Washington

Audubon Washington became one of the early adopters of the IBA Program in the United States, initiating an effort to identify IBAs beginning in the late 1990s. In 2001, Important Bird Areas of Washington (Tim Cullinan) likewise became one of the first state-level books cataloging these critical landscapes. The program has added many landscapes to the IBA portfolio since those early days of the program, including four largely open-water IBAs capturing some of the critical coastal and pelagic bird resources of the state. Recent attention has focused on Eastern Washington, where shrub-steppe and riparian habitats suffer many of the same pressures and threats as in other regions of the Intermountain West. The IBA Program in Washington is housed in Audubon Washington's science program, and as such is integrated into the state's broader education and policy efforts. With cooperation from the state's Department of Natural Resources, protocol for integrating the IBAs into the Natural Heritage Program are also being explored.