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Opportunity knocks! As part of Missouri’s Comprehensive Wildlife Strategy, Conservation Opportunity Areas (COAs) designate some of the best places in the state to conserve all wildlife. COAs include both places you know and are familiar with (the Current and Eleven Point Rivers, Prairie State Park, Mingo National Wildlife Refuge), and also places that are just as important to wildlife, but less familiar on a statewide scale (LaBarque Creek Watershed, Mystic Plains, Missouri River Hills).
A broad partnership of conservation organizations and agencies used scientific data to select these COAs. Now, locally led partnerships are driving activities in many COAs across the state. I recently had the opportunity to spend an afternoon with the Niangua Basin COA team in Lebanon. The Niangua Basin COA includes lands surrounding the Niangua and Little Niangua Rivers, including Bennett Springs State Park, Ha Ha Tonka State Park and Lead Mine Conservation Area. The area is known for its spring-fed streams and potential for healthy, open woodlands. The COA team is currently made up of representatives from the Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC), Missouri Department of Natural Resources, The Nature Conservancy, Audubon Missouri, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, County SWCD/NRCS, Ozark Regional Land Trust and the American Bird Conservancy.
Recent work in the Niangua Basin COA includes the replacement of three low water stream crossings with clear span bridges. This project was made possible with a variety of funding partners, including USFWS, Missouri Conservation Heritage Foundation, FEMA, County Commissions and MDC. The replacement of these three bridges means that 30 miles of additional stream habitat are now available for fish like the federally threatened Niangua Darter.
The Niangua Basin COA team is currently working to increase woodland management within the COA to benefit woodland wildlife including Ozark Swallowtail butterflies, Whip-poor-wills, Summer Tanagers, Orchard Orioles, Wild Turkey and Plains Spotted Skunk.
If you live near the Niangua Basin COA, one of the best ways to get involved is to join the new Master Naturalist Chapter that will be starting in Camdenton in Spring 2009. The Missouri Master Naturalist program is an adult community-based natural resource education and volunteer service program sponsored jointly by the Missouri Department of Conservation and the University of Missouri Extension. For more information on the Master Naturalist program, contact Syd Hime, Missouri Department of Conservation (573-751-4115) or visit www.monaturalist.org.
Conservation of Missouri’s natural resources is too big a job for any one agency or organization. Businesses, organizations, hunters, anglers, birdwatchers, and outdoor enthusiasts all have a role to play.
For more information on Missouri’s Comprehensive Wildlife Strategy (including COAs), visit: www.wildlifeactionplans.org/missouri.html.
Teaming With Wildlife is a national coalition of organizations and businesses in support of additional dedicated funding for fish, forest and wildlife conservation and related education and recreation. Teaming With Wildlife supports implementation of Missouri’s Comprehensive Wildlife Strategy. To add your organization or business to the Teaming With Wildlife Coalition, please visit www.teaming.com/action.
Amy Buechler
Teaming With Wildlife Coordinator, CFM
Reprinted from the November 2008 issue of Missouri Wildlife
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