A controlled burn on Twain Island at Mono Lake targets invasive weeds that have deprived California gulls of prime nesting ground.
A massive weed infestation on a tiny island at Mono Lake has choked out the nesting grounds that California gulls need to complete a life cycle as ancient as the million-year-old Sierra Nevada ecosystem.
“With this effort, we’re essentially hanging up a sign for California gulls that says, ‘Ready for occupancy,’” said Kristie Nelson, a biologist and expert on the California gulls of Mono Lake. Federal firefighters conduct a controlled burn at Twain Island in Mono Lake to clear California gull nesting grounds that had been overwhelmed by an invasion of weeds.
“We immediately reached out to the Forest Service for help in mobilizing a multi-agency response against an enemy that had caught us by surprise,” he said. “We were facing the potential loss of one of the three main nesting colonies of California gulls in the world.”The largest number of gull nests ever recorded at Mono Lake was about 32,000 in the early 1990s. The number of nests has been in gradual decline since 2004, and in steep decline since the weeds showed up in 2016, biologists say.
McQuilkin wants to see similar collaborative efforts conducted at four other islands used as nesting grounds by gulls and other birds including black-crowned night herons — all of which have come to depend on human help to save their offspring from drought, water diversions and the danger of ambush by hungry coyotes.
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