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Marquette earns ‘Bird Friendly’ designation

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Marquette has been designated a “Bird Friendly Community” by the organization Bird Friendly Iowa. Driftless Area Wetlands Centre Director Alicia Mullarkey and resident Dennis Mason, who’s helped establish a thriving purple martin population in Marquette, are pictured with BFI Coordinator Annie Fangman at an April 29 event. (Photos by Audrey Posten)

Bird researcher Jon Stravers honored Rodney Rovang, who last fall retired after 40 years at Effigy Mounds National Monument. As natural resource director, Rovang’s efforts at the park supported cerulean warblers, peregrine falcons and other bird species.

Recognition ties into area’s larger bird conservation efforts

 

By Audrey Posten, Times-Register

 

An April 29 event at the Driftless Area Wetlands Centre recognized local bird conservation efforts as well as Marquette’s recent designation as a “Bird Friendly Community.” The musical group Big Blue Sky performed a special concert, with proceeds going toward Driftless Area Bird Conservation.

 

Bird Friendly Community recognition is given to counties and cities by the organization Bird Friendly Iowa (BFI). Coordinator Annie Fangman, who at the event presented several signs and a flag announcing Marquette’s new status, said the program is similar to Tree City USA in that each city or county must meet criteria. Approval is given by the BFI steering committee, which is comprised of conservation professionals.

 

“We have three criteria: creating habitat for birds, reducing threats to birds—keeping cats indoors and window collision education—and educational events, so stuff like the Wetlands Centre does and county conservation,” Fangman explained. “It is also about networking and bringing communities together. There is a larger effort to make this a nation-wide thing as well, which makes sense with how birds migrate. Our website will have birding hot spots on there, and we’re hoping it will help more of the tourism aspect.”

 

The honor is not surprising considering Marquette falls within the Bird Conservation Area of Northeast Iowa, which is as a “Globally Significant Bird Area,” said Jon Stravers, bird researcher and leader of Big Blue Sky.

 

Stravers recognized both Dennis Mason, who has helped establish a thriving purple martin population in Marquette, and Rodney Rovang, recently-retired natural resource director at Effigy Mounds National Monument whose efforts supported cerulean warblers, peregrine falcons and other bird species in the park.

 

Mason said his interest in purple martins dates back 30 years, when he first tried establishing housing for the birds at his home.

 

“I wasn’t very successful. I had to learn a lot,” he quipped.

 

Around 15 years ago, he began focusing on the Marquette riverfront. With help from friend Dan Beck of Elkader, they found favorable housing for the birds.

 

“His father designed and built what I call the Beck House, which is the square, eight-compartment ones we have at the riverfront. Dan and his father grew gourds, and we’ve got some of those down there also. I didn’t do it by myself,” said Mason, who additionally credited the Marquette Action Club for donating housing materials and the high school for building houses.

 

The group effort has been successful.

 

“Last year, we fledged 225 purple martins in Marquette,” Mason said.

 

Mason’s and Beck’s latest focus has been on shutting off some of the compartments on the riverfront to divert purple martins to Mason’s home on the Marquette bench.

 

 

“Our fear was that if something happened, like a great horned owl, they would abandon the site. We wanted to spread them out and make more colonies. It’s been very successful,” Mason shared.

 

Stravers commended the efforts, which harken back to Native American tradition. Gourds were hung in villages to attract martins, which would then eat bugs and create a more comfortable campsite.

 

“Now, all summer long, the purple martins are down there cheering up the place, eating the bugs and making the Marquette riverfront a little more delightful,” Stravers said.

 

Rovang, who retired last fall after 40 years at Effigy Mounds, was recognized for his care of the mounds and park, prairie reconstruction and forest management. The latter created what Stravers called perfect habitat for cerulean warblers.

 

“One of the things he did was forest management on top of the mounds, where he opened up the forest so you could see through. It kind of recreated the savanna. Now, the cerulean cluster is right on top of where he did this forest management,” Stravers explained.

 

Rovang was additionally part of a group that, over two decades ago, re-established peregrine falcons on the cliffs at Effigy Mounds. Like bald eagles, peregrines were one of the species most sensitive to DDT, but unlike eagles, which Stravers said had a recoverable population, there were no peregrines falcons left in the eastern half of the United States.

 

“We had no peregrines to recover, so we had to reintroduce them to the land,” Stravers noted.

 

Rovang said he was supportive of the project because of its roots in the area’s ecological history. He discovered that Ellison Orr, a self taught archeologist and birder who was integral in the creation of Effigy Mounds National Monument, had documented one of the last nesting sites in the eastern U.S. at Waukon Junction, just north of the park.

 

“That was in the early- to mid-1960s,” Rovang said. “So they belonged here. I knew this reintroduction to the bluff sites was what needed to happen. This was the synergy of the right people in the right place at the right time.”

 

Now, there are around a dozen active sites on the cliffs, with all current peregrines tracing their heritage to those original birds.

 

These efforts, stressed Stravers, contribute to the Effigy Mounds-Yellow River bird conservation area.

 

And they are part of what makes Marquette a bird hot spot too, according to Wetlands Centre Director Alicia Mullarkey. Marquette city limits alone have over 250 acres of habitat for birds, including the purple martin sanctuary and the Wetlands Centre. 

 

The Wetlands Centre has seen an abundance of diverse bird activity during recent flooding. The number of geese in the wetland area doubled and a pair of sandhill cranes that first nested in 2020 have returned.

 

“It was an easy designation for us in Marquette because of all the work everybody has done and all these wonderful conservation areas. We’ve got Effigy Mounds to the north, Bloody Run trout stream, Pikes Peak, Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation has property, Phil Specht with his bird sanctuary,” Mullarkey said. “We wouldn’t be able to do what we do without all the conservation partners we have—whether it’s conservation or land management or just appreciating birds. It’s such an incredible place for birding and bird habitat.”

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