Hidden in the brush behind suburban homes one afternoon earlier this month was a 26-pound female bobcat. She was on the move.

Biologists
were keen to know where she’s been and where she’s going. The cat,
dubbed B15, was outfitted with a radio collar in January. And Mark
Freeman and Olivia LaMaistre of the Vermont Fish and Wildlife
Department were tracking her through the back roads of the state’s most
populous county.

"She’s probably maybe a football field and a half in front of us,"
Freeman said after locating the cat with a directional antenna. "She’s
right off in that scrub, some of the thicker stuff maybe."

Freeman and LaMaistre’s search, which is helping to judge the health
of Vermont’s bobcat population, is part of a national effort to
determine how various wildlife populations are faring.

In New Hampshire, for example, biologists are using the program to
foster survival of Karner blue butterflies by encouraging school
children to plant blue lupines that butterflies need to live. In
Maryland, off-road vehicles are being studied to determine whether
they’re threatening cold water streams.

There are also programs to protect bats in Pennsylvania, bay scallops in New York and the Pine Barren tree frog in New Jersey.

Those are among projects in all 50 states, the District of Columbia
and U.S. territories that have received State Wildlife Grants from the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

"The whole intent of state wildlife grants is to keep common species
common and address species conservation needs before they become
endangered," said Dee Mazzarese, who helps administer the grants for
the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service from Virginia to Maine. "It’s to
look at the critters out there that haven’t had dedicated funding and
direct some funding to them."

In Vermont, the $300,000, four-year bobcat study is one of about 40
projects that have been funded with the help of the federal program.
Biologists have used the grant money to study giant lake sturgeon or
tiny rainbow smelt in Lake Champlain, a prime forage fish for trout and
salmon, or fresh water mussels. It has funded studies of Bicknell’s
thrush on top of Mount Mansfield, the state’s highest peak, helped
develop a butterfly directory and a wildlife planning manual for towns.

"For a lot of these species it’s the first time any biologist has
had a chance to spend any time on them," said Jon Kart, who has helped
coordinate state plans.

Freeman and LaMaistre’s tracking of bobcat B15 is helping determine
how a species that’s typically wary of humans is faring in areas where
development is moving into what until recently were rural areas.
Bobcats can be found throughout the Vermont countryside, but in what
came as a surprise to Freeman, many are living in suburban back yards
at the edge of the state’s most populated areas.

By Wilson Ring
news.yahoo.com