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EURING
GENERAL MEETING – AUGUST 2003
REPORT
FROM BTO RINGING SCHEME (BRITAIN & IRELAND)
BTO,
The Nunnery, Thetford, Norfolk IP24 2PU, UK
Email: ringing@bto.org
Website: www.bto.org
Organisation
The Ringing
Scheme in Britain & Ireland is run by the British Trust for
Ornithology (BTO). The Ringing Scheme forms part of the BTO’s
Populations Research Department. Staff primarily involved in the
Ringing Scheme are as follows:
BTO Director
Jeremy Greenwood
Director of Populations Research Stephen Baillie
RINGING
UNIT
Head of Unit Jacquie Clark
Secretary Jane Wells
Recoveries & Licensing Team:
Leader Jeremy Blackburn
Recoveries Officers Mark Collier
Mark Grantham
Data & Sales Team:
Leader Bridget Griffin
Ringing Data Officer Sue Adams
Ringing Assistant (part-time) Brenda Read
Ringing Sales Anne Trewhitt
DEMOGRAPHY
UNIT
Senior Population Biologist Rob Robinson (Ringing Research)
Research Officer Dawn Balmer (Organiser of CES & RAS)
BTO
RINGING SCHEME OPERATIONS
| Numbers
ringed |
Annual
(2001) |
648,936 |
|
| |
Ever (to
end 2001) |
30,295,091 |
|
| |
|
|
|
| Numbers
recovered |
Annual
(2001) |
10,692 |
|
| |
Ever (to
end 2001) |
582,798 |
|
| |
|
|
|
| Number
of ringers |
(2001) |
1,967 |
(proportion professional less than 10%) |
Computerisation
Recoveries of
all BTO-ringed birds and all foreign-ringed birds received since
1979 (some species fully computerised) have been computerised.
Ringings for
over 4.5 million birds have been received from ringers electronically.
Data have been accepted electronically since 1996. For 2002, 88%
of ringing data were submitted electronically by ringers. The majority
of the electronic data is received via email. Ringers have been
supplied with free programs (IPMR and B-RING) to allow input and
submission of ringing and recovery data. IPMR is based on Access
and will be demonstrated at the conference.
The remaining
data coming in on paper will start to be computerised shortly and
back data for Starlings (Sturnus vulgaris), Blackbirds (Turdus merula)
and other species taking the same ring size have also been computerised.
Recaptures and
biometrics are now also collected from ringers electronically.
Problems
None
Finance
Ringers pay
towards cost of rings, pay for equipment and pay an annual permit
fee. Other costs are met from a partnership between BTO and JNCC
(Government) and by the BTO. Ring prices are based on current conservation
concern of species being ringed. Where all, or most species, that
have a particular ring size are of conservation concern the ring
price is reduced. If only a few of the species taking a particular
ring size are of conservation interest, a refund is given to ringers
at the end of the year. Refunds are only given for data submitted
electronically.
| Annual
Report |
Published
in BTO Ringing Scheme Journal Ringing & Migration. |
| Ringers’
Bulletin |
Published
three times a year. |
| CES
News |
Published
annually |
| RAS
Newsletter |
Published
annually. |
| Ringer’s
Manual |
New edition
(with major revisions and additions) published December 2001. |
BTO RINGING SCHEME RESEARCH - PROJECTS
CONSTANT
EFFORT SITES SCHEME (CES)
This scheme
monitors demographic changes for 25 widespread songbird species.
115 sites were operated in 2002 (with good geographical spread),
with extensive flooding disrupting operation in some areas. Adult
numbers were down following a poor breeding season in 2001, but
productivity was generally good.
EURO-CES
This is a EURING
collaborative project, lead by the BTO and CRBPO. We have received
the results from a detailed questionnaire from most European schemes
and draft European guidelines have been produced and circulated
for comment. It is hoped to publish these in the next EURING Newsletter.
RAS
This project
was started in 1998 to collect mark-recapture data to monitor adult
survival rates for a range of species. Ringers choose their own
study area and attempt to ring and retrap (or resight) all the breeding
adults in the study area each breeding season. The project concentrates
on species not well-monitored by CES or other types of ringing.
There are now 100+ studies registered, covering around 40 species.
Of these species, 50% are of current conservation concern. The first
piece of analytical work using RAS data (including historical data):
an analysis of temporal and geographical variation in the survival
rates of Pied Flycatchers (Ficedula hypoleuca) will be
submitted for publication shortly.
MIGRATION
ATLAS
The Migration
Atlas: movements of the birds of Britain and Ireland was published
last year and is a fascinating and ground-breaking account of bird
movements, presenting from almost 100 years of ringing and bringing
in information from other methods of studying bird movements. A
variety of statistical analyses were carried out to inform the species
accounts and supporting chapters. The analyses included migratory
status of species, which was linked to other characteristics of
the species such as nesting behaviour and diet. Other analyses included
work on temporal and spatial change in migratory behaviour and differential
migration.
BREEDING
BIRDS IN THE WIDER COUNTRYSIDE: THEIR CONSERVATION STATUS 2001
This major report
on bird population trends is available on the BTO Website (http://www.bto.org/birdtrends).
It includes abundance and productivity trends from CES as well as
information from census schemes and nest recording.
BTO
RINGING SCHEME RESEARCH – ANALYSES
The ringing
scheme is a key component of the BTO’s Integrated Population
Monitoring programme and major demographic analyses of Starling,
House Sparrow (Passer domesticus) and Song Thrush (Turdus
philomelus) have been carried out recently. These have incorporated
newly developed methods to look at post-fledging and regional survival
rates. All have indicated an important role for juvenile (first
year) survival in determining patterns of demographic change. An
analysis of Blackbird data is planned for the winter.
Ringing data
have also been used to assess the practicality of measuring breeding
productivity of high-arctic breeding waders by monitoring the ratio
of juvenile to adults in the wintering grounds. Although a number
of methodological problems had to be considered, there did seem
to be meaningful variation, which merits further work on the usefulness
of this technique.
A number of
studies are ongoing looking at variation in biometrics, especially
weight, of individuals. Work by Jacquie Clark for her masters thesis
investigated seasonal changes in the weight of wintering waders,
and how birds responded to severe cold weather events. The amount
of fat a bird carries, and hence its weight, is subject to a number
of influences including starvation and predation risk. Work in collaboration
with the University of Oxford is investigating some of the complex
trade-offs which affect a bird’s weight gain strategy.
Jacquie Clark
and Rob Robinson
19 August 2003
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