LOCALadk Magazine

LOCALadk 13 like the loon and the hermit thrush, who would lose nearly all suitable habitat within the Adirondacks. For Snell, Climate Watch was an opportunity to make a meaningful contribution to this ongoing research. He became hooked on birding as an undergraduate stu- dent and went on to study birds for his master's degree before transitioning to a ca- reer in financial planning. "I was looking for something that was more substantive than just counting the birds on my feeder," Snell said. "It probably is my background of wanting to be sort of a, you know, an armchair scientist, because I was originally… trying to be a real scientist… It feels good to actually do something that you believe is actually going to provide important scientific data." So far, the data collected by Snell and other Climate Watch volunteers have vali- dated the predictions of com- puter models, highlighting the important role that they can play in bird conserva- tion. The study focuses on a suite of target species, which in the Adirondacks includes red-breasted and white-breasted nuthatches. "We ac- tually are seeing birds shifting their ranges as we sort of anticipated….and we're seeing that in real time, so we're tracking these range shifts," said Bateman, who co-authored a 2020 scientific publication presenting the results. Researchers are currently analyzing Climate Watch data to test the most current models, which broaden predictions of bird ranges through Mexico, and incor- porate higher resolution and additional environmental variables. Other research projects in the Adirondacks also re- quire data collected over large areas, or long times- cales – or both. The Citizens Statewide Lake Assess- ment Program – or CSL AP – is a partnership between the New York State Department of Environmental Con- servation and the New York State Federation of Lake Associations, Inc. Lake associations across New York State recruit volunteers to collect water samples that provide information about nutrient levels, chlorophyll concentrations, salt levels, and other factors. This in- formation helps identify long-term trends and informs management decisions. Over 210 lakes have been monitored since 1986, with 185 sampled in 2024 alone. "DEC has a fundamental need for this data…I think that the advantage that our CSL AP lakes provide is the high frequency of data… To create the equivalent program using in-house staff would require a lot of staff resources that we don't nec- essarily have," said Alene Onion, Volunteer Water Qual- ity Monitoring Coordinator at the DEC. Water quality in the Adirondacks is also monitored by the Adirondack Lake Assess- ment Program, or AL AP. This partnership between Protect the Adirondacks and the Paul Smith's College Watershed In- stitute also recruits volunteer monitors. "We consider them to be an excellent partner," Onion says, noting that CSL AP monitors fewer lakes in the Ad- irondacks because of AL AP's strong role and emphasizing the collaboration among orga- nizations. Using CSL AP data, research- ers have documented an in- crease in water temperature of approximately 1 degree per decade. "At first (volunteers) were using mercury thermom- eters, now they're using elec- tricity-based thermometers… they're not refined; they're crude. But it's because we've been monitoring since 1986 that we're actually able to see that change," said Onion. Identifying such trends is important to help under- stand the impacts of climate change in the Adirondacks. Community science volunteers play a similarly essen- tial role in statewide surveillance for invasive species. The Adirondack Park Invasive Plant Program, or APIPP, has been conducting invasive species surveillance throughout the Adirondacks for more than 25 years, and has trained nearly 1,300 volunteers. In their aquat- ic projects alone, "collectively with all of our partners and agencies…we've monitored 509 water bodies over that time period…There's no way that APIPP alone, our staff of 4.7, could be able to monitor all these hundreds of lakes," said Brian Greene, APIPP Program Director. APIPP currently has multiple projects dedicated to identifying and tracking invasive species like Eurasian watermilfoil and hemlock wooly adelgid. Early detection is key. "If we can find them earlier in a lake when they're smaller populations…usually you have a much better likelihood that we can successfully manage them and we can also manage them at a much lower cost," said Greene. The same is true for terrestri- al invasives. Volunteer surveillance paid off recently with the identification of Eurasian watermilfoil in Moody Pond near Saranac Lake. "One of our volunteers…who's been in the program for years, was paddling around Moody Pond, a lake right next to her home, and found it. And Rob Snell listens for red-breasted and white breast- ed nuthatches on a cold morning. Photo credit: Erika Schielke

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