Projects

This 2023 Northeast Regional Conservation Synthesis updates the original 2013 synthesis for State Wildlife Action Plans. Its purpose is to support the 2025 State Wildlife Action Plan (SWAP) revisions.

From 2019–2023, the Northeast Eastern Box Turtle Working Group — a team of state, federal, university, and NGO biologists — collaborated to develop a status assessment and conservation plan for the eastern box turtle in the northeastern United States (Virginia to Maine). As a part of this project, we:

The Northeast states share a long history of conservation and collaboration. The region’s extensive forests, wetlands, rivers, and coastline cross state boundaries, and a tradition of working together to understand and conserve them has evolved. In 2008, the Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies (NEAFWA) and its partners developed a multi-state monitoring framework to take stock of the condition and conservation of the species and habitats that characterize the region.

This initiative will improve our overall effectiveness in conserving, restoring, and managing landscapes critical for the conservation of Blanding’s and Wood Turtles, and other species as appropriate in conjunction with Wood and Blanding’s Turtles, building upon years of dedicated coordination among Northeastern States to identify the most important landscapes and necessary conservation actions for these at-risk species.

Recent declines in commercial honey bee colonies, and potential impacts on crop production, have heightened attention on the plight of native pollinators. Although many groups of native pollinators remain understudied and poorly understood, there is increasing evidence of alarming declines in some species. For example, the once widespread rusty-patched bumblebee was recently listed as Federally Endangered, and significant declines of other North American bumblebees have been documented (Cameron et al. 2011).

This project built consensus across all 13 states and the District of Columbia and culminated with an updated 2022 Lexicon ready for application in 2025 SWAP revisions. See an overview video on the project here.

The Mid-Atlantic Center for Herpetology and Conservation will create a sub-contract with Tangled Bank Inc. to genotype approximately 500 individuals across the northeastern range using single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers to add to samples collected as part of an existing grant from The Turtle Survival Alliance (TSA). The TSA project to develop a barcoding system using genetic samples collected across the range. The RCN funds will increase the number of samples analyzed from the Northeast region and support an assessment to identify conservation units.

1. Establishment of a regional network of experimental adaptive management sites where coordinated management and monitoring will lead to management improvements over time (e.g.

In 2018, the Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies (NEAFWA) initiated a five-year project through the Northeast Fish and Wildlife Diversity Technical Committee (NEFWDTC) and the Regional Conservation Needs Grant Program to improve habitat management of Barrens in the Northeastern U.S.

Over the two-year sampling period, a total of 20 distinct sites in northern New York were sampled using the Spotted Turtle Assessment Protocol. Spotted turtles were captured in eight of those sites, resulting in a total of 107 unique individuals. Additionally, 89 unique blood samples were obtained for DNA analysis, however at only two sites did we meet the desired minimum threshold of 20 samples.

This project is a synthesis of the growing volumes of regional conservation data and information produced through the Regional Conservation Needs (RCN) program and Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (LCCs). This synthesis will provide the regional context for the elements that states must review and revise in their State Wildlife Action Plans (SWAPs) by 2015.