Newsgroups: bit.listserv.biosph-l
Date:         Thu, 19 Nov 1992 20:00:23 EST
Reply-To:     "Norman C. Saunders" <NYS@NIHCU.BITNET>
From:         "Norman C. Saunders" <NYS@NIHCU.BITNET>
Subject:      Duck Stamp Contest & Other F&WS News

Fish and Wildlife Service
For Release: November 12, 1992

Janet Chesky  202-208-5634
Hugh Vickery

            1993-1994 Duck Stamp To Feature Canvasback Ducks


     Wildlife artist Bruce Miller of Mound, Minnesota, capped off a ban-
ner year  by winning  the 42nd  Annual Federal Duck Stamp Contest with a
design featuring a pair of canvasback ducks.

     Miller's acrylic painting will be featured on the 1993-1994 Federal
Duck Stamp.   Money  from the  sale of the stamp is used to purchase and
protect  vital  wetlands  for  waterfowl  and  numerous  other  wildlife
species.

     Held November  9 and  10 in Washington, D.C., the annual contest is
sponsored by the Interior Department's U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

     A professional  artist and  avid outdoorsman,  Miller, 40,  has re-
ceived a number of honors this year, including being named artist of the
year by  the Michigan Wildlife habitat Foundation and artist of the year
at the  Wildlife and  Western Art  Show in Minneapolis.  He also won the
1993 Minnesota Pheasant Habitat Stamp Contest.

     Calling it  "the biggest  thing that  ever happened  to me," Miller
said winning  the Federal  Duck Stamp Contest is particularly meaningful
to him because he is an ardent hunter and fisherman.

     "Like most  sportsmen, I  support all kinds of conservation activi-
ties and  the Duck Stamp program has done more than any other program to
promote wild  ducks," Miller  said.   "I just  hope that by winning this
year, i will help put more ducks in the air in the years to come."

     Miller's design was one of 629 in this year's contest.  The artists
who finished  in second and third place are previous winners of the con-
test.   Second place  went to 1981 winner David Maass of Long Lake, Min-
nesota, for his design of a pair of mallards.  Neal Anderson of Lincoln,
Nebraska, the  winner of  the 1988 contest, took third place with an oil
painting of canvasback ducks.

     Miller, an  Eagle Scout  who grew  up in Minnetonka, Minnesota, and
attended the  University of St. Cloud, started painting wildlife in 1980
and took  third place in the 1991 Federal Duck Stamp Contest.  He became
a full-time  artist in  1985 and has published 25 limited edition prints
through his company, Mixed Bag Publishing Co.

     Ironically, the  winning art  was modeled  after his  design of two
shoveler ducks  that failed  to make the finals in this years' Minnesota
Duck Stamp  Contest.   Miller said  he had  made some changes to provide
more contrast for the ducks.

     "I wanted  to add  more color  to the design than there had been in
the winners the last few years and I took a chance with the angle of the
drake,' he  said.   "But in  a contest  like this  if you  don't take  a
chance, you are not going to win."

     Since it  began in  1934, the Federal Duck Stamp Program has gener-
ated $414  million to acquire more than 4 million wetland acres, primar-
ily for  the National  Wildlife Refuge System.  All waterfowl hunters 16
years of age and older are required to purchase the stamp annually.  The
current price is $15 and remarkably, 98 cents out of every dollar raised
through the  sale of  Duck Stamps goes directly to purchase vital migra-

tory waterfowl  habitat.   The stamp  also has become a valuable collec-
tor's item for philatelists and conservationists across the country.

     The canvasback,  one of  North America's  fastest flying  ducks, is
distinguished by its long reddish-chestnut neck and head, and white body
with a  black chest  and hindquarters.  Its wedge-shaped head slopes up-
ward from the tip of its long black bill to the back of the crown.

     The other  eligible species for this year's contest were the Canada
goose, and greater scaup, mallard, and pintail ducks.  Through an annual
process of  elimination and alternating eligible species, all 42 species
of North  American waterfowl  should be portrayed on a Duck Stamp by the
turn of the century.

     The Duck  Stamp has  been issued annually by the Federal Government
since 1934 when Jay N. "Ding" Darling's first drawing entitled "Mallards
Dropping In" became the first design for the stamp.  Subsequent art work
was commissioned until the contest began in 1949.

     The Federal  Government offers no monetary award to the winner, but
a panel  of stamps  bearing the  artist's design  and autographed by the
Secretary of  the Interior  is presented  to the  artist during the next
year's competition.  However, by winning the contest, the reputations of
previously unknown artists have been established overnight, and those of
professionals considerably  enhanced.   Winning artists profit when lim-
ited edition  prints of their design are marketed by commercial wildlife
art dealers  under private agreements.  The Duck Stamp Licensing Program
allows the  use of  Duck Stamp designs to adorn various products -- such
as T-shirts, caps, and mugs -- from which the artist also profits.

     Judges for this year's competition were Robert F. Dumaine, owner of
Sam Houston  Philatelics, Inc. and publisher of The Duck Report, a quar-
terly journal  of Duck Stamp activity; Kit Harrison, conservation editor
of Sports  Afield magazine  and co-author  of several books on birds and
bird-watching; Ginger  K. Renner, recognized expert on art of the Ameri-
can West,  particularly Charles  Russell's works;  Frank J. Sisser, edi-
tor/publisher of  U.S. Art  and a specialist in limited edition artwork;
and Mona M. Willis, who runs an art studio in Wichita, Kansas, dedicated
to her  late husband, artist M. Wayne Willis, and a member of the Kansas
Art Commission from 1987-91 and president of the commission in 1991.

     The current  1992 Duck  Stamp, designed  by 1991 contest winner Joe
Hautman, is on sale at most U.S. Post Offices and some national wildlife
refuges across  the country.  Duck stamps also can be used for admission
to National Wildlife Refuges requiring entrance fees.

  ====================================================================

This press  release has  been brought to you compliments of The Osprey's
Nest, a  computer bulletin  board for birders and other amateur natural-
ists in  the Washington,  DC area.   The Osprey's Nest may be reached 24
hours per day at 301-989-9036 and answers the phone at 300 to 9600 baud.

The Osprey's  Nest is not associated in any way with the U.S. Department
of the  Interior or  with the  U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.  Opinions
expressed in  these press releases are not necessarily those of the sys-
tem operator of The Osprey's Nest.



Fish and Wildlife Service
For Release: November 16, 1992

Georgia Parham  202-208-5634


                        Endangered Species News
                From The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service


After Decades, Canada Geese Return To Russia

     An endangered species success story in the United States may have a
Russian chapter if an effort to bring rare Aleutian Canada geese back to
Russia is  successful.   After  being  virtually  extinct  in  Asia  for
decades, the  geese that  once migrated between Japan and Russia will be
returning, thanks  to a  permanent loan  of 10  nesting pairs  from  the
United States.   The Aleutian Canada goose was once listed as endangered
in the  United States, but recovery efforts by the Interior Department's
U.S. Fish  and Wildlife  Service brought  populations back from a low of
fewer than  800 in  1967 to  a current  estimate of  8,000 birds.    The
species' status  in the  United States  has been upgraded to threatened.
The birds  sent to  Russia will  be the  start of  an extensive  captive
breeding program.   In  time, Russian  biologists hope  to duplicate the
success of  the recovery  effort and  re-establish a  migrating Aleutian
Canada goose population in Asia.


Conservation Agreement Will Help Rare Plants

     The U.S.  Fish and  Wildlife Service  and the Center for Plant Con-
servation have  signed a  cooperative agreement aimed at benefiting rare
plant species in the United States.  The agreement paves the way for the
Service to  provide funding  and technical  expertise in  support of the
Center's research  and development  of techniques  for  propagation  and
reintroduction of  endangered and rare plants.  The Center is a private,
non-profit organization  dedicated to  the conservation  of the nation's
most critically endangered plants.


More Condors To Fly Free

     Six rare  California condors will soon join the nation's only free-
flying condor  in the  skies over  the Los  Padres  national  Forest  in
southern California.   The  young condors,  all hatched  last spring  in
captivity at  the Los  Angeles zoo, were transferred in October from the
zoo to  a secluded  acclimation site  in the forest's Sespe Condor Sanc-
tuary.   By December  or January, once the birds are old enough and have
mastered flying  skills, biologists  from the  U.S.  Fish  and  Wildlife
Service will  drop the  nets surrounding the site, and the birds will be
free to take to the skies.

     All wild  condors were  brought into  captivity in 1987.  Last Jan-
uary, two  California condors  became the  first of their species to fly
free since  that time.   One of the pair was found dead recently, of an-
tifreeze poisoning.   The  bird was  apparently attracted to a puddle of
the toxic  liquid.   While disappointed  with the  accidental death, the
Service's condor  team is  hopeful that  the release  of the  six  young
condors will  mark another  positive step along the road to recovery for
North America's largest bird.


Black-footed Ferrets Released In Wyoming

     Biologists from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the State of
Wyoming released another 91 black-footed ferrets in the Shirley Basin of
Wyoming this  fall, supplementing last year's historic reintroduction of
49 of the rare mammals.  Black-footed ferrets were thought to be extinct
until a  small population  was discovered  in 1981  and eventually taken
into captivity.  Breeding programs have boosted ferret numbers, allowing
biologists to  attempt to  establish a wild population with captive-bred
animals.   Encouraging news  for the  ferret recovery  program came last
summer when  biologists discovered  that several of the released ferrets
had produced young in the wild.

  ====================================================================

This press  release has  been brought to you compliments of The Osprey's
Nest, a  computer bulletin  board for birders and other amateur natural-
ists in  the Washington,  DC area.   The Osprey's Nest may be reached 24
hours per day at 301-989-9036 and answers the phone at 300 to 9600 baud.

The Osprey's  Nest is not associated in any way with the U.S. Department
of the  Interior or  with the  U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.  Opinions
expressed in  these press releases are not necessarily those of the sys-
tem operator of The Osprey's Nest.