The Guam Kingfishers at the Albuquerque Biological Park (continued).

We were thrilled to learn this fabulous news today - the Albuquerque Biological Park has been successful in hatching Guam Kingfishers in their cork nest logs! This is great news for this highly endangered species. If you have been following this blog, you have seen our previous post. If not, take a look at it for details on the species and the importance of their nests including the material (cork) used to construct their nesting log: Harvested cork also helps preserve endangered species.

Thanks again to Peter Shannon, Curator of Birds at the Albuquerque Biological Park in New Mexico for sharing this news with us.

Jelinek Cork circa 1940.

It is always fun to find old pictures and what a cool picture this was to find. It is of the old Jelinek Cork factory (then known as Jelinek & Son) in the Czech Republic in the 1940s. If walls could talk, this building would have a lot to say...

 

See the gates in the front? That's how you get into the complex. This next picture shows Henry Jelinek III with his brothers-in-law and other colleagues standing in front of the gates.

The building survived World War II but in 1948 Jelinek Cork was nationalized and the Jelinek family escaped to Canada to find freedom and a new start. The new North American company was started and prospered throughout Canada and the USA and began expanding into other countries. In 1989, with the collapse of the Iron Curtain and the ousting of the communist regime, Jelinek Cork Group re-established a division of JCG in Eastern Europe and today also have facilities in both the Czech Republic and Slovak Republic (along with Portugal and the UK).

In the 1940s, a bus stop close to the Jelinek cork factory was named "Korek" (translates to "Cork" in English) and shows the importance of the company.

Here is a "Now" picture: Henry (Sonny) Jelinek V (who now operates Jelinek Cork USA in Savannah, Georgia) and Henry (Casey) Jelinek VI are visiting the old factory and the bus stop still remains.

Jelinek Cork is a privately owned, fifth generation family run business with locations throughout the world. It was founded in 1855 and is one of the oldest continually active cork companies in the world!

For more information on cork and the Jelinek Cork history, visit jelinek.com or take a look at House of Cork by Henry Jelinek IV.

Jelinek Cork - Supplying Cork to Distillers Since 1855.

Jelinek Cork began supplying cork to distillers in 1855 and continues to do so today. This fifth generation, family owned operation knows cork. The knowledge and understanding of cork, a remarkable natural material, has literally been passed along generation after generation after generation after generation after generation.

In 1855, the civil war in the US hadn't even begun, Canada was not yet a country and it would still be more than half a century for Czechoslovakia to be formed ... yet ... Jelinek was already busy supplying cork!

Harvested cork also helps preserve endangered species

We received the following email from Peter Shannon, the Curator of Birds at Albuquerque Biological Park. We love hearing how our cork is used, especially when we learn that even after the cork is harvested, it continues to play a part in preserving highly endangered species.  

From Peter Shannon:
"In the mid 1980's, zoos were called upon to assist in saving the Guam kingfisher from extinction. 29 birds were collected from the island of Guam, and by 1988 the species was extinct in the wild. Over the past 25 years, zoos have managed to breed the species and increase its numbers to about 135 individuals.

Knowing very little about the natural history of the species at the time, we struggled with development of the best husbandry practices to successfully propagate them. One thing we did know was that once a pair was established, they required soft, rotten logs in order to excavate a nest cavity. A significant challenge for many of the zoos has been finding the "right" logs that the birds would be able to use.

For some reason I recently came across an article about duck decoys, and the cork blocks that carvers use to make them. The internal wheels started turning and I bought some of the low density cork blocks to begin experimenting. We built some open fronted boxes, cut the cork blocks to size and filled the boxes several layers deep with the cork panels.

We have two pairs of the kingfishers at the zoo here in Albuquerque. Within days of installing our cork "nest logs", both pairs began excavating nest cavities. And the day before yesterday, we had our first kingfisher egg in one of the "logs".

It will be three weeks before we know if it will hatch.

Just thought you would be interested to know that not only is cork forest management making a difference in preserving valuable wildlife habitat, the harvested materials may also be making a difference in preserving other highly endangered species. If these cork nest logs are successful, not only will the captive population of kingfishers benefit, the strategy may make a difference in facilitating return of the species to the wild someday. As Martha Stewart would say, "it's a good thing:."" 


Peter also shared with us a little history about the Guam Kingfisher.
"In the short form, here is the tale.......... In the 1970's, birds on Guam were disappearing at an alarming rate. It turned out that sometime at the end of World War II, the brown tree snake from Indonesia found its way onto Guam (probably hitching a ride on cargo ships). A largely nocturnal species, it feeds on eggs and nestlings and female birds sitting on nests. The birds on Guam had not evolved with this type of predator and had no natural defense strategies to survive this invasion. By the early 1980's, several species were already functionally extinct -- only males remained. This is when zoos stepped in to bring kingfishers and rails into captivity. Within a few years, both species were extinct in the wild. Control or total elimination of the tree snake has proven to be challenging. There is still no comprehensive technique for the snake problem. But in the meantime, zoos continue to do their part to keep these species going until sometime in the future the problem can be solved. Right now, there are agencies exploring the possibility of introducing kingfishers to similar island habitats until such time as they can be returned to Guam".

If you are interested in reading more, "And No Birds Sing" by Mark Jaffe is a good history of the Guam story.

Awesome! Thanks to Peter Shannon, Curator of Birds at the Albuquerque Biological Park in New Mexico for sharing this story with us.

School fun (while learning): Building with cork

In my previous post, I wrote about the box of corks my daughter's first grade class was going to be building with. As they are learning about communities, building and recycling, their task was to design and build a structure of their choice using cork (and glue of course)! The students could choose from whatever cork material they could find in the box (similar components are found in the cork craft grab bag on the corkstore.com). They needed to come up with a plan, design it and then build it. Below are some of their creations:

Kids and Recycled Cork

The other day, I dropped off a box of recycled wine corks with my daughter's first grade class. The classroom became a big buzz of excitement: What were the corks for? What should they build? How will they build it? After much discussion it was decided to use the corks to build a community. The kids can glue corks together to build tall skyscrapers, they can glue corks side by side to create little houses, they can even make little people, animals and trees from the wine stoppers. Roads will be built where recycled cork cars can drive, fire stations will be erected with recycled cork fire engines, bridges and train tracks all will be built with cork. Once construction begins on the cork community, I'm sure other ideas will surface.

The recycled cork stoppers are part of a unit the children are doing on recycling and the environment. Re-using what could be considered garbage by some, will save room in our landfills and give our "junk" another purpose. In my daughter's class not only are they learning about communities but they are doing so while learning and building with recycled materials.

I look forward to visiting the recycled cork community. It should be a fun learning experience for all!

Need more recycled wine corks for a craft or idea? The corkstore.com has them along with special Cork Grab Bags - bags full of various corks.

Jelinek Cork Fabric in Vogue Patterns Magazine

Cork fabric, also known as cork leather or cork skin, is produced from natural cork - the bark of the cork oak tree. The cork fabric is composed of thin sheets of natural cork adhered to a fabric support backing. It is available in a variety of different patterns and colors. Take a look at the corkstore.com to see the many patterns available. One may think "Cork Fabric? How can that last?". But it does. This amazingly durable fabric is comparable to leather in terms of durability. The main difference? Cork fabric can actually get wet and be washed - unlike leather. Besides being durable, beautiful to look at and warm it is also environmentally friendly, hypoallergenic, water resistant and stain resistant.

Take a look at this month's (February/March 2012) issue of Vogue Patterns Magazine. You'll see Jelinek Cork fabric featured (along with a promo code). The magazine also includes a cool project demonstrating how to make a wallet and e-book reader using cork fabric.

The magazine is available at newsstands or take a peek at their online sampler.