Illinois Natural History Survey Reports

              1
I LLINOIS
NATURAL
HI STORY
S U R V E Y R e p o r t s
Winter 2001
No. 366
I N S I D E
CTAP, A Far-reaching
Program
2
CTAP Monitoring
Framework
3
Results
5
Conclusions, Direc-tions,
Vision for the Pro-gram,
and the Upcom-ing
CTAP-II Report
12
Announcing Field
Guide to Butterfl ies of
Illinois
13
Species Spotlight:
Coyotes
14
Naturalist's Apprentice:
Coyote Word Search
15
Critical Trends Assessment Program Update
Continued on back page
“If we could fii rst know where we
are and whither we are tending,
we could better judge what we
do and how to do it. . . .” This
quote from Abraham Lin-coln,
however removed
from our present context,
sums up what the Criti-cal
Trends Assessment
Program (CTAP) is all
about. CTAP, man-aged
by the Division
of Energy and Environ-mental
Assessment, of
the Illinois Department
of Natural Resources
(IDNR), is designed to
evaluate the current condi-tion,
future trends, and extent
of Illinois ecosystems and
to provide citizens of the state
with some of the data necessary
to forge a plan for the future of
Illinois ecosystems. CTAP is the
fi rst attempt at a comprehensive
assessment of the Illinois envi-ronment,
and is a unique and am-bitious
undertaking among state
natural resource organizations.
Phase I of this program lasted
from 1991 to 1994 and culmi-nated
in The Changing Illinois
Environment: Critical Trends, a
seven-volume report summariz-ing
existing information on the
condition of Illinois ecosystems.
While it concluded that the dis-charge
of regulated pollutants had
drastically declined since 1970, it
pointed to continuing decline of
ecosystem condition due to habi-tat
fragmentation and introduced
species. The most important
fi nding, and one that prompted a
phase II of CTAP, was that avail-able
data were insuffi cient to ac-curately
assess ecosystem condition
on a statewide basis. This lack of
standardized information initiated
four distinct components:
• Land-cover mapping of the entire
state to document the extent of sev-eral
target ecosystems and land-use
patterns and to develop a protocol
for choosing random sample loca-tions
within the target eco-systems.
• Establishment of a team
of professional scientists
at the Illinois Natural
History Survey (INHS)
and a larger network of
dedicated, well-trained
“citizen scientists” (with
coordinators and train-ers,
part of the Illinois
EcoWatch Network) to
sample the state’s forests,
wetlands, grasslands, and
streams using standard,
scientifi cally valid pro-tocols.
The professional
scientists would carry
out detailed sampling at a
relatively few sites each
year, while the citizen
scientists would sample
many more sites, repeat-ing
them every year but
with less detail than their
professional counterparts.
• Additional professional
scientists from the Illinois State
Water Survey, the Illinois State
Geological Survey, and INHS
accumulate existing data in the
form of regional assessments de-signed
to inform citizen-led and
IDNR-facilitated ecosystem part-nerships
across the state on how
to protect, enhance, and restore
their natural setting while deal-ing
with ever-present growth and
development issues.