Please view the full set of January announcements by clicking here. Opportunities and contacts, websites, and other details are available on the calendar.
Thanks to our guests and members for joining us. I hope all feel welcome at NTMN.
Take care,
Rebecca Posten
President
North Texas Master Naturalist
Have any friends who may be interested in becoming a Texas Master Naturalist?
photo by Kent Trulsson
The application window for 2024 NTMN class is now open! Applications are being accepted between September 15 and October 31, 2023.
We are sad to announce the loss of John White, NTMN class of 2016, who passed away on August 19. He served the chapter as Outreach Director and was co-leader on the development of the Pollinator Trunk.
After a life lived by the motto of “When given the choice to sit it out or dance –dance!” and a brave year of facing cancer, John (Johnny) Branum White, passed away with his beautiful bride Elaine (Epps) White by his side.
John was born on March 19, 1952 to mother Patsy Ann (Jenkins) White and father John Allen White who predeceased him. He grew up in Garland, Texas with his younger brother Jeff to play with and boss around. In 1973, he married his high school sweetheart, Elaine L. White. Together they raised their six children, instilling in them such values as, “Life is short, eat dessert first,” and “Leave every place better than how you found it,” and “If that’s rock n’ roll you’re listening to, turn it up!”
He and Elaine celebrated their 50th anniversary on August 18, 2023. With meticulous attention to detail, John worked as a material scientist specializing in failure analysis. He loved his family, music, nature, gardening, learning, weight lifting, data, and protein. He was an attentive listener, friend to many, and a great conversationalist.
John is survived by his wife, six children, four grandchildren, two daughter-in-laws, as well as his brother, nieces, and nephew.
John’s family has asked that memorials be made to a charity of your choice.
North Texas Master Naturalists:
If you are attending the 2023 annual meeting in October, you might qualify for a scholarship from the chapter. We have limited funds available for members in financial need.
Qualification for scholarships may include:
1. Members who are presenting at the conference.
2. Members who have not attended a Texas Master Naturalist Annual Meeting in the past.
3. Members who are submitting items to be judged at the conference (chapter project, video, etc.).
2023 Texas Master Naturalist Annual Meeting Scholarship Application
Applications are due by September 28.
Please contact Tim Skipworth, Vice President, with any questions.
vi***********@**mn.org
The Announcements
It’s time to RSVP for a special valentine to the chapter: our Annual Banquet on Wednesday, February 1, 2023 at Texas Discovery Gardens. For details please see the invitation emailed on January 6th. Please view the full set of January announcements by clicking here. Further activities are listed on the chapter calendar. Opportunities and contacts, websites, and other details are available here.
Highlights of the Meeting
Recognition – Congratulations to Master Naturalists achieving major milestones in the fourth quarter of 2022!
250 Hours – Susan Roberts, Gail Elmendorf, Leea Thompson Fudge
500 Hours – Rebecca Trevino
Well done, each of you!
Competitive Birding/Pollinator Bioblitz
Many thanks to Shelly Plante, Nature Tourism Manager with Texas Parks and Wildlife for a very engaging presentation on the Great Texas Birding Classic and the Pollinator Bioblitz.
Birding – Shelly used a discussion of wildlife watching to introduce the Great Texas Birding Classic. Over 4.4 million people engage in viewing wildlife in Texas each year, with an economic impact over $13 billion. This is many times greater that the involvement and impact of hunting and clearly a major activity in the state.
That high level of engagement led to the idea of developing wildlife trails around the state, to guide activity and identify viewing locations. In 1996 Texas became the first state to implement wildlife trails and now has 9 trails featuring some 920 sites. With 90 state parks in Texas, trails significantly expand opportunities for folks to view wildlife.
Detailed interactive trail maps are available online here. Holiday flash sale for paper maps: through January 15th Shelly is offering these colorful maps by mail order from the online form.
One way for Master Naturalists to help improve the trails is through the Adopt-a-Loop program. Volunteers review trail segments to identify needs and recommend new sites.
While these trails help address the growing need for access to nature, maintaining and improving them requires ongoing funding. The Great Texas Birding Classic was created to help meet that need.
The Great Texas Birding Classic (GTBC) is designed to be a casual, fun competition to raise funds for birding and bird habitat. Proceeds from entry fees and sponsorships are distributed annually as grants. From registration to category selection to final reporting, the entire GTBC process is online, with data submittal via the eBird app.
Taking advantage of spring migration, the competition runs from April 15 through May 15 each year. The registration deadline is April 1. Participation has grown steadily. In 2022, 187 teams participated (over 1,100 individuals) and $45,000 in grants were awarded.
Shelly reviewed how the GTBC works and focused particularly on the Big Sit category. It involves counting all day from a set 50-foot circle, sort of a long birding tailgate party. She shared interesting locations, advocacy approaches, food spreads, and success stories.
Other categories include Sunrise to Noon, Texas Two-Stop, State Park and Human-powered. The Outta-Sight Song Birder Tournament was designed to include birders who are visually impaired. In this category birders identify by song alone.
Grants disbursed from the GTBC target benefits for bird populations. They protect areas important to birds (land acquisition and habitat restoration), improve access to watch wildlife and enhance conservation awareness. Grants range from $1,000 to $10,000. Last year three Master Naturalist chapters won grants.
Shelly encouraged us to field teams, find sponsors, compete, and apply for grants. She emphasized that each year the birds are the big winner!
Moving to the Pollinator Bioblitz Shelly described how the event is used to raise awareness of pollinators. It includes both plant and animal observations. She discussed the competition, the daily challenges, leaderboards and participation on social media.
Like the GTBC, data from this bioblitz also contributes to citizen science.
Going Deeper: TPWD Nature Tourism page
Great Texas Wildlife Trail Maps are available online in interactive format; Hard copies of these maps are available by mail-in order form
Great Texas Birding Classic general information and links
GTBC grant information
GTBC Facebook page
TPWD Pollinator Bioblitz page (2023 dates TBD)
TPWD Private Lands and Habitat Program
Contact information: Shelly Plante
When the recording of this meeting is available, it will be posted here.
Thanks to our guests and members for participating in this month’s meeting. I hope all feel welcome at NTMN.
Take care,
Scott Hudson
President
North Texas Master Naturalist
The Announcements
Save the date for a special valentine to the chapter: Annual Banquet on Wednesday, February 1, 2023 at Texas Discovery Gardens. Please view the full set of December announcements by clicking here. Further activities are listed on the chapter calendar. Opportunities and contacts, websites, and other details are available in the announcements.
Highlights of the Meeting read more…
The Announcements
It’s National Hispanic Heritage Month! We are honoring our members with Hispanic/Latin American heritage. Please open this presentation to learn more by clicking here. Note that announcements begin immediately after the Hispanic Heritage slides. Further activities are listed on the chapter calendar. Opportunities and contacts, websites, and other details are available in the announcements.
Highlights of the Meeting
Recognition – Congratulations to Master Naturalists achieving major milestones in the third quarter of 2022.
250 Hours – Adrienne Cortez, Mark Jones, Nicole Jones, Margaret Marshall, Kim Sanders George, Shelby Smith
500 Hours – Sierra Carter, Doug Guiling, Julia Koch
1000 Hours – Cecilie Wallace
And Wow! 2500 Hours – Bruce Leiding
Well done, each of you!
Protecting Dark Skies for Humans & Wildlife
A huge thank you to Dr. Karen McGraw for such an excellent presentation on light pollution, its effects, and how to protect dark skies. Karen is the North Texas Outreach Coordinator for the International Dark-Skies Association (IDA), Texas Chapter.
Karen began by helping us recall our own experiences under a truly dark sky and how healthful that can feel. She then reviewed the extent of global light pollution and the alarming rate at which it is increasing, twice the rate of population growth. A nighttime satellite view illustrated the extent of light pollution and its impacts on key bird migration routes.
To frame her discussion, Karen defined light pollution as excessive or inappropriate uses of artificial light. She categorized light pollution as glare, skyglow, light trespass, or clutter and gave examples of each.
Karen reviewed the effects of excessive artificial light, especially blue light, on human health – how it can disrupt our natural rhythms. Even dim light suppresses our melatonin production, impacting our immune systems. Recent studies suggest links between blue light exposure and heart disease, obesity, and cancer. Her demonstration using diffraction grating glasses showed how much blue light we’re exposed to from phones, computers and various home light sources. Thus, she recommends lowering home lighting levels an hour or two before going to bed.
Of course, artificial light also affects wildlife. When exposed to night lighting, birds’ metabolism does not slow down adequately, preventing needed rest. Light pollution affects navigation, especially during migration, contributing to the hundreds of millions of fatal bird-building collisions.
Night lighting also disrupts turtle navigation, particularly with newly hatched turtles trying to make their way to the sea. Further, it affects amphibian behavior. For example, frogs reduce or stop calling and have less success finding mates. They are less able to find cover and avoid predation.
Artificial lighting affects insect communication, foraging, reproduction and pollinating. Quoting one researcher, “We strongly believe artificial light at night – in combination with habitat loss, chemical pollution, invasive species and climate change – is driving insect declines. We posit that artificial light at night is another important – but often overlooked – bringer of the insect apocalypse.”
Karen outlined three key outdoor lighting challenges: glare and safety, light trespass, and wasted energy costs. She showed how high levels of outside lighting often create so much glare that they are neither safe nor effective.
Light trespass from unshielded fixtures creates about 75% of artificial sky brightness, with the rest coming from street lights. Unshielded lighting wastes energy and money by lighting areas (and sky) that we don’t want or need to.
IDA has developed five principles to remedy these problems:
Following these guidelines significantly increases safety, reduces glare and trespass, and saves energy. Most of all, they promote a darker sky.
In closing Karen encouraged us to take action by
Going Deeper:
Karen provided these additional resources:
The recording of this meeting is available here.
Thanks to our guests and members for participating in this month’s meeting. I hope all feel welcome at NTMN.
Take care,
Scott Hudson
President
North Texas Master Naturalist
View the full set of August announcements by clicking here. Further activities are listed on the chapter calendar. Opportunities and contacts, websites, and other details are available in the announcements.
Highlights of the meeting
Recognition – Congratulations to our 2nd Quarter Milestone Achievers: 250 Hours – Lybo Buchanan, Dan Matkin; 500 Hours – Adam Cochran, Sarah Hutchings; 1000 Hours – Judy Cato, Carrie Robinson, Barbara Wilson; and 2500 Hours – Don Pearson. Well done!
Honorary Membership: The chapter voted to confer Honorary North Texas Master Naturalist Membership on pioneering environmentalist Ned Fritz (1916-2008).
Lights Out: Safer Skies for Migrating Birds
Many thanks to Yvette Stewart, Audubon Texas, and Dr. Tania Homayoun, Texas Parks and Wildlife, for an enlightening presentation on light pollution and building collisions, and for challenging us with practical actions we can take to make bird migration safer.
Tania began with an overview of migration, stresses on bird populations, and the critical role Texas has for birds. While migration allows birds to take advantage of abundant food supply and nesting areas year round, it comes with the need for safe habitat in each season.
Dangers – That habitat is rarely safe. Risks from light pollution and proximity to the built landscape is especially high for songbirds, raptors and shorebirds that migrate at lower altitudes. Some 70% of birds migrate, of these 80% do so at night.
Threats from light and building collisions stress already declining bird numbers, accounting for a billion bird deaths annually. By far the largest losses are to domestic and feral cats, at some three billion birds annually. These losses are compounded by habitat fragmentation, light and chemical pollution, and climate change.
Texas’ role – Our state is critical because of the rapid growth in our interconnected megaregions and because we are on the Central Flyway (and part of the Mississippi). Some 630 bird species, including 98.5% of North America’s Neotropicals have been recorded in Texas. Particularly after crossing the Gulf of Mexico, birds need good stopover habitat to rest and refuel.
The rate and pattern of growth in Texas have made Houston and Dallas two of the highest migration risk areas in the United States. The danger is highest for night migrators and increases for insectivorous and woodland species.
Hazards from built environment – Two building elements work together to create collision risk: glass, its reflectivity and invisibility, and light, especially overly bright or misdirected light that creates glare and sky glow. Building height is also a factor, with most fatal collisions at low rise structures (2-11 stories), followed by lower buildings.
Practical measures – Yvette picked up this thread, outlining what we can do to minimize these hazards – at personal, community, and statewide levels.
Looking first at our homes, daytime solutions include window stickers, UV paint, Acopian barriers, and other deterrents that follow the 2”x4” rule. At night, it is important to only light areas when and where actually needed, outdoors and in. Consider lower levels, motion sensors, and using warm white tones.
At the community level Yvette encouraged participating in citizen science through iNaturalist and morning bird surveys. She also stressed the importance of social media (hashtag #LightsOutTexas) and educating friends and neighbors.
Using social media at the state level is also powerful, particularly identifying positive and negative decisions. Supporting PROs (proclamations, resolutions, ordinances), scheduling meetings, and engaging with coalitions round out the toolkit.
Our challenge – Yvette closed with this: Knowing that it makes a real difference, would you commit to:
Resources: Tania and Yvette passed along these additional contacts and information sources. They welcome your questions on birds and conservation at Ta************@********as.gov and yv************@*****on.org.
When the recording of this meeting is available, it will be posted here.
Thanks to our guests and members for participating in this month’s meeting. I hope all feel welcome at NTMN.
Take care,
Scott Hudson
President
North Texas Master Naturalist
North Texas Master Naturalists:
If you are attending the 2022 annual meeting in October, you might qualify for a scholarship from the chapter. We have limited funds available for members in financial need.
Qualification for scholarships may include:
1. Members who are presenting at the conference.
2. Members who have not attended a Texas Master Naturalist Annual Meeting in the past.
3. Members who are submitting items to be judged at the conference (chapter project, video, etc.).
NTMN Annual Meeting Scholarship Application Form
Applications are due by October 15.
Please contact Susannah Moore, Vice President, with any questions.
vi***********@**mn.org
The Announcements
View the full set of July announcements by clicking here. There are many chapter activities available. The calendar lists more opportunities to get involved. Please note the Landowner Workshop coming up July 16 at AgriLife on Coit. Opportunities and contacts, websites, and other details are available here.
Highlights of the Summer Social
Recognition – Congratulations to all of our early certifiers in the Class of 2022. Well done!
Meg Botteon Mary Carter Anne Edwards
Tim Gibson Mackenzie Hall Laura Haynes
Blythe Kamin Ben Knaus Heather Mishra
Christopher Morris Rebecca Posten Priscilla Shane
Shelby Smith Frankie Vaca
We also took time to remember fellow naturalists who died over the past year:
Shannon Love, Class of 2012 Michelle Miles, Class of 2016
Sandy Stinson, Class of 2004 Kenny Wickline, Class of 2015
We miss each of you.
New Class Projects – Many thanks to our new class members for outstanding presentations on your class projects. For 2022 the projects are Campo Santo Monarch Waystation, Forest Trunk Educational Materials, Tenison Park Riparian Restoration, and Buckeye Trail & Bonton/Ideal Community Outreach.
Not only did each team offer outstanding displays of their work, but also they presented project overviews to the whole group. These projects create new resources for the chapter and will have ongoing impact in the community.
Thanks to our guests and members for participating in this year’s summer social. I hope all feel welcome at NTMN. Special thanks to the Hospitality and Programs teams for making this such a fun event.
Take care,
Scott Hudson
President
North Texas Master Naturalist