An Assessment of the Effects of Oil and Gas Field ... - BLM

An Assessment of the Effects of Oil and Gas

Field Activities on Nesting Raptors in the

Rawlins, Wyoming and Price, Utah Field Offices

of the Bureau of Land Management

BLM

BLM Technical Note 433

BLM/WY/ST-10/008+1110

BLM Technical Note 433

An Assessment of the Effects of Oil and Gas

Field Activities on Nesting Raptors in the

Rawlins, Wyoming and Price, Utah Field Offices

of the Bureau of Land Management

Jeff P. Smith, Steven J. Slater1, and Mike C. Neal

HawkWatch International, Inc.

2240 South 900 East

Salt Lake City, Utah 84106

1

Phone: (801) 484-6808 x108

Email: sslater@

Prepared for:

U.S. Department of Interior,

Bureau of Land Management

Utah State Office, Salt Lake City,

Wyoming State Office, Cheyenne, and

Colorado State Office, Lakewood

Table of Contents

List of Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iii

List of Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix

Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Price, Utah Study Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi

Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi

Results and Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

Price, Utah Study Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

Rawlins, Wyoming Study Area . . . . . . . . . . . . xiv

Overall Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvi

Objective 1: Describe temporal trends

in development near focal-species

nest clusters. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xvii

Rawlins, Wyoming Study Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Oil and Gas Development and Raptors . . . . . . . . . . .

The Raptor Radii Research Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Goals and Objectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

1

1

2

3

Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Nest Cluster Focus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Study Areas and Background Information . . . . . . . . 5

Price, Utah Study Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Rawlins, Wyoming Study Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Description of Datasets and Data Preparation . . . . . 8

Raptor Nest Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Oil and Gas Well Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Road Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Landcover/Vegetation Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Climate Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Other Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Calculation of GIS-based Metrics . . . . . . . . . . 11

Analytical Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Objective 1: Describe temporal

trends in development near focal-species

nest clusters. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Objective 2: Describe distributional patterns

of nest cluster status in relation to

development hotspots. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Objective 3: Assess relationships between

nest-cluster status and development. . . . . . . . . 12

Objective 4: Assess Ferruginous Hawk nest

success and productivity in relation

to development. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Objective 5: Assess the response of

Ferruginous Hawks to artificial

nest structures. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Objective 2: Describe distributional patterns

of nest cluster status in relation to

development hotspots. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Objective 3: Assess relationships between

nest cluster status and development. . . . . . . . . 19

Objective 1. Describe temporal trends

in development near focal-species

nest clusters. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Objective 2: Describe distributional patterns

of nest cluster status in relation to

development hotspots. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Objective 3: Assess relationships between

nest cluster status and development. . . . . . . . . 29

Objective 4: Assess Ferruginous Hawk nest

success and productivity in relation

to development. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Objective 5: Assess the response of

Ferruginous Hawks to artificial

nest structures. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Price, Utah Study Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Golden Eagles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Red-tailed Hawks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Prairie Falcons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Common Species Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Rawlins, Wyoming Study Area . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Golden Eagles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Ferruginous Hawks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Red-tailed Hawks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Prairie Falcons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Common Species Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Comparison of Price and Rawlins Results . . . . . . .

Conclusions and Management Implications . . . . . .

45

45

45

46

47

47

48

48

49

53

53

54

54

57

Literature Cited . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Appendix A. Glossary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Oil and Gas Development and Nesting Raptors ? BLM Technical Note 433

iii

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