Date: 12/23/25 10:23 am From: Kevin Murphy <kevin.murphy39...> Subject: Re: [ia-bird] the reason for Not a Sighting, Habitat destruction at Big Creek State Park for cropland
Clayton,
There's a whole lot of nuance missing from your perception of habitat
management. First and foremost, the area you are describing is NOT part of
Big Creek State Park, it is part of Big Creek Wildlife Management Area.
State Parks and WMA's have distinct/separate management goals and staff
from each other. Areas around Army Corps reservoirs often have a
complicated matrix of management organizations (Corps, DNR parks, DNR
Wildlife, County) and goals/constraints, and it's vital to understand that
structure to understand why things may be the way they are. Criticism of a
management decision/plan is also different than a personal attack on agency
staff that don't even have the management responsibility for the area in
question, please do better going forward.
There's a lot of things that used to be true in the world of wildlife
management that I'm quite grateful no longer are. Our understanding of the
natural world and best habitat management practices changes constantly with
the passage of time. In fact, there are lots of things that at one point
were promoted in the name of habitat improvement or erosion control
that in hindsight were profoundly bad ideas.....Autumn Olive, Multiflora
Rose, Bush Honeysuckle, Buckthorn, and the list goes on. I'm guessing that
the people involved in those decisions basically a century ago would choose
differently if they saw the long term consequences of the
introduction/spread of those invasive species. Historically some state and
federal governments paid bounties for the persecution of predators
including raptors in some places (a Red-tailed Hawk was worth 50 cents to
the state of Maryland when their bounty program was active)...I'm pretty
grateful wildlife management has changed since those times.
Promotion of edge habitat historically definitely was a benefit to
recovering our White-tailed Deer population (the first modern hunting
season was a limited effort in 1953 after basically total extirpation from
the state by early settlement). During that same time period Iowa's
landscape was fundamentally different from today with much smaller
agricultural fields in constant rotation that included lots of pasture and
small grains that were also beneficial to wildlife. The world around us is
fundamentally different today than it was decades ago with a whole suite of
new constantly evolving challenges and priorities for conservation,
ignoring this fact is at our own peril.
There are definitely a suite of species that benefit greatly from early
successional edges between woodland and grassland...Brown Thrashers,
White-tailed Deer, Baltimore Oriole, Raccoons, and many more edge-loving
habitat generalists. The other side of that coin is that other species are
harmed by the presence of this same habitat type like Henslow's Sparrow,
Bobolink, Northern Harrier, and a whole suite of other species that are
grassland specialists. There is lots of published research on landscape
habitat associations for birds, including work done right here in Iowa,
that repeatedly demonstrate these relationships.
There are winners and losers in every single habitat management decision,
and if we have to make choices about those winners and losers I'm quite
comfortable with public land managers choosing to focus on the most
imperiled habitat types for their efforts. Iowa doesn't lack edge habitat,
but has lost functionally all of its historical grasslands. Iowa also ranks
49th (out of 50 for those keeping score) in the United States for
availability of public land...with such a limited public resource it makes
sense to try to manage for the most imperiled habitat types. I am not
anti-edge-habitat, and happily spend a lot of time birding/hunting lots of
scrubby edges. I am just able to recognize that our public resources need
to be managed for long-term sustainability and preservation of entire
imperiled ecosystems and not just my favorite activity to do on that public
parcel. Do I like or agree with every decision made by the Iowa DNR?
Definitely not. In spite of this do I also think that the Iowa DNR needs
every bit of support and help we can muster? Resoundingly YES.
Good Birding,
Kevin Murphy, Boone
On Tue, Dec 23, 2025 at 9:18 AM Clayton Will <willcfish...> wrote:
> This didn't make my Christmas jolly. A quarter to half mile of hedgerow
> torn out along NW Madrid Drive between the two NW 100th st accesses. Ironic
> there is their own sign at that location that reads "Habitat is Key" when
> they tear out habitat to turn it back to cropland. This was a very popular
> access and dog walking area at a parking lot. The naturalist manager is a
> young 25 year old that has no idea what she is doing and I've told her
> that. For years I've said Big Creek State Park will be the first Treeless state
> park in Iowa. And so it continues. I have no idea what they are thinking.
> It's sure not rational.
> It always used to be that edges were critical and they still are. Prairie
> and treeline edges are compatible but that's not what is being taught in
> college.
>
> Clayton Will
> Madrid
>
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