Wildlife Commission biologists Ryan Heise and Rob Nichols examine a robust redhorse collected from the Pee Dee River in April.

North Carolina’s submission of its conservation strategy made it eligible to receive an estimated $1.4 million in state wildlife grants (SWG) in 2005 from the Fish and Wildlife Service. From 2001-2004, North Carolina received $4.7 million in SWG money, a number that swelled to $6.1 million after receiving its $1.4 million for 2005.

The Wildlife Commission uses SWG money to support research and management that benefit fish, wildlife and their habitats. Commission biologists direct funds to species with the greatest conservation need, taking into consideration the conservation funding already in place for those species.

“The Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy is an effective resource for broad-reaching conservation action in North Carolina because it links species and habitat conservation issues,” said Salinda Daley, who coordinated North Carolina’s strategy. “Our strategy proposes a cost-effective, proactive approach to the conservation of entire wildlife communities, including those animals that traditionally have been underfunded and overlooked.”

Wildlife in North Carolina that will benefit most from the conservation strategy include, among hundreds of others:

• northern flying squirrels, which inhabit high-elevation forests in the southern Appalachians,
• peregrine falcons, which nest on rocky cliffs and outcroppings,
• bog turtles — the smallest turtles in the world — found in cool bogs in North Carolina’s mountains,
• Greensboro burrowing crayfish, which are found only in certain parts of the state’s Piedmont region,
• robust redhorse, a rare fish found in North Carolina only in the Yadkin/Pee Dee River system, and
• gopher frogs, which breed in temporary ponds that can be found in longleaf pine forests.

Congress in May 2002 required each state fish and game agency in the United States to develop its own conservation strategy by October 2005 to remain eligible for federal funding through the state wildlife grants program.

North Carolina’s conservation strategy exceeds 600 pages and took three years to produce. It has been posted on the Wildlife Commission’s Web site, www.ncwildlife.org, in sections that can be downloaded and saved as PDF files. The Wildlife Commission developed its conservation strategy in collaboration with hundreds of conservation partners across the state, including the N.C. Natural Heritage Program, the Audubon Society and The Nature Conservancy.

The strategy builds on all of the conservation efforts that precede it, and it will be strengthened by other conservation strategies being developed by states across the nation, according to Daley.

“It was very important for the Wildlife Commission to develop the strategy by engaging and involving the public — our constituents — as well as conservation partners with whom we work,” Daley said. “Congress required state fish and game agencies to make broad public participation an essential element of developing and implementing our respective conservation strategies. We embraced that mandate, knowing it would strengthen North Carolina’s strategy.”

For more information about wildlife in North Carolina or the Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy, visit the Web sites of the Wildlife Commission (Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy page), the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or the Teaming with Wildlife Initiative.

(Images provided by the NC Wildlife Commission and U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.)

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