Uihlein Foundation announces opening of new Motus Wildlife Tracking System in Lake Placid

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Friday, May 3, 2024 

LAKE PLACID – In partnership with the Northeast Motus Collaboration, the Henry and  Mildred Uihlein Foundation are delighted to announce the opening of the region’s first  Motus Wildlife Tracking Station. The station will be located at Uihlein Farm on Bear Cub  Lane in Lake Placid at the site of the former Cornell potato research laboratory. 

Motus Wildlife Tracking Systems are a network of towers involving hundreds of  institutions, independent researchers and agencies all coordinated by Birding Canada.  The systems currently track over 200 species of tagged animals including bats, raptors,  songbirds, butterflies, seabirds and even some dragonflies. The goal is to create a  collaborative network for all researchers monitoring flying animals that would normally  be too small to track. Motus receiver stations all over the world send the data collected  from the VHF Nanotag transmitters on animals to a shared database that is then made  available for public education purposes. 

“We are thrilled to partner with this group of collaborators by adding a new Motus station  here at Uihlein Farm to help track migratory birds traveling through the Adirondack  Park,” said James McKenna of the Uihlein Foundation. “In addition to being good  stewards of Uihlein lands, we think Henry and Mildred Uihlein would be pleased about  the ways our Foundation is working to enhance and promote wildlife conservation.” 

Lisa Kiziuk or Chris Regan quote here about the importance of advancing avian  research and significance of this location: 

The Uihlein Foundation is planning a ribbon cutting ceremony to open the Motus station  on Saturday, June 1st at Uihlein Farm from 9 am -3 pm. The event will be shared by the  AdkAction’s Adirondack Pollinator Festival and the Great Adirondack Birding  Celebration (GABC) hosted by Paul Smith’s College. The day will be packed full of  family-friendly activities for bird and plant lovers alike, a native pollinator plant sale,  guided grassland bird walks with experts, a native plant and pollinator talk, discussions  about grassland conservation with staff members from Adirondack Land Trust, and a  conversation with AuSable River Association about their upcoming native conservation  nursery, face painting, seed giveaways and more. The event is open to the public and  we hope you will join us for this celebration. 

For questions or information about the Motus Wildlife Tracking station grand opening  contact Andrea Grout, Properties Director of the Uihlein Foundation at  andrea@heavenhillfarm.org. For information or to register for a Paul Smith’s College  GABC walk, visit: https://www.paulsmithsvic.org/gabc/. To pre-order plants from the  AdkAction Native pollinator plant sale visit: https://www.adkaction.org/plantsale/.