To all Friends of Patuxent Research Refuge,

The recent deliberations regarding the FY 26 federal budget and the “One Big Beautiful Bill” making its way through Congress point to budget and personnel cuts that would be catastrophic to the wildlife science programs and research at Patuxent Research Refuge. 

The President’s recently released budget narrative for the FY 26 budget calls for eliminating more than 90 percent of funding for the Ecosystem Mission Area of the US Geological Survey which would effectively wipe out Patuxent’s wildlife research  program including the Bird Banding Lab (BBL), the program that analyzes and interprets the data from bird bands collected from around the world; the Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) a research effort that provides critical science-based data collected by professionals and citizen scientists across North America; and the Bee Monitoring and Inventory Lab (BIML), which tracks wild bee populations across the country.

This is an existential threat to the federal wildlife science program that goes back in some cases more than 100 years, science that is the underpinning of modern conservation planning and natural resources management. In Patuxent’s case, it would mean the loss of scientists and toxicology research programs that historically led to the restoration of bald eagles whose eggshells were thinned by DDT poisoning to the loss of researchers who today are studying avian flu today and the potential crossover of H1N5 influenza from migratory waterfowl to commercial poultry flocks. 

The loss of EESC/Patuxent Research Refuge would be devastating to our nation and to our nation’s natural resources. The Friends of Patuxent Research Center urge you to contact your US Representatives and Senators today to let them know this would be an unacceptable loss to our country.

Please take action now! Even if you have no experience in reaching out to your Members of Congress, you can make a phone call or send an email to your own Members of Congress.

Here are links to easily help you find your US Representatives and Senators:

https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative 

https://www.senate.gov/senators/senators-contact.htm

Tell them in your own words why you think it would be a very bad idea to wipe out all funding for USGS’s science center at Patuxent Research Refuge.

For a deeper dive on what’s at stake and why such cuts would be catastrophic to wildlife conservation, see the below letter prepared by the Friends of Patuxent. Feel free to adapt it or use any part of it for your message to Congress. Join with the Friends of Patuxent and act today!

View Sample Form Letter Here