News and Highlights

Staff with the CDC's Maritimes office conduct extensive field projects designed to improve our understanding of the status and distribution of rare species and ecological communities. They document thousands of such occurrences in the region each year. In the past few field seasons, our staff identified new provincial species records of flower fly (Syrphidae) in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, 26 of which were new to the Maritimes. In addition, they found three plant species (Forked Bluecurls, Trichostema dichotomum, Maleberry, Lyonia ligustrina, Inflated Narrow-leaved Sedge, Carex grisea), two dragonfly species (Extra-striped Snaketail, Ophiogomphus anomalus, an as yet unidentified Shadowdragon, (Neocordulia sp.), and a butterfly species (Dorcas Copper, Lycaena dorcas) previously undocumented in Nova Scotia. The Maleberry was also a new species for Canada and will likely be listed as a federal Species at Risk in the future.

In 2011, CDC staff authored a variety of reports, including: Integrating Past, Present, and Future Biodiversity Data, and Related Information, to Improve Conservation Decision-Making in New Brunswick, and a SAR Procedures Manual for Transport Canada.

In 2009, the CDC completed describing forest communities in the Maritimes and, with input from ecologists throughout the region, developed rarity ranks for those ecological communities in New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island. Those ranks are expected be complete for Nova Scotia in 2012. Ecological community work has begun in non-forested habitats with biological inventories and community classification in sand dune ecosystems of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

Funding from Environment Canada's EcoAction program in 2008 helped launch the increasingly popular Maritime Butterfly Atlas, a citizen science project documenting occurrences of all Maritime butterfly species. In the first two years of field collection, with support from the Gosling Foundation, the Canadian Wildlife Federation, and others, ~6,000 records were submitted.

For more information on butterfly species observed see the Maritimes Butterfly Atlas for details.