing protected lands increasing the size and the value of these lots. Will your favorite woods be silent? Or will you grand children here the melodious notes of a wood thrush? You can give song to our forests of the future through Bear-Paw’s conservation efforts (Bear-Paw.org) or your local land trust. Your support for land conservation is needed now more than ever!

Eric Orff
01/20/04

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Big Bucks Abound in New Hampshire- Right Now!

Think big, really big when it comes to bucks in New Hampshire. After all the really biggest bucks on record have been taken in the Granite state fairly recently. Four out of the top-ten have been taken within the last ten years and all of the biggest bucks within the last twenty years.

 Since 1999 the New Hampshire Antler and Skull Trophy Club (NHASTC) assumed the responsibility of the state’s trophy deer program each year president Roscoe Blaisdell (603-895-9947) provides the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department with a list of the top bucks entered into the trophy deer program. The top ten firearms, muzzleloader and archery deer (all over 200 ponds) are listed in the departments Wildlife Harvest Summary.

 A look at this years report shows that during the 2002 deer hunting seasons archery hunters in particular set three new records with bucks weighing 252 pounds as well as 251.5 and 242.5 pounds. Essentially all of the record archery buck kills have been within the last decade. Jeremiah Donaldson of Albany NH has the top archery buck at 252 pounds taken in 2002 in Carroll County.

 All the record muzzle load killed bucks have been taken since 1990 as well. Right now Scott Magoon of Topsham VT. Holds the lead in the muzzleloader category with a 277-pound buck taken in 198 somewhere in Coos County.

 New Hampshire’s’ top rifle killed deer was taken in 1985 by Arnold Girroir of West Newbury Ma. And weighed in at 289.5 pounds. It too was taken in Coos County. Although Coos County certain leads the pack in producing consistent record bucks numbers, every county is represented in one category or another in the listing of trophy deer in the 2002 Harvest Report. So no matter where you live or hunt in New Hampshire you’ve got a good chance of taking a buck of a lifetime.

 Further analysis of deer statistics in the Harvest Report provides some other interesting facts about the state’s deer. While not everyone can expect to tag a trophy buck, even New Hampshire’s’ yearling bucks are surprisingly robust. For instance over 73 percent of the yearling bucks had at least one forked antler. Yearling buck weights were good as well averaging000 pounds.  New Hampshire’s’ relatively low hunter densities means that more deer simply make it to the older age classes where you expect to see trophy bucks. In fact in 2002 only 38 percent of the adult buck kill was a yearling. Age 2.5 bucks made up 28 percent of the kill. Even 3-½ year old bucks, a rare find in many other states, accounted for 21 percent of the kill. Most interesting was the fact that 8 percent were age 4 ½ and those at least 5 ½ years old made up 4 percent of the buck kill.

 This means there’s lots of old bucks scraping up New Hampshire’s’ countryside right now.

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