The Conservancy’s biological effectiveness monitoring team just notified us that two amazing things happened on one of the Conservancy’s preserves. Two of the NBHCP’s “covered species” have been found nesting in places we had not seen before. First, the white faced ibis had not been known to nest inside the Natomas Basin, but had actively foraged in the Basin. Now, they have been seen nesting in a constructed marsh sanctuary in the Conservancy’s Central Basin Reserve Area for the first time this year. Second, tricolored blackbirds have forsaken invasive Himalaya blackberry as a nesting site for near-marsh emergent vegetation, planted by the Conservancy in part to provide succession planting to the Himalaya blackberries.
These two events tell us that what is being done to provide these covered species with a safe, protected, enhanced refuge is an indication the NBHCP is working as envisioned. This is an important day for the NBHCP’s “plan operator,” (that is, the Conservancy). Kind of makes it all worthwhile!
