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Many of us have probably heard of the 7 p’s: Proper Prior Planning Prevents Piss-Poor Performance. One consideration we urge all developers to not overlook is the "Proper Prior Planning" associated with wildlife and wildlife habitat impacts. Simply put, proper consideration of wildlife and wildlife habitat impacts before development activities get under way, or before too much development planning has occurred, can often save a great deal of time, money, and aggravation later.
At RES, we pride ourselves in our ability to work with Developers in finding balanced solutions to their wildlife issues that work within proposed development schedules and their budgets. Even more importantly to some, RES is one of the very few wildlife management and consulting companies that has a high level of experience working with diverse and often emotional publics, municipal and county governments and planning commissions/offices, and State and Federal wildlife agencies. In addition to our assistance with conscientious development planning, we often assist our clients in the public review process and wildlife-related public relations. Whether you need a simple plan for avoidance, or large-scale comprehensive mitigation, conservation, and/or management plans, RES has the expertise to help get you on the right track.
With that said, if you have already started down the road of development planning, and find yourself unexpectedly faced with wildlife or habitat issues in need of immediate assistance, call us, we can still help. We will review your development plan, the wildlife issues at hand, and work with you to “develop” the most appropriate course of action for the mitigation, conservation, or management planning issue of concern. Bottom line, with the right consultant, wildlife issues don’t have to become issues. Let us help you through the process in order to avoid costly mistakes or oversights, and help ensure that wildlife and their habitats are given proper consideration, and your development moves forward as smoothly as possible.
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We are often retained to conduct basic wildlife surveys in the pre-development phase to assess adverse impacts upon wildlife species from the future development. Our primary focus is
to ascertain the presence of potential habitat of any federally or state-listed threatened or endangered (T&E) species in the property, however we don't stop there. For the same price other consultants charge for only an analysis of your potential impacts to T&E species, we will assess potential impacts to many other species of wildlife - including migratory birds, cottontail rabbits, raptors, etc.
Our wildlife impact surveys employ current wildlife survey methodology, including but not limited to camera surveys, track stations, spotlight scans, scat and/or track transects, and daytime visual scans/observations, depending on the species being surveyed. These surveys help us and our clients assess the risks to wildlife species that may be affected by development activities. It is important to identify those species and work towards mitigating any impacts through live relocation or avoidance, or by obtaining the proper state or federal take permits.
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| Frequently, wildlife species are transient visitors to a property, and their use of the property cannot be ascertained through surveys for presence/absence as described above. In this case, our expertise and understanding of behavior, ecology, and landscape level habitat characteristics as well as our experience interpreting "wildlife sign" (trails, scat, tree browsing, past nests, etc..) enables us to make extremely accurate predictions of wildlife use of the property in question. Habitat evaluations are often much less expensive than traditional presence/absence surveys and can often be conducted throughout the year. Having the ability to provide either approach allows us to be flexible to the needs of both wildlife and our clients. |
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