Restoring Habitat for Endangered Songbirds with Travis County DNR

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Priorities: Assess and Recondition 15 Acres to Prioritize Black-capped VireoChallenges: Evaluate Complex Habitat – Meet Tight Timeline Ahead of NestingSolutions: Task Expert Staff – Expedite with Key Equipment

The black-capped vireo is one of Texas’ most distinctive rare songbirds. And under a specific government directive, it receives protections based on monitoring in known habitats.

The bird left the endangered species list in 2018, but is now the focus of an “abundance monitoring” plan. Its relisting as “vulnerable” owed mostly to habitat restoration — which still has to happen on a regular basis.

Maas Verde undertook vireo habitat management on 15 acres of the Balcones Canyonlands National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) in northwest Austin. There, conflicting habitats between it and another threatened Texas songbird butted right up against each other.

The endangered golden-cheeked warbler roams a far different range than the black-capped vireo at large. But in Texas, their territories overlap. The birds often nest side-by-side, choosing different species that grow closely together in our area.

This situation demands precision and judgment from a land manager prioritizing one bird species or the other. Maas Verde’s job would be to optimize the habitat for black-capped vireos without chasing warblers away.

Natural Resources Specialist Paul Fushille led the project for the Travis County Department of Natural Resources (DNR).

“The area just looked like a wall of brush at the start of the project,” Fushille said. “Any casual onlooker wouldn’t have been able to make any sense out of it. This required strong skills in species identification and forestry mowing.”

Habitat Circumstances

Vireos tend to nest in thickly-clumped shrubby vegetation like shin oak (Quercus grisea), evergreen sumac (Rhus virens), and flameleaf sumac (Rhus lanceolata) at heights of about 3-6 feet. Golden-cheeked warblers like to nest relatively high up in mature Ashe juniper trees that stand alone.

The Balcones Canyonlands NWR parcel that Maas Verde treated was a tangle of these habitats. And due to the relative maturity of the landscape, which had gone unmanaged for around a decade, it was no longer harboring vireos effectively.

Instead of post-oak savannah, with clumped vegetation surrounded by open areas, it was becoming denser.

“A lot of the shin oak and flameleaf sumac — the shrubby species — had actually matured into tree-like structures,” Maas Verde project manager Marc Opperman said. “Essentially, it was aging out of what the black-capped vireo prefers.”

Project Outline

Close surveillance by Fushille and his team dictated expectations on the project. They monitored the local vireo population using coded ankle bands to track the birds’ nesting locations and movement patterns.

“When we started monitoring this area in the mid-1990s, we had around 20-22 birds,” Fushille said. ” But because the area had not been managed for some time, those numbers were declining.”

Maas Verde’s treatment would occur at the very end of the viable season. The birds’ protected mating season runs from March 1 to July 31. During that time, heavy equipment use is prohibited in their area under take regulations.

Multiple obstacles, like February’s damaging ice storm, delayed Maas Verde’s restoration work until late in the month.

The distribution of species and general brush density on the land forced Maas Verde to create “lanes.”

“This wasn’t a clear cut. Instead, we would judiciously look at pockets of vegetation and particular trees — especially Ashe junipers and big oaks — and treat those as islands, managing the surrounding species,” Opperman explained.

Attention to the detail of Fushille’s spec guided this approach.

“We’d had previous companies come in that removed a little too much [brush],” Fushille said. “Clear cutting is pretty common at this scale of land management in our area. It’s what a lot of ranchers want. Grassland for livestock, etc. But we needed more habitat evaluation.”

Implementation and Challenges

Hitting the Target Boundary

The Balcones Canyonlands NWR is huge. At 32,000+ acres, it is larger than the city of Round Rock.

It was important for Opperman and the crew to treat only the target area. To facilitate this, Fushille uses an app that combines GIS location services with PDF maps his team created internally. The Maas Verde crew could track their locations inside the project boundary with their phones.

“They picked up the app and ran with it,” Fushille said. “Technical literacy was no problem.”

Detailed Treatment

Opperman and the crew developed a system and worked quickly, without removing too much brush.

For instance, the crew might “top” (or trim to height) an overgrown flameleaf sumac. A ground crew with chainsaws would cut the shrub to a suitable height for vireo nesting. Then Opperman would mulch the excess with the forestry mower.

By design, the process would encourage the low, radiating growth that vireos prefer.

Two key challenges placed the strictest demands on Opperman’s skill and resources. First, identifying one woody species from another without any leaves to compare. Second, balancing the ecosystem’s holistic health against the vireo prioritization.

He met the first challenge with resolute dedication to Texas wildlife. A certified Master Naturalist since 2012, Opperman is an energetic student of local species.

Meeting the second came down to applying those skills.

“Every time I looked at a particular area, I had to make a decision. Is this great habitat that just needs to be cleaned up a little bit? Is there anything significant that I need to remove completely, because if we just mow it down, it will come back up again and impair the habitat? Or should we be opportunistic and mow one species, say a young juniper, that won’t necessarily attract vireos and also won’t grow back even if we don’t pull it from the roots?”

Project Manager Marc Opperman

Efficiency

Evaluating an overgrown, 15-acre area one tree at a time would be painstaking. So efficient implementation was key.

Opperman ran the mower in “pirouettes” around mature trees to create lanes. Ground personnel directed by crew leader Juan Carlos Hidalgo worked in close proximity. Maas Verde tasked the same staff throughout the project to fuel the accuracy and efficiency of the treatment.

The crew averaged 10-hour shifts to finish the project in 10 days, working around one skid steer breakdown. The DNR also added two acres onto the scope during the project.

“I went into it not expecting to get it all done,” Fushille said. “You run into issues you can’t predict on every project. Maas Verde encountered and overcame these, and surprisingly, covered the entire area in this short window.”

a skid steer operator with a forestry mower attachmentOpperman managing the preserve lands with a forestry mower; (photo/Maas Verde)

Results

Fushille’s team does not expect black-capped vireo numbers to recover on the treated land for several more nesting seasons. That’s because the birds generally avoid disturbed areas. However, Fushille spoke to the engineered habitat’s suitability.

“Marc came in fully understanding the vision, and our land management requirements. There was a lot of really good communication,” he said. “That showed in the final result. Our team surveyed the property all nesting season, because even though we didn’t expect any vireos to return there, it looked like such good habitat.”

The preserve will need ongoing management to support black-capped vireos. And because of habitat loss, engineered tracts like the Balcones Canyonlands NWR acreage will remain important.

“We know we’re going to have to do this again in five to eight years,” Fushille said. “Maas Verde is the first group to come in and do mechanical treatment at the NWR on this wide of a scale. It’s hard to make this kind of treatment perfect, but the crew was able to leave a lot of really, really good habitat behind.”

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If you’re lucky enough to come across a black-capped vireo nest, you’ll see they both stand out and blend in. The birds make cup-shaped nests with a wide variety of materials including spider silk and Ashe juniper bark, often garlanded with strips of green lichen. Find them several feet off the ground — placed securely within their preferred shrubby species.

*Featured image: Black-capped vireo in the Balcones Canyonlands NWR; (photo/Isaac Sanchez via Flickr)

Pond Drainage Repair and Forestry Mowing for Wildlife Habitat

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Priorities: Fix Unwanted Pond Drainage – Improve Hiking Access – Irrigate PondsChallenges: Dense Brush – Long Distances – Multiple Scopes – Remote AreaSolutions: Right Equipment – Team Efficiency – Attention to Safety

One South Texas ranch owner needed solutions on a property where prior efforts hadn’t measured up.

Jimmy Burke, an avid bird hunter, had contracted multiple companies to dig several holding ponds, or “tanks,” to support local wildlife. But the ponds kept draining. They refused to hold water for more than a day or so.

Additionally, he needed long lanes cleared through thick brush for easier hiking access on the 250-acre property. The job demanded forestry mowing to create lasting clearance through the understory. He had attempted this himself on a conventional tractor, but results were unsatisfactory.

Finally, Burke wanted a solution to fill the ponds more efficiently. A separate plan was in place to connect the ponds to a well with several thousand feet of PVC. Maas Verde solidified these details on site, expediting the process of trenching, installing, and connecting the pipe.

With limited time and finite staffing resources on the mobilization, Maas Verde leaned into the work.

“Maas Verde was flexible in that we added on a pretty substantial scope during the project,” Burke said. “Watering the tanks was the goal, and Maas Verde worked efficiently and expeditiously to complete that — at what I thought was a fair price.”

Forestry Mowing

Dense, woody brush was also a key factor in the project timeline. Brush clearing came first, which both completed a scope and helped the team access work areas.

Maas Verde’s choice to use a forestry mower for clearing was key. Cutting thousands of linear feet of these woody species would be functionally impossible with a conventional mower (as Burke’s experience demonstrated). The only other feasible tool would be a bulldozer.

But Maas Verde opted against this method to minimize soil disruption. This would allow low growth to return to the property, helping retain the soil profile and preserve its microbe communities and the larger ecosystems it supports.

The forestry mower also expedited the work.

“The brush clearing was exceptional,” Burke said. “I was impressed that the team showed up with the right equipment to get the job done. The [forestry mower] skid steer attachment saved days of time and labor. It really goes to show the value of having the right tools.”

Bentonite Install

The team then addressed the unsatisfactory ponds. Our solution was to spread bentonite on the pond floors.

A type of natural clay, bentonite’s strength as a pond liner comes from its enormous surface area and tendency to self-bond. The clay reacts with water to form a paste, where its particles swell to 30 times their size and compress. These tiny particles have thousands of times more surface area than sand granules — so their capacity for absorption and surface contact is extremely high.

The bentonite arrived at the job site in 3,000-lb. “super sacks.” Maas Verde’s team first performed square footage and volume calculations for spreading, then measured the areas and started pouring.

Safety was critical in the application process. A skid steer operator hoisted the sacks, then ground crew members opened the spouts below, staying clear of any fall zones.

The operator then spread the outpouring bentonite evenly, paying attention to steep grades on the pond sides. Spreading also required the operator to move quickly and steadily.

bentonite spreading(Photos/Maas Verde)

The crew then finished the spreading process with a mini excavator, prioritizing a timely finish.

“The planning in advance was obviously well thought-out. And because they efficiently used their equipment, it minimized cost,” Burke said.

a bentonite pond(Photo/Maas Verde)

Trenching and PVC Install

Our crew worked closely together on the PVC/well linkage project. Each pond needed its own conduit, and the longest distance between pond and well was 1,200 linear feet. Brush clearing was arduous, and each path snaked between larger trees and thickets.

During trenching, one team member stayed out front in the skid steer to cut. One installed and welded PVC segments, while one ran laps to deliver fresh pipe.

“We got a really good process in place,” said Andy Maas, who coordinated the project for Maas Verde. The team welded all the PVC outside the trenches. Then once they had the whole pipe connected, they simply rolled it into the trench and backfilled.

Once the team turned the water on, the results became obvious immediately.

“With this project, we knew all along that the fill-up would tell us whether we succeeded or failed right away,” Maas said.

Three weeks after install, each pond is holding water to spec.

South Texas Wildlife and Ecology

Research suggests Texas’ historical southern prairie and savannah lands have transformed into successional forest under human management. Overgrazing and wildfire suppression have led to some grass monocultures and some areas dominated by low, woody species, like Burke’s property.

The success of several invasive grasses “simplifies vegetation structure, reduces biodiversity, and decreases habitat for many species of wildlife,” a group from Texas A&M asserted. Historically, though, South Texas is a biodiverse area, thanks to its subtropical, desert, and coastal location.

map of south texas ecoregionsThis project was located along the boundary of the Texas-Tamaulipan Thornscrub (31c) and Southern Subhumid Gulf Coastal Prairie (34b); (image/Wied et. al)

Maas Verde’s remediations resulted in a property that can better accommodate both humans and wildlife. “These woody species were wall-to-wall,” said Ted Maas, who worked as head equipment operator on the project. “It can happen when you don’t see natural fires create a ‘mosaic,’ or random pattern, in vegetation control.”

It’s possible that biodiversity on Burke’s land will now increase, thanks to prioritized wildlife habitat and re-engineered competition between species. He plans to task Maas Verde on annual brush clearing to support the success of the initial project.

And he looks forward to South Texas’ second dove hunting season, from Dec. 15-Jan. 21.

“This gets us further down the road toward good wildlife management. We now have two tanks that can attract thousands of dove and other wildlife,” Burke said. “All we have to do now is monitor our water levels.”

*Featured image: Bentonite pond and a mini excavator; (photo/Maas Verde)

Prescribed Burn for Land Management

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Project Description

A controlled or prescribed burn, also known as hazard reduction burning, backfire, swailing, or a burn-off, is a fire set intentionally for purposes of forest management, farming, prairie restoration, or greenhouse gas abatement. Maas Verde Landscape Restoration was hired to safely execute a prescribed burn on a property in Central Texas to reduce dead biomass build-up, decrease non-native plant competition, increase the potential for other native species to take hold, increase soil temperature by allowing sunlight to hit the ground instead of dead thatch, and control Ashe juniper (Juniperus ashei) encroachment.

Because safely executing a controlled burn relies on varied factors like the weather and humidity, it can be a challenge to schedule a burn. The conditions have to be within a certain range in order for a burn to be executed safely and confidently. During the event, clear and consistent communication of safety procedures is critical for a successful outcome.

The Maas Verde team held a safety and procedure meeting before splitting up into groups and using radios to stay in constant communication across the fields. Two ATVs carrying water tanks and sprayers were employed, and drip torches were used to ignite burn lines. One crew was dedicated solely to ensuring the fire did not jump the mowed lines. This client is a repeat client on a cadence of every 24 months for sustainable land management.

Project Details

Skills Needed:

Controlled Burn
Sustainability Education