Endangered Species Day

What can you do to help endangered species?

This Golden-cheeked Warbler nests only in a Central Texas woodland. Its small breeding range is ever more fragmented by residential development, and its numbers are in serious decline. Endangered Species Day was established by Congress to acknowledge the plight of this warbler and many other creatures, and to encourage all of us to do what we can to save them.
Funding for The Endangered Species Act is renegotiated every year. Be sure to let your elected representatives know how you feel about this issue.

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Transcript:

BirdNote^®

Endangered Species Day

Written by Bob Sundstrom

This is BirdNote and today is Endangered Species Day!

[Whistled notes of Piping Plovers]

Listen to the mellow voices of Piping Plovers. These pale gray shorebirds winter along our Southeastern coasts. [Whistled notes of Piping Plovers] Trying to coexist with humans along our beaches has made life precarious for the tiny Plovers. Their entire population now stands at less than 6500.

This rising series of buzzy notes is the song of a Golden-cheeked Warbler. [Golden-cheeked Warbler song] The only area in the world where it nests is in a Central Texas woodland. This small breeding range is ever more fragmented by residential development and its numbers are in serious decline. [repeat Golden-cheeked Warbler song]

[Loud calls of Whooping Cranes – adult pair calling in unison]

How fortunate would you be to hear the bugling cries of Whooping Cranes! [Loud calls of Whooping Cranes] Although their numbers have been slowly increasing, Whooping Cranes remain one of our rarest birds. Only 600 of these statuesque white cranes exist in the world today, and that includes both wild and captive birds.

All three of these are birds are in danger of going extinct. [calls of Piping Plover]

Endangered Species Day was established by Congress to acknowledge the plight of fragile species, and to encourage all of us to do what we can to save them. Funding for The Endangered Species Act is renegotiated every year. Let your federal representatives know how you feel about this issue.

For BirdNote I’m Mary McCann.

[Whistled notes of Piping Plovers; Golden-cheeked Warbler song; loud calls of Whooping Cranes]

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Call of the birds provided by The Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Whistled notes of Piping Plovers recorded by Dolly Minis; Golden-cheeked Warbler song recorded by Jeffrey Bolsinger; calls of Whooping Cranes recorded by G. Archibald.

Producer: John Kessler

Executive Producer: Chris Peterson

ID# endangeredspeciesday-01-2010-05-21 SotB-endangeredspeciesday-01b