First attempt to restore a red-cockaded woodpecker population via re-introductions to unoccupied habitat at the Avalon Plantation, Florida, USA

Summary

The red-cockaded woodpecker (Picoides borealis), endangered since 1970 and dependent on cavities it excavates in mature living pines, was the subject of the first-ever attempt by any landowner or agency to establish a population from scratch where none existed, at the privately owned Avalon Plantation in north Florida. Because the pine forest there had never supported the species, the Turner Endangered Species Fund and US Fish and Wildlife Service installed artificial nesting inserts, creating five release and five recruitment clusters starting in fall 1998. From 1998 to 2002, following federal translocation policy limiting removals to sub-adult males from groups with a helper, ten birds (five unrelated pairs) were trapped each year from Florida's Apalachicola National Forest and later Georgia's Red Hills, then released together at dawn the next morning; 50 sub-adult woodpeckers in total were released over five years. Post-release monitoring found 36 of the 50 released birds established residency, with retention climbing from 50% after year one to 80% by years three to five, and breeding success documented every year starting the first season; Avalon eventually supported 15 active clusters, short of the 25-30 cluster goal. Difficulties included coordinating overnight capture and transport, sustaining monitoring funding, and an unanticipated reluctance of offspring to disperse, prompting a cap on cavities per cluster. The project rates itself successful, crediting high-quality release habitat and simultaneous release of multiple unrelated pairs, while acknowledging it underestimated how many years reaching its full population target would take.