The New Mexico Wildlife Federation will be present at the Department of Wildlife’s New Mexico State Game Commission Meeting in Soccoro.

For more information about this meeting or other ways to participate, visit: https://wildlife.dgf.nm.gov/commission/meeting-agendas/

If you are interested in attending, here is the Zoom link to register.

Researcher Explores Habits of Female Red-Winged Blackbirds

Wildlife Wednesday is a free monthly speaker series held on the 2nd Wednesday.

Marble Brewery NE Heights, Albuquerque at 5:30pm

The male red-winged blackbird is a noisy showoff with flamboyant coloration and a penchant for singing wildly. The female, however, is more reserved, less colorful and less well known.

Chris Walker, a doctoral student in biology at the University of New Mexico, has studied the female red-winged blackbird. She has discovered that they have songs of their own and their own characteristic behavior.

Walker will discuss her findings as the featured speaker at the New Mexico Wildlife Federation’s “Wildlife Wednesday” event May 13 in Albuquerque.

“Studying females of different species is just as important as the males,” Walker said. “There’s not been a ton of research done on females.”

Red-winged blackbirds are fond of marshy areas and are a common sight at the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Area and along waterways and damp fields elsewhere.

Male red-winged blackbirds are a familiar sight to birders in New Mexico and around the country. They’re black with red and yellow patches on their shoulders while the females are dark brown.

“They’re a really big backyard bird in most, if not all, of North America and you can typically find them around water sources, or like marshlands or swamps, different things like that,” Walker said. “They nest in marshes, often like cattails, or reeds, and males have like a loud, they call it a ‘conk-la-ree’ sound.

“Females have two songs that are different from the males,” Walker said. “So that’s another entirely different thing that’s super cool that females have a different song as well. Not only do the females have an entirely different song, they actually have two song types that they’ll sing while they’re displaying.”

Walker said many researchers have focused on how male red-winged blackbirds use visual signaling, their body size, the coloring on their wings and their song to communicate with eachother and indicate the territories that they have.

“Females do the same thing,” Walker said. “And because they’re not kind of as flashy as the males, I guess, they are often overlooked.”

Walker’s free presentation starts at 5:30 p.m., May 13, at the Marble Brewery Northeast Heights Taproom, 9904 Montgomery Blvd., NE., Albuquerque. For more information, click HERE.

Bird Researcher to Speak on NM Red-Tailed Hawks

Some of the varieties of red-tailed hawk that winter in New Mexico travel as far as Alaska during the summer. Others are content to stay here year-round.

Nicole Richardson, a Canadian bird researcher, has extensive experience tracking red-tailed hawks in New Mexico and elsewhere in the United States.

Richardson will present a talk April 8 in Albuquerque on the varieties of red-tailed hawks in New Mexico and their migration patterns. Her free presentation is part of the New Mexico Wildlife Federation’s “Wildlife Wednesday” series.

Richardson lives in Ontario and works with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, New York. She works remotely, collecting data on bird species as part of the Cornell’s Birds of the World team.

Richardson also has been working with the independent Red-Tailed Hawk Project for five years. The group focuses on the ecology and evolution of the species.

The project has a core team of six researchers, Richardson said. Its work last year included deploying transmitters on hawks in New Mexico and elsewhere in the West. There are 16 subspecies of red-tailed hawk, she said, with various types having different colors and markings on their feathers.

The project tracks over 200 transmitters on red tail hawks across the continent now, Richardson said. She said researchers are starting to work on an academic paper addressing variations in the spring migration of different subspecies.

“Raptors are notoriously challenging to survey at a population level,” Richardson said. “A lot of surveys for raptors are conducted at migration sites in North America and around the world. That makes it challenging to study the population trends.”

New Mexico is home to a fascinating diversity of red-tailed hawks, Richardson said. “You have really long-distance migrants – white-morph colored birds that we’ve tagged in this region that go and breed in northern British Columbia,” Richardson said. “We’ve checked birds in northern Alberta that fly all the way through New Mexico and winter in Mexico.”

Richardson’s talk will start at 5:30 p.m., April 8, at Marble Brewery’s Northeast Heights Taproom, at 9904 Montgomery Blvd., NE., Albuquerque. For more information, click HERE.

New Mexico Wildlife Federation’s mission is rooted in collaboration. We work at the crossroads of conservation, culture, and community—uniting hunters, anglers, outdoor enthusiasts, land stewards, and advocates under one shared goal: to protect and celebrate the lands and wildlife that make New Mexico home. Now, we're excited to extend that spirit of connection with a brand-new event: The First Annual New Mexico Outdoor Festival and Skills Competition, coming April 2026 to the stunning Legacy Ranch.

This is more than just a festival—it’s a celebration of our state’s outdoor traditions, skills, and shared future. Whether you're an avid hunter, a weekend hiker, or simply someone who loves being outside, there’s something here for everyone. We're bringing together local communities, outdoor brands, conservation leaders, and families for a day of fun, learning, and connection—all in support of our mission to preserve the wild heart of New Mexico.

We invite participants, sponsors, vendors, and partners to join us in making this inaugural event a success. Your support will help us grow a legacy of conservation and outdoor celebration that will benefit generations to come.

Let’s come together and celebrate what makes New Mexico wild, beautiful, and uniquely ours.

See our full event page HERE!

The New Mexico Wildlife Federation will be present at the Department of Wildlife’s New Mexico State Game Commission Meeting in Albuquerque.

For more information about this meeting or other ways to participate, visit: https://wildlife.dgf.nm.gov/commission/meeting-agendas/

If you are interested in attending, here is the Zoom link to register.

Wildlife, Water, Landscape

Wildlife Wednesday is a free monthly speaker series held on the 2nd Wednesday.

Marble Brewery NE Heights, Albuquerque at 5:30pm

Speaker Details:

NEW MEXICO OFFICIAL DISCUSSES OPTIONS FOR HANDLING PRODUCED WATER FROM ENERGY BONANZA

Winter has failed to materialize across New Mexico. Record warm temperatures combined with minimal snowpack have water managers bracing for a bleak irrigation season and beyond.

But while much of New Mexico is parched, the Permian Basin, in the southeast corner of the state, is wrestling with the question of what to do with too much water.

Every day, the oil and gas industry pumps hundreds of millions of gallons of groundwater from the Permian Basin as a byproduct of energy production. 

Current New Mexico regulations require energy companies to reinject this “produced water” from their operations back underground. There’s so much of the water that the industry faces the prospect of running out of places to put it.

Some in the energy industry are calling for developing state regulations to allow the treatment of the produced water for agricultural and other purposes. But some state regulators and environmental groups warn that adequate purification technology doesn’t yet exist for treating water on such a huge scale. They say that releasing it would pose an unacceptable environmental threat.

Zach Stoll, assistant director of the New Mexico Produced Water Research Consortium, will speak on the produced water issue at the New Mexico Wildlife Federation’s free “Wildlife Wednesday” presentation at 5:30 p.m., March 11, at the Marble Brewery NE Heights Taproom at 9904 Montgomery Blvd. in Albuquerque. For more information, click HERE. 

That stark change in river flows coupled with the wholesale invasion of nonnative plant species such as salt cedar and Russian olive have created challenging conditions for cottonwoods and other native plant species. All that, in addition to widespread development, has resulted in loss of wildlife habitat.

While it’s easy to see such changes on the surface, Wagner’s research shows that disturbances in the bosque also hurt the fungi that coexist with and help sustain plant roots in the soil. In working to replant areas, he said it’s important to add soil from undisturbed areas of the bosque that still retain the essential native fungi. For more information, click HERE.

While human beings get to reach for a wool blanket when nights get cooler in the fall, many other animals rely on the ability to slow down their metabolism to conserve energy. From the tiniest hummingbird to the largest bear, a wide spectrum of creatures rely on torpor and hibernation to get through lean, cold times.

Shayne Halter, a graduate student at the University of New Mexico, will speak on how animals use torpor and hibernation. He’s the featured speaker at the New Mexico Wildlife Federation’s free “Wildlife Wednesday” presentation for September.

Halter’s talk will start at 5:30 p.m., Sept. 10, at Marble Brewery’s Northeast Heights Taproom, at 9904 Montgomery, Blvd., NE, Albuquerque.

March 12, 2025: Join the New Mexico Wildlife Federation to learn about our wildlife, their habitats, and other topics each month from local conservation experts.

March 7, 2025: The New Mexico Wildlife Federation hosts Camo at the Capitol – a day of advocacy on behalf of the interests of public lands, waters, and wildlife and all New Mexicans who enjoy these spaces. If you are a hunter, angler, hiker, or other outdoor enthusiast, join us.

The NMWF is pleased to present Jason Kerkmans speaking on stream access in New Mexico. Kerkmans’s free 'Wildlife Wednesday' presentation starts at 5:30 p.m., Feb. 12, at Marble Brewery’s Northeast Heights Taproom, at 9904 Montgomery Blvd., NE, Albuquerque.