Utah's yellow warblers need donations.

So do American robins -- and peregrine falcons, yellow-billed cuckoos, spotted owls, river otters, black-footed ferrets, pygmy rabbits and prairie dogs.

Donations to study and protect nongame wildlife have fallen more than 50 percent in the past year, and state wildlife managers are hoping to reverse the trend.

Many Utahns may not realize that hunters and anglers, through purchasing hunting fees and licenses and paying special taxes on hunting and fishing equipment, provide almost all of the funding to manage wildlife in Utah, said Greg Sheehan of the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.

Because that money comes from those harvesting game animals, most of the money is used to benefit game animals, he said.

To help support nongame animals, the DWR successfully petitioned the Legislature more than two decades ago to allow Utahns to donate to nongame animal management through state tax forms. Since then, seven other charities have been added to the tax form.

Last year, citing shortage of space, the state removed the names of the charities from the tax form, meaning residents must search for special codes in a supplemental booklet if they want to donate.

The affect has been devastating, Sheehan said. Utahns donated $54,000 in 2004 and just less than $24,000 in 2005.

"It is always a struggle to find money for nongame species," said Kevin Bunnell of the DWR. "Every dollar counts and because the dollars are hard to come by, we try to be very productive with every dollar that we get as far as putting things on the ground and making it mean something."

The money donated last year was used to fund surveys of raptor and songbird populations in Utah, among other projects, he said.

The surveys help managers make decisions to assure the future of birds as common as yellow warblers and American robins, and as rare as peregrine falcons and yellow-billed cuckoos.

Biologists use the money to "try to figure out where they eat and if there are any threats to the population, if the population is expanding," Sheehan said.

Using global positioning technology and 15 years of survey data taken in Utah's remote canyons, the money has also been used to learn how much habitat is available in Utah to support the state's population of Mexican spotted owls, he said.

The money is also used to expand populations of endangered and sensitive species including river otters in southern Utah, black-footed ferrets in northeastern Utah, and pygmy rabbits and prairie dogs in other areas.

Until they were transplanted in Utah nine years ago, all black-footed ferrets were believed to have died out in the state, he said. Donations are used to put radio collars on some of the animals and monitor their travel and eating patterns.

Caleb Warnock can be reached at 443-3263 or This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

How to donate to nongame wildlife:

Write in the proper code on your 2005 Utah State Income Tax form and donate the amount you want to give to the Utah Nongame Wildlife Fund. The code for the fund is 01. The code and dollar amount you want to give can be written on any line between 21a - 21f on the tax form. Then write your total contribution on line 21.

If you've already filed your taxes, donations can be sent to Division of Wildlife Resources, P.O. Box 146301, Salt Lake City, Utah, 84114-6301. Please indicate, either on the check or on a note attached to the check, that the money is for Utah's Nongame Wildlife Fund.