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Wood storks abandon busy crossroads

The flock, once a mainstay at Bruce B. Downs Boulevard, is gone. Drought may be to blame.

By DONG-PHUONG NGUYEN
Published July 28, 2006

CROSS CREEK - Like fallen snow, the white wood storks were a welcome sight on Dianne Brown's drive home. They were part of the landscape, perched in a cluster of trees at Bruce B. Downs and Cross Creek boulevards, their white bodies reflecting off the lake.

"It was just like an old friend," said Brown, a 65-year-old church fundraising organizer. "Hundreds and hundreds of them were there every night, beautiful birds sitting in trees, it felt like you were home."

Now they're gone. Brown and her husband noticed their absence when they returned from a weeklong business trip. The neighbors noticed, too. "We are all wondering what happened to the wood storks," Brown said.

No one seems to know for sure what chased them away. Jim Rodgers, an avian biologist for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, suspects the drought.

Wood storks need water underneath the trees to serve as a moat of sorts, which protects them from raccoons and other predators, Rodgers said. Also, their main source of food thrives in water; they use their long beaks to forage for food such as fish, frogs and crayfish.

For two years Rodgers monitored the Cross Creek rookery, which he called "neat" and "unusual." The site is all man-made, he said, with cypress trees planted to create the artificial wetlands.

Other species of herons, egrets and water turkeys also flocked to the site, and they all appeared to have adapted to their often loud and busy surroundings, even heavy traffic and lawn mowers.

"The birds really didn't pay that much attention to them," Rodgers said.

During his two-year study, Rodgers counted 18 to 46 wood stork nests and an average of 1.5 fledglings per nest, more than the state average of 1.2 fledglings.

Last year, which marked the beginning of the drought, the lack of water had a dramatic effect on two colonies in Pasco County, causing the rookeries to fail, he said. However, the Cross Creek site managed to produce nestlings that year.

Rodgers' study ended, so he was unaware that the storks were gone.

"In some situations, they will return," he said. "At other colony sites, they will abandon the site, never to return."

Dong-Phuong Nguyen can be reached at nguyen@sptimes.com or 813 269-5312.

[Last modified July 28, 2006, 06:30:45]