Regional U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Award Recognizes Nancy Menasco for Support of USFWS Mission and Red River National Wildlife Refuge
Shreveporter Nancy Menasco, president of the Red River Refuge Alliance, is the recipient of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service Regional Director's Honor Award for volunteer service, one of 10 so honored in the Southeast Region's 10 states and two territories. The region includes Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
"Nancy Menasco is an advocate of wildlife conservation, a supporter of the National Wildlife Refuge System and a vital member of the Refuge Friends Movement," said published materials and Southeast Director Sam Hamilton of the USFWS when making the award at the Regional Director's Awards Ceremony in May in Atlanta, Ga.
Menasco was recognized for her volunteer service to the Fish and Wildlife Service and the Red River National Wildlife Refuge, which was established in 2000 to restore and conserve bottomland hardwood habitats within the Red River valley for native plant and animal communities and for migratory waterfowl and song birds.
Menasco has been president of the Red River Refuge Alliance, the friends group for the refuge, since October of 2007, and has been an officer and a volunteer since the group's inception. She was instrumental in securing a major financial contribution that was used to plan and execute the renovation of a building for use as a temporary headquarters for the Refuge.
In the absence of a Refuge biologist, she organized a partnership with the Shreveport Bird Study Group and Louisiana State University in Shreveport to implement an annual avian monitoring program. This monitoring program includes efforts to catalog dragonfly, spider and small mammal species on the Refuge. She is also editor and contributor of the quarterly Red River Raft newsletter, and has served as large events coordinator for the organization.
The refuge, which currently consists of several tracts along the Red River between the Louisiana-Arkansas state line and Natchitoches Parish, has the potential to protect and enhance approximately 50,000 acres. Funding is secured and plans are being drawn for a visitor center-administration building at the headquarters tract just south of the Jimmie Davis Bridge in Bossier City.
c/o Red River National Wildlife Refuge Headquarters Unit, 555 Sunflower Road, Bossier City, LA 71112
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (6-10-08) with photo (original 300 dpi)
Contact: Lynn Stewart, Red River Refuge Alliance, 318-868-1067, or Gay Brantley, North Louisiana Refuges Complex, 318-387-1114
Upcoming Events
September 2008
- Monday, September 8: General Membership Meeting, LSUS Museum of Life Sciences, Shreveport
October 2008
- Monday, October 6, 2008: General Membership Meeting, Broadmoor Library, Shreveport
- Saturday, October 18, 2008, 8:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. 4th Annual Refuge Celebration, Refuge Headquarters, Bossier City
Stay tuned for announcement of members-only events, including a visit to the refuge's Lower Cane River unit with possible overnight lodging at the NSU Aquaculture Center.