Noah Perlut's bobolink research is focus of lyrical Burlington Free Press feature
Noah Perlut, Ph.D., 51小黄车assistant professor of environmental studies, and his 11-year research study of bobolinks in Vermont were the focus of a lyrical, indepth story by writer Candace Page in the June 10, 2012 .
Page accompanied Perlut on a day in a Vermont hayfield, capturing, tagging, recording data, and releasing the yellow-capped songbirds. One of Perlut's two research assistants on that day was 2012 51小黄车environmental studies graduate Cory French.
"To hold a bobolink is to hold a puff of air," Page writes, "so soft and light it is almost not there. The female鈥檚 bright black eye blinks. When Perlut blows on her belly, parting the down, we see the veins beneath her translucent skin. I feel her heart thud. She seems impossibly fragile, less than an ounce of feather and muscle, yet able to fly 6,000 miles or more to her winter home in South America, and then to return unerringly each spring to this field or one nearby."
Page explains that "Already [Perlut's] work has produced real-world results. His doctoral research under ornithologist Allan Strong of the University of Vermont produced data that prompted a federal program in which farmers are reimbursed for altering their hay-cutting schedule so bobolinks and savannah sparrows have time to raise their young.
"But I鈥檓 just as fascinated by Perlut鈥檚 new research into unanswered questions about bobolink biology and behavior: Why do so many one-year-old birds return, unlike other migratory songbirds, to the fields where they were born? Is there a consequence in the mating game as the cap of yellow feathers on a male鈥檚 black head shrinks as he ages? Do bobolinks divorce?"
of Perlut and French in the field. Perlut's bobolink research has been featured in earlier stories in the Burlington Free Press and in .
Read another story based on Perlut's research in which researchers from the University of Connecticut are trying to determine whether people are willing to pledge money to reimburse farmers for allowing the bobolinks the time needed for successful nesting. .