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~I <br />CHAPTERTHREE Affected Environment <br />Wilson's phalazope. Other water birds include ring-billed gull, California gull, American coot, <br />pied-billed grebe, and great blue heron. <br />Piceance Creek Site <br />No natural waterfowl or shorebird habitat is present at the Piceance Site, although Piceance <br />Creek is located adjacent to the lease tract. Currently there are two small evaporation ponds <br />located at the test facility. These have the potential to act as an attractant to wildlife, specifically <br />in colder months when other local waterbodies aze frozen. To date, the use of these ponds as <br />migratory waterfowl resting location has been negligible. The lack of use is probably more <br />attributable to the small size, proximity to the test facility, and position in a small confined <br />tributary than to a small population of waterfowl neaz the facility. <br />Pipeline Corridor <br />The pipeline corridor crosses Piceance Creek at two locations. Other waterfowl habitat along the <br />pipeline comdor is minimal, limited to small creeks and springs. Habitat that may support a <br />limited number of waterfowl is located at the crossings of the East and Middle Forks of <br />Parachute Creek. Waterfowl would probably use these habitats (other than Piceance Creek) <br />principally as resting areas during migration. <br />Parachute Site <br />The Parachute Site is an existing industrial facility, with no natural waterfowl habitat. A lazge <br />industrial pond was present until recently, but was removed in 1998. The extent of waterfowl use <br />of this pond is unknown. Migratory shore birds may also have used the facility as a resting azea. <br />Killdeer could use the large, open disturbed areas as nesting sites, especially areas that are gravel. <br />3.8.5 Neotropical Migrants <br />Neotropical migrant landbirds are birds that breed within the U.S. and undertake annual round- <br />trip migration between their breeding grounds in North America and wintering grounds south of <br />the U.S. border in Mexico, Central America, South America, and the islands of the Caribbean. <br />' Neotropical migrants have undergone significant, widespread declines at local and regional <br />levels across at least the eastern portions of their breeding ranges in the U.S. and Canada (Dobkin <br />' 1994). This decline is attributed to fragmentation of large, contiguous forests into smaller, <br />isolated patches which result in avian communities of predictably different species composition. <br />In addition to altering species composition, fragmentation results in more "edge" relative to <br />"interior" habitat, leading to increased nest predation (Dobkin 1994). In response to this <br />potential crisis, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation proposed the Neotropical Migratory <br />Bird Conservation Program known as Partners in Flight (Dobkin 1994). This is a comprehensive <br />and cooperative effort among state, federal, and local agencies and private organizations. The <br />goal of this project is to gather the cooperative and coordinated resources of all concerned <br />organizations. The BLM is committed to ensuring the success of Partners in Flight and the <br />protection of neotropical migrant landbirds on lands that they manage. Neotropical migrants are <br />present throughout the entire Project Area. <br />Wildlife 3-37 <br />