Wildlife

Michigan’s lost prairies: Grassland restoration fights wildlife decline

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By Ruth Thornton

Gary Groff fondly remembers hunting all day on his grandfather’s land as a boy. “For my dad’s life he could not believe that I could go out there before daylight and come back after dark,” he said. 

Now retired for many years, he still hunts the central Michigan property with friends. The parcel is partially wooded and partially farmed, but the farmland is poor. “The soil is sandier than heck,” Groff said, and the farmer who rented it did not make much money from the crops. 

So, a few years ago, they enrolled the parcel in a government set-aside program and seeded it with native grasses and wildflowers. Now, the farmer “gets paid more for leaving it idle than he does for farming,” Groff said.  

The program is one of many by state and federal agencies to restore grasslands and native prairies in Michigan.

Waste

Minnesota debates what counts as carbon-free energy

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By Ruth Thornton
A recent decision by Minnesota’s Public Utilities Commission could mean that wood and trash will be considered “carbon-free” energy sources under the state’s new climate law. The law, passed in 2023, requires all electricity to come from carbon-free sources by 2040, with interim goals defined for 2030 and 2035. However, it did not define which energy sources meet that definition and instead tasked the PUC to make that decision with public input. At first glance, the definition of carbon-free energy seems straightforward. But there is disagreement over the details.

The Buzz

Wolves could expand across the eastern U.S.—but they might need help

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By Ruth Thornton

Gray wolves could thrive in the eastern United States well beyond their current range in the Great Lakes region, but they might have a hard time reaching other suitable habitats without human intervention, researchers say. Wolves once had the largest known range of any land mammal but they were nearly exterminated in the United States in the early 1900s after persecution by humans. 

Their population only recovered after they were placed under federal protection in the 1970s. They have since recolonized some areas where they once flourished, including in Minnesota, Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. 

A 2022 study analyzed which areas in the eastern U.S. still have suitable habitat for wolves and are connected enough to each other so wolves might be able to travel between them. 

To do that, the researchers used survey data collected between 2018 and 2020 by biologists working for the natural resource departments in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan. 

They then modeled the characteristics of the habitats where wolves were found and predicted where else in the eastern U.S. large tracts of suitable areas occur. They also modeled how connected to each other those areas are. They found that six areas had good habitat and were large enough to sustain wolves, but the animals occur in only one of them, the western Great Lakes.

Wildlife

Biologists race to save rare Michigan butterflies from the brink of extinction

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The Poweshiek skipperling has disappeared from most of Michigan’s prairies. Now scientists are raising them in zoos for release back into the wild. By Ruth Thornton

Standing next to a converted hoop house in one of the back areas of John Ball Zoo in Grand Rapids, David Pavlik points to a line of small cloth-covered cages filled with yellow black-eyed Susans and small orange butterflies. “These cages out here are females that have already bred in the facility,” Pavlik said. “They’re out here in the sun laying eggs.”

Pavlik, a research assistant with Michigan State University, is part of an international partnership racing to save a small, inconspicuous butterfly known as the Poweshiek skipperling that was once so common in Midwest prairies that collectors largely ignored them.

Climate

Warmer-than-normal fall likely in Michigan

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By Ruth Thornton

Early fall temperatures in Michigan will likely be higher than average, according to the National Weather Service, but are predicted to return to normal for the winter if long-term predictions hold up. Cort Scholten, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Grand Rapids, Michigan, said precipitation amounts are expected to be near normal for the next three months. “Right now, this outlook is saying that the odds are favoring overall we’ll see more warmer-than-usual days than we will colder than usual days,” he said. Scholten said temperatures are expected to return to near-average in November through December, but with higher-than-average precipitation expected, which could be in the form of either rain or snow. “We’ll still have plenty of temperature swings during the winter,” he said.

: A Blanding's turtle stands at the edge of a wetland. Image: U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
Water

Michigan and Ohio receive $500,000 to study rare turtles

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By Ruth Thornton

State wildlife agencies in Michigan and Ohio have received nearly $500,000 in federal funding to study rare turtles. The grant is part of more than $7 million distributed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to benefit rare and declining fish and wildlife and their habitats across the country. Other states receiving funding under the program this year include Minnesota, Iowa, Hawaii and North and South Carolina. Michigan’s work will focus on Blanding’s and spotted turtles, two rare species that often occur in wetlands. The funding will allow researchers to understand how the populations of both species are doing, especially the survival of nests and baby turtles.

Student researchers Ava Whitlock and Brody Glei get ready to fly a drone equipped with a heat-sensitive camera to find rare eastern massasauga rattlesnakes. Image: Ruth Thorton/WKAR
Wildlife

Researchers use drones to find elusive Michigan rattlesnake

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By Ruth Thornton

Standing together at Pierce Cedar Creek Institute near Hastings, Michigan, two students stared intently at the screen, looking for the subtle signs of the small rattlesnake they were trying to find. The eastern massasauga, Michigan’s only rattlesnake, typically hides in dense vegetation in wetlands, and conservation biologists are concerned about trampling their sensitive wetland habitats to study them. To avoid that problem, researchers are using drones equipped with heat-sensitive cameras to find them. “What I’m looking for is anything that looks what we call ‘snakey,’” said Brody Glei, a student at Grand Valley State University, as he looks at the screen with the camera feed – “where it’s either kind of looking like an S-curve or if it’s in some weird shape that doesn’t really look like vegetation.”

Those studying the rare and elusive eastern massasauga rattlesnake are hampered by its secretive behavior. Massasaugas hide so well that researchers often walk by just inches away without seeing them, Glei said.