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At least 415 records · Page 23Linked to original sources
USGS2000

Atlantic Flyway review: Piedmont-Coastal Plain, Region IV, Fall 1999

In a slight reorganization, the Mount Nebo station in the mountains of western Maryland near Oakland was moved to Region III (Western Ridge), in exchange for Lakeshore Estates in Leon County, Florida, which we welcome to Region IV. This was the year of the hurricane in Region IV, with the majority of stations commenting on summer drought, persistent easterly winds, or hurricanes. Nine of the ten stations that operated in both 1998 and 1999 banded fewer birds in the 1999 season, the notable exception being Chino Farms, which jumped from 5193 to 8225 birds and also had a 3% increase in birds per 100 net-hours. Summing across these ten stations: 27,911 birds were banded in 1998, 24,753 in 1999, a decrease of 11%. (Net-hours are not available for all sites for 1998). Yellow-rumped Warbler was again the most commonly banded, followed again by Common Yellowthroat (which was among the top ten species at all sites except Lakeshore Estates at Tallahassee), and with the American Goldfinch a surprise in third place.

North American Bird Bander↗
USGS2005

Winter status of White-eyed Vireos in northeastern Louisiana

In December 2004, February 2005, and June 2005, we recaptured a White-eyed Vireo (Vireo griseus) that was banded on 19 May 2004 at the same location on the Tensas River National Wildlife Refuge, Madison Parish, LA. This is the first documented permanent resident White-eyed Vireo outside of resident populations known from Florida and southern Texas. This individual appears to be resident near the northern limit of the winter range for the species. Although White-eyed Vireos are uncommon in northeastern Louisiana during winter, we detected other White-eyed Vireos during line transect surveys and banding during winters 2003-2004 and 2004-2005. The lack of research and observation of winter birds in northern Louisiana and the secretive and inconspicuous behavior of White-eyed Vireos in winter may have led to an underestimation of abundance at the northern limits of their winter range.

North American Bird Bander↗
USGS2008

Modeling wetland blackbird populations as a function of waterfowl abundance in the prairie pothole region of the United States and Canada

Blackbirds share wetland habitat with many waterfowl species in Bird Conservation Region 11 (BCR 11), the prairie potholes. Because of similar habitat preferences, there may be associations between blackbird populations and populations of one or more species of waterfowl in BCR11. This study models populations of red-winged blackbirds and yellow-headed blackbirds as a function of multiple waterfowl species using data from the North American Breeding Bird Survey within BCR11. For each blackbird species, we created a global model with blackbird abundance modeled as a function of 11 waterfowl species; nuisance effects (year, route, and observer) also were included in the model. Hierarchical Poisson regression models were fit using Markov chain Monte Carlo methods in WinBUGS 1.4.1. Waterfowl abundances were weakly associated with blackbird numbers, and no single waterfowl species showed a strong correlation with any blackbird species. These findings suggest waterfowl abundance from a single species is not likely a good bioindicator of blackbird abundance; however, a global model provided good fit for predicting red-winged blackbird abundance. Increased model complexity may be required for accurate predictions of blackbird abundance; the amount of data required to construct appropriate models may limit this approach for predicting blackbird abundance in the prairie potholes. Copyright ?? Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

Environmental Bioindicators↗
USGS1995

Report from the banding lab

Mr. Tautin reported on the seemingly everchanging structure of biological science units within the Interior Department. Current Congressional proposals would either change the name of the Bird Banding Lab's parent agency or make it part of the Geological Survey. The current Congress has not looked favorably on science budgets within the Interior Department, and the Banding Lab's budget is being squeezed ever tighter.

North American Bird Bander↗
USGS2001

Forest fragmentation and bird community dynamics: Inference at regional scales

With increasing fragmentation of natural areas and a dramatic reduction of forest cover in several parts of the world, quantifying the impact of such changes on species richness and community dynamics has been a subject of much concern. Here, we tested whether in more fragmented landscapes there was a lower number of area-sensitive species and higher local extinction and turnover rates, which could explain higher temporal variability in species richness. To investigate such potential landscape effects at a regional scale, we merged two independent, large-scale monitoring efforts: the North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) and the Land Use and Land Cover Classification data from the U.S. Geological Survey. We used methods that accounted for heterogeneity in the probability of detecting species to estimate species richness and temporal changes in the bird communities for BBS routes in three mid-Atlantic U.S. states. Forest breeding bird species were grouped prior to the analyses into area-sensitive and non-area-sensitive species according to previous studies. We tested predictions relating measures of forest structure at one point in time (1974) to species richness at that time and to parameters of forest bird community change over the following 22-yr-period (1975–1996). We used the mean size of forest patches to characterize landscape structure, as high correlations among landscape variables did not allow us to disentangle the relative roles of habitat fragmentation per se and habitat loss. As predicted, together with lower species richness for area-sensitive species on routes surrounded by landscapes with lower mean forest-patch size, we found higher mean year-to-year rates of local extinction. Moreover, the mean year-to-year rates of local turnover (proportion of locally new species) for area-sensitive species were also higher in landscapes with lower mean forest-patch size. These associations were not observed for the non-area-sensitive species group. These results suggest that landscape structure may influence forest bird communities at regional scales through its effects on the total number of species but also on the temporal rates of change in community composition. Evidence for higher rates of local extinction and turnover in more fragmented landscapes suggests that bird communities function as metapopulations at a regional scale, and points out the importance of colonizations and recolonizations from surrounding landscapes to local community dynamics. Further, our results illustrate that the methods used to estimate the community parameters can be a powerful statistical tool in addressing questions relative to the dynamics of communities.

Ecology↗
USGS2000

Geographic analysis of species richness and community attributes of forest birds from survey data in the mid-Atlantic integrated assessment region

Species richness of local communities is a state variable commonly used in community ecology and conservation biology. Investigation of spatial and temporal variations in richness and identification of factors associated with these variations form a basis for specifying management plans, evaluating these plans, and for testing hypotheses of theoretical interest. However, estimation of species richness is not trivial: species can be missed by investigators during sampling sessions. Sampling artifacts can lead to erroneous conclusions on spatial and temporal variation in species richness. Here we use data from the North American Breeding Bird Survey to estimate parameters describing the state of bird communities in the Mid-Atlantic Assessment (MAIA) region: species richness, extinction probability, turnover and relative species richness. We use a recently developed approach to estimation of species richness and related parameters that does not require the assumption that all the species are detected during sampling efforts. The information presented here is intended to visualize the state of bird communities in the MAIA region. We provide information on 1975 and 1990. We also quantified the changes between these years. We summarized and mapped the community attributes at a scale of management interest (watershed units).

Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West V↗
USGS2025

U.S. national park units as breeding bird habitat: A comparison of species prevalence and land cover across the midwestern and central United States

The value of national parks as bird habitat depends not only on local conditions within the parks, but also on the landscape habitat matrices in which they are located. However, the influences of local and landscape habitat matrices on birds vary by species and have not been quantified. Similarly, the trends of land cover types through time have not been systematically quantified for Midwest Region national parks and the landscapes around them, despite evidence of ongoing habitat loss exacerbated by climate change and human population growth. Managers and policy makers can use this information to understand and sustain the contribution of parks to our Nation’s avifauna. We developed models using North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) data collected on routes from across the central United States. The models were used to predict occupancy of bird species of concern in 32 national park units across nine Bird Conservation Regions in the Midwest based on land cover in and around those parks. We then compared these predictions with data collected through National Park Service (NPS) bird surveys at each park to determine if bird species of concern were more or less prevalent than expected. In each park, the mean difference between observed species detections and mean predicted detections indicates that most species are less frequently detected in the parks than predicted. However, when the range of uncertainty of predictions is considered, only 21% of park-bird combinations showed strong evidence (95%) of differing from expectation. Of these, species were less common than expected in the park in all but two cases. These results indicate that some bird species of concern occupy sites in Midwest Region national park units at a rate roughly comparable to sites with similar land cover in the Bird Conservation Region (BCR) in which they occur. However, for one in five species-park combinations, parks appear to be less occupied than comparable sites elsewhere.

Midwest region↗
USGS2015

H7N9 influenza A virus in turkeys in Minnesota

Introductions of H7 Influenza A virus (IAV) from wild birds into poultry have been documented worldwide, resulting in varying degrees of morbidity and mortality. H7 IAV infection in domestic poultry has served as a source of human infection and disease. We report the detection of H7N9 subtype IAV in Minnesota turkey farms during 2009 and 2011. The full-genome was sequenced from eight isolates as well as the hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) gene segments of H7 and N9 virus subtypes for 108 isolates from North American wild birds between 1986 and 2012. Through maximum likelihood and coalescent phylogenetic analyses, we identified the recent H7 and N9 IAV ancestors of the turkey-origin H7N9 IAV, estimated the time and geographic origin of the ancestral viruses, and determined the relatedness between the 2009 and the 2011 turkey-origin H7N9 IAV. Analyses supported that the 2009 and the 2011 viruses were distantly related genetically, suggesting that the two outbreaks arose from independent introduction events from wild birds. Our findings further support that the 2011 MN turkey-origin H7N9 virus was closely related to H7N9 IAV isolated in poultry in Nebraska during the same year. Although the precise origin of the wild-bird donor of the turkey-origin H7N9 IAV could not be determined, our findings suggest that, for both the NA and HA gene segments, the MN turkey-origin H7N9 viruses were related to viruses circulating in wild birds between 2006 and 2011 in the Mississippi flyway.

Minnesota↗
USGS2010

Assessing allowable take of migratory birds

Legal removal of migratory birds from the wild occurs for several reasons, including subsistence, sport harvest, damage control, and the pet trade. We argue that harvest theory provides the basis for assessing the impact of authorized take, advance a simplified rendering of harvest theory known as potential biological removal as a useful starting point for assessing take, and demonstrate this approach with a case study of depredation control of black vultures (Coragyps atratus) in Virginia, USA. Based on data from the North American Breeding Bird Survey and other sources, we estimated that the black vulture population in Virginia was 91,190 (95% credible interval = 44,520?212,100) in 2006. Using a simple population model and available estimates of life-history parameters, we estimated the intrinsic rate of growth (rmax) to be in the range 7?14%, with 10.6% a plausible point estimate. For a take program to seek an equilibrium population size on the conservative side of the yield curve, the rate of take needs to be less than that which achieves a maximum sustained yield (0.5 x rmax). Based on the point estimate for rmax and using the lower 60% credible interval for population size to account for uncertainty, these conditions would be met if the take of black vultures in Virginia in 2006 was < 3,533 birds. Based on regular monitoring data, allowable harvest should be adjusted annually to reflect changes in population size. To initiate discussion about how this assessment framework could be related to the laws and regulations that govern authorization of such take, we suggest that the Migratory Bird Treaty Act requires only that take of native migratory birds be sustainable in the long-term, that is, sustained harvest rate should be < rmax. Further, the ratio of desired harvest rate to 0.5 x rmax may be a useful metric for ascertaining the applicability of specific requirements of the National Environmental Protection Act.

Journal of Wildlife Management↗
USGS2004

Atlantic Flyway review: Region IV - Fall 2003

We welcome the Eden Mill station in northeastern Maryland to Region IV this year. With three stations reporting their worst year ever, we really need to be refreshed. After a cool and wet July, August was hot and wet in the east. Temperatures in September remained close to normal, but thanks to tropical storms Henri (6-8 Sep) and Isabel (18 Sep), rainfall was excessive in the Chesapeake Bay states. The entire Northeast had cool weather in October, starting with an early freeze on 3 Oct that triggered some good banding days in our region. Precipitation was unusually spotty in October, but plentiful at most of the Region IV stations. November temperatures were consistently well above the norm, starting with a record-breaking 81 ø in Baltimore on the 1 st . Four of the five Maryland stations had their best day on 19 or 20 Oct. One might expect some of the Virginia coastal stations, Chincoteague, Kiptopeke, and Back Bay, to share the same best day, but they did not. Three stations reported an increase in birds per net hour this year, while seven had a decline. Summarizing the changes in rank in Table 2, Gray Catbird was the species with the most (5) increases in rank (in excess of decreases), followed by junco (4) and Myrtle Warbler and Swamp Sparrow (3 each). Yellowthroat had the most decreases (5), followed by redstart (3). Myrtle Warbler (4572) was once again the most commonly banded species in Region IV, followed by White-throated Sparrow (1723), Gray Catbird (1349), and Western Palm Warbler (1090). Michelle Davis' station on Key Biscayne is the envy of the rest of us. Her top eight species were all warblers and there was not a Myrtle among them. Imagine having Parula, Prairie, and Worm-eating warblers fighting for sixth place! Not showing among the top ten, however, are other surprises. Several banders commented on Sawwhet Owls and Bicknell's Thrushes. Deanna Dawson banded a Cerulean Warbler at Patuxent. Danny Bystrak caught 138 Swamp Sparrows at Jug Bay. In addition to two Clay-colored Sparrows and two Gambel's White-crowns, Jim Gruber at Chino Farms had his first Le Conte's Sparrow and a state high of 39 Lincoln's Sparrows. Dick Roberts' new species at Chincoteague included Yellow-throated and Mourning warblers, while Jethro Runco's best birds at Kiptopeke included S edge Wren and Golden-winged Warbler. The Simpsons at Back Bay finally identified a Western Wood-Pewee after many years of trying. Unusual for Michelle Davis' warbler station on Key Biscayne were Tennessee, Chestnut-sided, and Bay-breasted warblers.

North American Bird Bander↗
USGS1999

Role of banding in forest conservation strategy in eastern Guatemala

In response to a request from FUNDAECO, a Guatemalan non-government organization, we worked with them to develop a conservation strategy for the Cerro San Gil Protected Area and surrounding private lands. Volunteer banders from a dozen states and Canadian provinces assisted in long-term monitoring of populations of resident and migratory species through banding and point counts. Guatemalan students were trained to continue the research and initiate other conservation projects. Banding data helped demonstrate habitat and elevational affiliations, effects of habitat fragmentation, site fidelity, survival rates, local movements, and presence of rare species not otherwise detected. Banding was also an excellent teaching tool and provided videos for conservation programs on Guatemala national television. Roadside and off-road Breeding Bird Survey transects were used to map distribution of breeding species on habitat maps derived from satellite imagery, and point count surveys on private lands were used to identify prime habitats that warrant protection through conservation easements--a new concept for Central America.

North American Bird Bander↗
USGS2021

Galliform exclusion from the Migratory Bird Treaty Act has produced an alternate conservation path, but no evidence for differences in population status

The Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) is critical to avian conservation in the United States, both through its protection of migratory birds and as a catalyst for a century of coordinated avian conservation. While more than 1,000 species are protected by MBTA, of extant bird species native to the continental U.S., only 20 species belonging to the order Galliformes are explicitly excluded. Management of galliforms has occurred largely without direct federal oversight, placing this group on a fundamentally different conservation path during the century following MBTA passage. In this paper, we review the historical context and biological justification for exclusion of galliforms from MBTA and synthesize how their present-day conservation differs from that of migratory birds. We find the most prominent difference between the two groups involves the scope of coordination among stakeholders. The U.S. government, primarily via the Department of Interior, acts as de facto coordinating body for migratory bird conservation and plays the central role in oversight, funding, and administration of management in the United States. In contrast, galliform management falls primarily to individual state wildlife agencies, and coordinated conservation efforts have been more ad hoc and unevenly spread across species. Migratory birds benefit from an almost universally greater scope of research and monitoring, scale of habitat conservation, and sophistication of harvest management compared with galliforms. Galliform harvest management plans, in particular, are less likely to use measurable objectives, reporting of uncertainty in population parameters, and explanation of harvest management techniques. Based on a review of species status lists (e.g., the U.S. Endangered Species Act), we found no evidence that galliforms were more frequently listed than migratory species. Regional trend estimates from the North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) were more likely to be negative for galliforms over the period 1966–2015, but this was primarily driven by Northern Bobwhite ( Colinus virginianus ). Data to assess galliform population status are generally poor, which complicates assessment for roughly half of galliform species. Increased support for coordination among state agencies and other stakeholders, similar to that applied to migratory birds, could help to ensure that galliform conservation is poised to tackle forthcoming challenges associated with global change.

North America↗
USGS2000

Atlantic Flyway review: Piedmont-Coastal Plain, Region IV, Fall 1999: Patuxent powerline right-of-way (390-0764)

Fall 1999 was among the poorest seasons in this banding station's 20 years of operation. Record high capture totals were set for only two species: Ruby-throated Hummingbird (41 individuals captured, none banded; previous high 21) and White-breasted Nuthatch (two individuals banded; previous high, one). The only other species that stood out as being unusually numerous was Blackpoll Warbler, for which the banding total (33 birds) was the highest since 1988. Bandings of several species (Red-eyed Vireo, Tennessee Warbler, Nashville Warbler, Ovenbird, Hooded Warbler, Canada Warbler, Eastern Towhee, and Field Sparrow) were at record lows, and bandings of many other species were below the long-term (1980-1998) mean. The number of species banded was also below the long-term mean of 86 species, and tied the previous low. Possible contributing factors included drought conditions in Maryland and elsewhere in the East, which may have influenced nesting productivity and migration dates for some species; Hurricanes Dennis and Floyd, which influenced East Coast weather through much of September; the unprecedented scarcity of Hercules' Club ( Aralia spinosa ) fruits at the banding station; and occasional visits by a gray fox, which reduced operation of some nets in October and November. A season highlight was the August capture of 37 Red-eyed Vireos banded at this station in previous years, including a bird banded in August 1989. These are almost certainly locally nesting birds that feed on the abundant fruits of Viburnum dentatum in the powerline right-of-way in late summer. Regular assistants at the banding station included Woody Martin, Susie Michaelson, Jane Nicolich, Gemma Radko, Jack Saba, Julie Tomita, and Laurie Walter. Danny Bystrak and Mary Gustafson each served as bander-in-charge on several mornings.

Maryland↗
USGS1989

A technique to prevent capturing birds in unattended, furled mist nets

A technique was developed to prevent the inadvertent capturing of birds in unattended mist nets left in place for long periods of time. This was accomplished by placing furled nets on top of 9-inch wide strips of 30-pound roofing felt secured to the ground between net support poles. All materials used are widely available and procedures used to make the felt strips and install them are described.

North American Bird Bander↗
USGS2002

Three geese resembling Gray-Bellied Brant/Lawrence's Brant from Long Island, New York

Three oddly plumaged brant, intermediate in several respects between 'Atlantic' or 'Pale-bellied Brant' (hrota) and ?Black Brant? (nigricans) were photographed and described on western Long Island, New York during 2002 (two in March, the third in October). Their plumage corresponded to that of the little-studied, and apparently genetically distinctive small population known among goose biologists as 'Gray-bellied Brant,' which breeds only on a few islands in the western Canadian High Arctic, stages in migration in the inner Aleutians, and winters in a small portion of the Greater Puget Sound area. But Gray-bellied Brant also wander, having recently been found in winter as far from Puget Sound as Baja California in the west, and Iceland and the British Isles to the east?these strays presumably having migrated southwest with Pacific-wintering nigricans and southeast with Atlantic-wintering hrota, respectively. Despite their tendency to associate with locally wintering hrota and nigricans, mixed pairs or hybrid young involving these vagrants have never been demonstrated in North America?nor have mixed pairs or hybrid young between hrota and nigricans, despite widespread belief to the contrary. Complicating the picture is that the type specimen of nigricans, a distinctive New Jersey specimen collected in 1846, also differs from 'true' Pacific Coast Black Brant in several respects, in a manner qualitatively similar to the LI birds described herein. The appearance of the type, often referred to informally as 'Lawrence?s Brant,' differs from typical Black Brant to such an extent that Delacour and Zimmer (1952) rejected application of nigricans to Pacific Black Brant, to which the name orientalis would have to be applied instead. Recent examination of museum specimens of breeding- and winter-area Gray-bellies confirms that Lawrence?s Brant closely resembles some of them?as do these three Long Island birds. Whatever the ultimate statuses of Gray-bellied and Lawrence's Brant prove to be?and however the relationships among them and the three currently recognized other taxa of brant eventually play out?birds resembling Gray-bellied/Lawrence?s are occurring on both Atlantic and Pacific coasts and perhaps also in interior North America, so knowledge of their plumage variation should now be factored into the identification of all oddly-plumaged or out-of-range brant, but especially of putative 'nigricans' inland or on the Atlantic Coast.

North American Birds↗
USGS2021

Demographic and potential biological removal models identify raptor species sensitive to current and future wind energy

A central challenge in applied ecology is understanding the effect of anthropogenic fatalities on wildlife populations and predicting which populations may be particularly vulnerable and in greatest need of management attention. We used 3 approaches to investigate potential effects of fatalities from collisions with wind turbines on 14 raptor species for both current (106 GW) and anticipated future (241 GW) levels of installed wind energy capacity in the United States. Our goals were to identify species at relatively high vs low risk of experiencing population declines from turbine collisions and to also compare results generated from these approaches. Two of the approaches used a calculated turbine-caused mortality rate to decrement population growth, where population trends were derived either from the North American Breeding Bird Survey or a matrix model parameterized from literature-derived demographic values. The third approach was potential biological removal, which estimates the number of fatalities that allow a population to reach and maintain its optimal sustainable population set by management concerns. Different results among the methods reveal substantial gaps in knowledge and uncertainty in both demographic parameters and species-specific estimates of fatalities from wind turbines. Our results suggest that, of the 14 species studied, those with relatively higher potential of population-level impacts from wind turbine collisions included barn owl, ferruginous hawk, golden eagle, American kestrel, and red-tailed hawk. Burrowing owl, Cooper’s hawk, great horned owl, northern harrier, turkey vulture, and osprey had a relatively lower potential for population impacts, and results were not easily interpretable for merlin, prairie falcon, and Swainson’s hawk. Projections of current levels of fatalities to future wind energy scenarios at 241 GW of installed capacity suggest some species could experience population declines because of turbine collisions. Populations of those species may benefit from research to identify tools to prevent or reduce raptor collisions with wind turbines.

Ecosphere↗
USGS2000

Atlantic Flyway review: Piedmont-Coastal Plain, Region IV, Fall 1999: Robbins Nest, Laurel, MD (390-0765)

This is the first of three stations along the Patuxent River. Elevation here at the edge of the Piedmont ranges from 265 ft at the house to 160 ft at the river. In spite of easterly winds and heavily overcast skies from Hurricanes Dennis, Floyd, and Irene, we suffered from drought all summer, not rain. We had only about two inches each in June and July, 4.55 in August, then a whopping 16.03 in September, and a normal 3.46 in October. This station operates all day on weekends, but only before and after work on other days. Net-hours were 5% above the 26-year mean of 3655, but way down from last year because other commitments kept me out of town on several weekends. I had only 14 days when I could net all day. Although the most birds were banded on opening day, the most per net-hour were on 19 and 15 October and 23 September. The nets caught 26 returns from prior years, the oldest being a seven-year-old Blue Jay and a seven-year-old cardinal. To illustrate how biased a sample one can obtain from netting, I captured only one junco in the nets, but caught 47 of them in baited traps on our deck. Other species taken only in the traps (and not included in the totals) were Mourning Dove, Chipping Sparrow, House Finch, Pine Siskin, and American Goldfinch.

Maryland↗