Passport to Texas

This is Passport to Texas

Drought doesn’t just affect how green your lawn is. It also affects wildlife.

Robert Perez, the parks and Wildlife’s upland game bird program leader, says ground nesting birds like the endangered Attwater’s prairie chicken are vulnerable during droughts.

11—Even winter rain is important for those species to get their greens and get their vitamins and get their body ready to get into the breeding season. Once they breed they need soil moisture in the form of rainfall on the mostly native grasses.

Agency water resources branch chief, Cindy Loeffler, says sometimes the drought can become worse when people use too much water. And animals in Texas springs are some of the most affected.

12—There are plans in place to go in and remove endangered species from these springs and put them in locations for safe-keeping in case the springs do go dry.

Drought can also cause coastal waters to have high salt-concentrations. That means species like oysters suffer.

11—The predators that prey on these oysters do better in higher salinity conditions. So that’s one indicator of how we’re doing in our bays and estuaries is how the oysters are doing.

And right now, says Loeffler, the oysters aren’t happy.

We receive support for our series from the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program, funded by your purchase of fishing and hunting equipment and motor boat fuel…

For Texas Parks and Wildlife I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Wildlife and Drought Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

TPW TV: Mountain Biking Big Bend Ranch Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

 
This is Passport to Texas

When the weather cools, and you’re ready to engage the outdoors again, strike out on two wheels. Get a taste of a mountain biking adventure on the TPW TV show. Producer, Alan Fisher.

Mountain biking is gaining popularity at Big bend Ranch vast state park.

Big Bend Ranch State Park is the biggest State Park that we have in the state of Texas—310 thousand acres and about 388 miles of road, trail, route.

So, are you following a couple of people on bike?

We followed a group of people who went on hundred mile ride over four days. They had quite an experience.

It is challenging in places. It’s smooth in places. *This is awesome!* What I love about Big Bend Ranch is it has a little bit of everything.

If you’re doing a multi-day ride out there, you really need to have somebody helping you carry some gear. There are also day rides that are options with interesting routes that you can bike.

Who’s your sag support when you’re out there?

Well, there were just hours and hours of jouncing around in a vehicle. It is a difficult place to get around, and that’s another great thing about seeing Big Bend Ranch State Park on a bicycle—there are areas you can access that you really can’t take a car, so it’s really a neat way to explore the park.

Thanks, Alan!

Check your local listings for air times.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Bison Celebration September 17, 2011 Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Caprock Canyon SP has much to offer visitors. Some folks have even called it the hidden gem of the state park system. Park Superintendent Donald Beard can support that claim.

29— We have beautiful canyon country. We have thousand foot elevation drops. Twenty-eight miles of biking, hiking, and equestrian trails inside the park. Plus, we have our Trailway, which is an abandoned railroad line, which runs from Estelline to South Plains–65 miles long. It has Clarity tunnel, which is home to 250-thousand to half a million Brazilian free-tail bats that emerge nightly. We just have so much to offer here…it’s an amazing place. You can come here and spend all kinds of time and never see it all.

The park also has the official state bison herd. And on Saturday September 17, everyone can celebrate the completion of the first phase of a park’s restoration project, which triples the room these animals have to roam.

24—We’re going to start out the day with an official ribbon cutting to celebrate the fact that we are completing phase one. And then that will kick off our day’s activities. We’re going to have food vendors, we’ll have a lot of living history type exhibitors, with buffalo hunter camps. Native American camps… Pioneer days type stuff. It’s just going to be an all day fun thing. Everybody’s invited to come on out.

Find details about the September 17 Bison Celebration at Caprock Canyon SP at texasstateparks.org.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife I’m Cecilia Nasti.

State Parks: Eisenhower State Park Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

Eisenhower State Park, on the shores of Lake Texoma, is a mid-sized park that offers BIG recreational opportunities, as our SP guide Bryan Frazier explains.

It sits right on the shores of 75-thousand acre Lake Texoma. It’s way up by Denison Texas, just south of the Oklahoma border.

And the state park is a great place to access that lake, and there’s water recreation there. It’s also unique because there’s a marina and a store there inside the state park—and it has even has a yacht club. But for fishing and recreation and scenery and an escape from the Dallas Fort Worth area, Eisenhower SP is as good as you’re going to find.

Thanks, Bryan!

That’s our show for today…with funding provided by Chevrolet…building dependable, reliable trucks for more than 90 years.

We record our series at The Block House in Austin.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Bison: Room to Roam Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

The official state bison herd—at Caprock Canyon SP—may be the last true example of the great southern bison.

08— They have roamed this area for centuries, and they have never had any outside influence.

No outside influence as it relates to genetics, says Park Superintendent Donald Beard. The herd will roam freely again with the completion of phase one of a park restoration project.

27—We are in the process of doing a lot of restoration work to return a lot of this park back to what it looked like 300 years ago before European man settled this area. Turning it back into grasslands and giving these bison some area to roam. We’re going to start with the park—fence it off—and turn them back loose again, and hopefully have a wild herd. The management will be as limited as possible, where we don’t have to interact with them, and they are truly wild again.

Park visitors get to experience these examples of true living history up close and personal, says Beard.

23—The way it’s set up is kind of like a Yellowstone type experience. You drive into the park and you are in the boson range, You are on the same side of the fence with them. It’s not like going to a wildlife park where they’re behind another fence—you will be in the area with them. You may have to stop and wait for the herd to cross in front of you. It’s a unique experience to be able to see these animals they once were—roaming the range free.

Celebrate the bison herd this month; we have details on tomorrow’s show.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife I’m Cecilia Nasti.