Passport to Texas

Teaching about prairies. Image: Texas Children in Nature.

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This is Passport to Texas

Less than 1% of the original 20 million acres of Texas’ tallgrass prairie remains. But restoration efforts are ongoing, and even small pockets of prairie have value.

Our vision for this prairie is that eventually we get back to what it was 250 years ago which would have been six to nine foot tall grasses mixed with forbes and other wildflowers.

Carolyn Klein teaches science at Westside High, in Houston, along with her colleague Lawrence Spence. The land that sustains this pocket prairie was originally destined to be a school parking lot.

Having a prairie here on campus enables us to bring students out during the school day. We don’t have to rent a bus. We just walk them outside and we have access to wild spaces.

In a segment airing this month on the Texas Parks and Wildlife TV Series, you’ll meet Westside educators, students and the prairie. Counselor, Jaime Gonzales is also on the show.

I’m trying to fix a broken relationship between people and nature. I think we’re working in a hybrid world. Technology’s cool, but Nature—which is very ancient and a part of us—I think needs to be a part of our lives, too, because it keeps us grounded and healthy.

These plant communities sustain pollinators and other wildlife. The pocket prairie segment airs on the Texas Parks and Wildlife TV series on PBS the week of December 18. Check your local listings.

The Wildlife Restoration program supports our show.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Golden fronted woodpecker, and golden voiced ornithologist, Cliff Shackelford

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This is Passport to Texas

Birds use their songs as a means of communication. But there are other ways birds get their point across, too.

Woodpeckers communicate by means of drumming.

Woodpeckers are the Questlove or Ringo Star of the bird world, and know how to make a racket.

Something like this: Brrrrrrrrrr. Very loud. Rapid succession beats to an object. Usually it’s going to be wood.

Those are the country woodpeckers. The city-dwelling woodpeckers drum on different surfaces.

They [woodpeckers] found in urban areas that we have metal rooves, telephone poles, aluminum gutters… These things really resonate and amplifies that drum to where that bird can cover more ground when drumming.

What are woodpeckers communicating through their drumming? And are they damaging property doing it?

When you hear that rapid-fire brrrrrrr, he’s not hurting anything. He’s just found a spot that really resonates, and he’s communicating to other woodpeckers, saying: ‘Hey, I’m the male here. This is my territory.’ And he’s also telling females: ‘Hey, if you’re interested, I’m here, too.’

Put a little smooth jazz or Barry White in the background and you have a bird version of love line.

The Wildlife Restoration program supports our show.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Duck hunting

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This is Passport

Although waterfowl numbers are expected to be somewhat lower than last year, they’re still near record when compared to the long term average; the total number of ducks headed south looks promising

Conditions on the coast this year are going to be better for the ducks. What’s better for the ducks is not necessarily better for duck hunters. When you have dry conditions, birds are concentrated. Now there’s going to be good habitat conditions across the coast so everybody is going to be sharing in the wealth this year.

Dave Morrison is Small Game Program Director at Texas Parks and Wildlife. He expects an above average duck season with broader distribution of birds, despite a slight down turn in overall populations compared to last year. Having said that, the outlook for goose is should be better.

I actually had the good fortune of going to the breeding grounds this summer. We spent two weeks up there in Manitoba banding geese and from what I saw, it looks like goose numbers are going to be better than last year. We saw quite a bit of young of the year in there and so production looks like it’s going to be up. When production is up for geese, it means you got a bunch of young ones coming down that have not seen this game before, makes them more available to the hunters. So hopefully, our goose season may be a little bit better this year than last.

For complete waterfowl hunting information in Texas, get the Texas Outdoor Annual. Find it on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

The Wildlife Restoration program supports our series.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Deer suffering from Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD).

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This is Passport to Texas

The outlook for deer season is outstanding thanks to plentiful rainfall. White-tail program leader, Alan Cain.

The rainfall that’s been very prevalent across the state this year, has also provided great vegetation for the mule deer and the pronghorn out there in West Texas. Hunters that are out there pursuing mule deer and pronghorn will have an excellent year [too].

To maintain healthy herds, biologists want hunters to help monitor deer for Chronic Wasting Disease [CWD]—a neurological disease that kills deer, but has no known effect on humans.

Chronic wasting disease has been a concern in Texas since 2012—since the first discovery in the trans Pecos. We also had a new positive discovered in the Panhandle this past hunting season 2015.

Texas Parks and Wildlife created mandatory containment and surveillance zones for Chronic Wasting Disease testing and rules for transporting harvested deer in parts of west Texas.

Hunters in those Chronic Wasting Disease zones that harvest a deer, are required to bring those deer to the check stations so our staff can pull a CWD sample. We do have another CWD zone in portions of Medina, Uvalde and Bandera counties; and that is a voluntary surveillance zone. So, we would appreciate all the help we can get from our hunters out there to bring deer in so we can monitor for CWD.

Find more information on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

The Wildlife restoration program supports our series.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Anderson Ranch in the Texas Panhandle

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This is Passport to Texas

Holiday gift giving season is upon us, and if you have nature lovers on your list—the giving is easy—and twice as nice.

A seventy-dollar Texas State Parks Pass is a thoughtful gift for your outdoor enthusiast. Pass holders enjoy twelve months of unlimited visits to more than ninety state parks and historic sites. They also get discounts on camping and recreational equipment rentals. Money spent on the pass supports your Texas state parks.

For thirty dollars each, you can give the drivers on your list a conservation license plate. Twenty-two dollars from every sale goes directly to help fund conservation efforts in Texas.

Give every outdoor lover on your list access to more than a million acres of public land—with the Limited Use Permit—for the ridiculously reasonable price of twelve dollars.

Permit holders receive twelve months of access to Texas’ wildlife management areas, where they can fish, hike, bird watch, cycle, and camp.

When you give one of these gifts, you delight the receiver, and help support state parks and conservation in Texas.

The Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation supports our series and helps keep Texas wild with support of proud members across the state.

Find out more at tpwf.org

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.