Connecticut State of the Birds 2025: Two Stories of Hope and Ingenuity
Cooperative habitat improvement projects may help Prairie Warblers in the Macedonia Forest Block. Photo by Julian Hough.
November 7, 2025—Across Connecticut, conservationists are carrying out projects that will benefit local conservation and also contribute to bird protection in a wider area.
In one example, the Northeast Bird Habitat Conservation Initiative, a project of the Highstead Foundation and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, is connecting land trusts, scientists, and landowners in Northwest Connecticut to turn data and local knowledge into solutions.
Connecticut’s Ospreys tell another kind of story. Once nearly wiped out by DDT, they’ve rebounded to roughly 800 active nesting pairs statewide. Ospreys are provide clues to the health of coastal ecosystems. Osprey conservation requires cooperation across geographic areas that span cultural and political borders. They are still strong in Connecticut but facing 80–90 percent nest failure in Chesapeake Bay; and of course they spend almost half the year in countries far to the south.
Here are key excerpts from two articles.
The first is about the Northeast Bird Habitat Conservation Initiative’s work in Connecticut. The article was written by Katherine Blake of Highstead, Sara Barker of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and Connie Manes of the Kent Land Trust.
The second is about the crisis facing Ospreys, written by filmmaker Jacob Steinberg.
“Collaborative Conservation: Engaging Communities through Birds”
Why Macedonia Matters
Macedonia is one of the largest remaining forest blocks in Connecticut, and it plays an outsized role in sustaining birds. Biologists and community scientists have documented more than 140 species there, including many species most imperiled by habitat loss [for example, Bobolinks, Savannah Sparrows, Wood Thrushes, Cerulean Warblers, Scarlet Tanagers, Prairie Warblers and Brown Thrashers].
In short, Macedonia provides a cross-section of the bird habitats Connecticut needs to sustain—grasslands, interior forests, and shrublands—at a time when all three are under pressure.
From Local to Regional: The Initiative at Work
What makes Macedonia more than just a haven for birds is the way local work is being connected to regional strategies through the Initiative.
Wood Ducks inhabited an oxbow pond in Kent. Photo by Paul J. Fusco.
Kent Land Trust is helping private landowners manage their woods in ways that are better for birds. With support from the Northeast Bird Habitat Conservation Initiative, it is testing a program based on one that has worked in Vermont. The idea is to bring neighboring woodland owners together instead of treating them as separate, isolated managers. Landowners get advice at workshops from forestry experts and also learn from each other. The program encourages people to care for their own land while also working with their neighbors to benefit the whole landscape.
The idea is simple but powerful: birds don’t recognize property boundaries. If Bobolinks are to survive, or if Wood Thrushes are to thrive, then stewardship must extend across fence lines and town lines. By connecting landowners to a community, the Initiative helps ensure that habitat patches add up to more than the sum of their parts.
The Role of Community Science
The NBHCI also relies heavily on eBird. The global bird observation platform, created by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, is among the world’s largest repositories of biodiversity data. It’s a powerful tool for research, education, and conservation. It’s essentially a large network of biodiversity “sensors”—1.2 million people have contributed over two billion bird observations. Every checklist submitted by a birder in the Macedonia region contributes to a real-time picture of what species are using the area, when, and in what numbers.
The eBird Science Team at the Cornell Lab uses bird checklists, environmental data, and satellite imagery. Then, through machine learning, it turns these into data products and visualizations of seasonal ranges, relative abundance, and population trends to help guide conservation decision-making and investments.The information is crucial. Conservation funding is limited, and data can help guide it to the places and species where it will make the most difference. The data have been used, for example, in collaboration with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to identify low-risk eagle collision areas for siting wind energy projects during the permitting process, directly influencing federal policy decisions.
Kent Land Trust uses eBird data to inform its land management, taking note of birds throughout the seasons and what their presence might indicate about habitat improvement needs. It hosted workshops to show people how to use eBird and the Merlin app at the eBird Hotspots it created along its trails. The workshops emphasized the personal aspects of enjoying birdwatching and the benefits it has to conservation.
One eBird Hotspot at Kent Land Trust’s home base is along a riverside trail where the land trust built a viewing platform. The Hotspot was created in 2020, and since then birders have submitted more than 150 checklists with 99 species (71 in 2025). These included increased sightings of Bald Eagles, Belted Kingfishers, and Green Herons. Double-crested Cormorants showed up in 2025. Waterfowl included Mallards, Common Mergansers, and Wood Ducks. In 2025, Kent Land Trust installed Wood Duck nestboxes and, while it has not confirmed their use, a family of 11 ducklings were raised in the oxbow pond adjoining the river over the summer. The eBird data has helped Kent Land Trust make other habitat restoration decisions as well, including the removal of invasive multiflora rose and privet thickets along the shore of the oxbow. The riverside trail also adjoins a small, organically-run farm, with open fields and many pollinators. The eBird checklists often included Cedar Waxwings, Baltimore Orioles, and Indigo Buntings (considered a species of greatest conservation need in Connecticut). To add to the farm’s habitat, the land trust has planted native fruiting trees and shrubs in the areas cleared of invasives.
The goal of full-cycle conservation is to protect Ospreys (and other species) year-round. Photo by Joseph Szalay.
“Osprey at the Crossroads: Crisis in the Chesapeake, Opportunity in New England”
What We Don’t Know
In Connecticut, we’ve celebrated a remarkable Osprey comeback: from just a handful of nests to more than 800 pairs. They’ve become a source of local pride, woven into the identity of our coastal towns.
Yet for all the attention Ospreys receive, large gaps remain in our knowledge. Dr. Alan Poole, author of several definitive books on Ospreys, notes that outside of the Chesapeake, we have surprisingly little data on what Ospreys actually eat. Are New England Osprey feeding primarily on menhaden, on alewives, on other local forage fish? How does diet vary between colonies, or from year to year?
These are not trivial questions. A clearer picture of Osprey diets within specific regions could strengthen their role as bioindicators, allowing us to track the health of forage fish populations before ecological stress cascades into crisis.
Full-Cycle Conservation: Protecting Ospreys Year-Round
Much of our attention focuses on Ospreys during nesting season. That’s only part of the picture. After leaving New England in late summer, most Ospreys migrate to the Caribbean, Central America, or northern South America. Research using satellite transmitters has shown just how vital these wintering areas are—and how Ospreys that nest near each other may scatter across a vast geography. One bird might winter in Cuba, another in Colombia, and a third in the mangrove estuaries of Brazil. Even within the same wintering region, some individuals stick closely to a small fishing area while others range widely.
Their survival hinges on the quality of these habitats, which are increasingly threatened by shoreline development, mangrove clearing for shrimp farms, and unregulated gillnet fishing. Protecting Ospreys means protecting places thousands of miles away, linking the health of Connecticut’s summer skies to conservation decisions made far beyond our borders.
Conservation efforts are underway in parts of the wintering range, though they are often aimed at broader coastal ecosystem health rather than Ospreys directly. In Ecuador, the World Wildlife Fund has worked with local fishing associations to protect about 371,000 acres of mangroves in the Gulf of Guayaquil, safeguarding key nursery habitat for fish. In Central America, a working group of scientists, wetland experts, and shrimp industry representatives is developing wildlife-friendly aquaculture practices to reduce habitat loss from shrimp farms. At a larger scale, the Americas Flyways Initiative links organizations across the hemisphere to identify and protect critical breeding, stopover, and wintering areas for migratory birds, including Ospreys. In Costa Rica, groups such as Osa Conservation are restoring tropical forests and coastal corridors, helping to sustain healthy ecosystems where Ospreys spend the non-breeding season.
