Pacific Southwest Research Station

Meeting of the Partners in Flight Monitoring and Inventory Working Group:

The meeting will take place at the Cooper Ornithological Society Annual Meeting, Riverside, California, April 25-29, 2000

The Monitoring and Inventory Working Group will hold a meeting in conjunction with the Cooper meeting shortly. Several important topics will be aired for the first time, and decisions on how the Working Group will proceed in the future will be recommended by the attendees. We intend this to be the first of a series of meetings and working groups to further the goal of landbird monitoring in North America.

Topics and Tentative Presenters:

1. New directions for monitoring the abundance of northern-nesting landbirds
1. Nesting birds in the boreal forests ... Jon Bart
2. Migration monitoring network .. C.J. Ralph
2. Role of Partners in Flight within the North American Bird Conservation Initiative .. Carol Beardmore
3. Comparison and evaluation of existing census methodologies as implemented into various regional inventories. Mark Wimer and C.J. Ralph
4. National data base for census and associated vegetation measures.-- Mark Wimer
5. Planning for National Meeting for PIF Landbird Monitoring Group (and perhaps other Groups) at Monterey, California, Fall 2001. -- Geoff Geupel

The meeting will be followed by break-out sessions later in the Cooper meeting to address the points raised during the first session. Minutes will be taken and distributed to all state, regional, and other monitoring working group members.

Coordinators

C. John Ralph, U.S. Forest Service, Redwood Sciences Laboratory, 1700 Bayview Drive, Arcata, California 95521. (707) 825-2992 (fax: 825-2901) cjralph@humboldt1.com or cjr2@humboldt.edu

Background About the Agenda

1. A New Approach for Monitoring the Abundance of Norther-Nesting Landbirds

   New National assessment and monitoring programs for landbirds, as well as other taxa such as shorebirds, call for estimating population size, and trend in size, for species that regularly breed in the U.S. and Canada. Many landbirds occurring in temperate latitudes are well-covered by the Breeding Bird Survey, but species that nest in boreal and arctic regions are not well-covered at present. The paradigm being suggested in the new programs contains three parts: (1) an initial, extensive 3-5 year survey of the breeding grounds to estimate population size, prepare abundance maps, and establish a benchmark for future work, (2) subsequent monitoring at migration stations to obtain indications of trends, (3) occasional further surveys on the breeding grounds, as needed, to verify disturbing trends detected at migration stations. Implementation of this approach will require cost-effective methods for surveying birds in remote northern regions and would benefit greatly from increased attention to data sets collect at landbird migration monitoring stations. We will discuss the pros and cons of this approach as well as consider ways of gaining acceptance of, and funding for, the effort.

   1. Nesting birds in the boreal forests

      Monitoring and inventory on breeding grounds of the arctic and sub-arctic are difficult tasks, due to access problems and limited time available for monitoring. We will address these problems and questions.

   2. Migration Monitoring

      We have described options and recommendations for field methods for monitoring population changes of small landbirds during migration in Hussell and Ralph (1996) "Recommended methods for monitoring bird populations by counting and capture of migrants." The recommendations are designed for intensively operated sites such as bird observatories and bird-banding capture stations, and they apply equally to spring and fall migrations. These have largely been implemented in Canada. The goals of a migration monitoring station are to contribute data to an international effort to determine what changes are taking place in populations of migratory birds, as well as to document migration at the station itself, thus we will discuss stepping up the effort in the rest of North America, especially the U.S.. Migration monitoring stations can also gather data relevant to a wide variety of important population parameters on migrating birds. These parameters, such as population size, trend, condition, timing of movements, age and sex ratios, are derived from capture of individual birds. They may indicate the basis of changes in migrant populations and generate hypotheses of specific causes of changes, including declines. These standards should be revised on the basis of ongoing monitoring. We will discuss implementation and dissemination of standards for a migration monitoring network.

2. Role of Partners in Flight Within the North American Bird Conservation Initiative

   NABCI is a newly-formed initiative intended to help facilitate the conservation aims and objectives of the various North American bird conservation initiatives, including shorebirds, waterfowl, seabirds, and certainly the landbird initiative, Partners In Flight. While some functions of , for example, waterfowl Joint Ventures, could be integrated into NABCI, others can and should remain separate. These could include technical, funding, political, and other considerations. We will discuss and formulate the potential role of PIF, especially the Monitoring and Inventory Working Group, in relationship to NABCI and its monitoring working group.

3. Comparison and Evaluation of Existing Census Methodologies as Implemented into Regional Inventories

   Several regional inventories have been proposed or are underway. These use point counts almost entirely, but the methods differ in small, but perhaps significant ways. We will discuss the similarities and differences and decide upon the course of action that the Monitoring Working Group should and can take to facilitate comparability across these efforts.

4. National Data Base for Census and Associated Vegetation Measures

   Related to the above, the need for national standards for census and vegetation work has been a primary goal of the Group since its inception. Progress has been made on institutionalizing these data bases, and we will learn about the progress and decide upon the role of the Group in furthering its objectives, including the revision of the "Needs Assessment" by Butcher et al. in 1981.

5. Possibility of a National Meeting for PIF Landbird Monitoring Groups at Monterey, California

   We are at a nexus in the Monitoring Working Group with the advent of NABCI and the implementation of various regional monitoring programs. As in the past at such junctions we have had a national meeting, at Estes Park, Colorado, and Cape May, New Jersey. The lead in both these meetings were from other parts of PIF, but Monitoring and Inventory were important parts. We will discuss the possibilities of such a national meeting, and the efficacy of inviting other parts of PIF, or the other bird conservation initiatives. We could hold such a meeting in the fall of 2001 at the Monterey Conference Center, on the shores of Monterey Bay in the historic town of Monterey. Sponsors could include Point Reyes Bird Observatory, the Western Working Group of PIF, other research stations, and educational institutions.

Research Contact:

• C.J. Ralph