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More than 40 bird species breed in Wisconsin's hayfields, prairies
and pastures. From 1960 to 1990, populations of birds such as
meadowlarks, savannah sparrows, upland sandpipers and bobolinks
experienced the steepest decline of any group of birds in North
America. Some of the decline in the Midwest can be traced to farmers
who converted grasslands to corn and soybean fields. But the recent
widespread adoption of rotational grazing in America's Dairyland is
giving Wisconsin grassland birds a second chance. With rotational
grazing, pastures are divided into paddocks and graziers let cows graze
one paddock at a time for two days or less before moving them to a
fresh paddock. A team of agronomists and wildlife biologists with the
UW-Madison and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has
evaluated techniques that can favor grassland birds on these pastures.
The researchers have identified bird-friendly practices that graziers
can implement at little or no expense. The scientists found, for
example, that moving cows from paddock to paddock frequently, leaving
more grass after grazing a paddock or protecting a couple of paddocks
during the birds' nesting season all increase the nesting success of
grassland birds on these pastures.

http://www.newswise.com/articles/200...THDY2.UWI.html
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