What's New
11 June 2010 - 2009 BCNRS Report in the mail
1 May 2010 - Wildlife Afield 6:1 now available
12 February 2010 - New mailing address
News
55th Annual Report - 2009 Nesting Season
21,888!
The annual report for the 2009 nesting season has been sent to all participants. The 92-page publication summarizes breeding information received for 2009 as well as the efforts of volunteers who spent hundreds of hours transferring historical breeding information to our nest cards dating back to 1919.
Results for the year were impressive. A total of 21,888 breeding records were received for 246 species. Of these, 210 participants contributed 11,634 records (53%) for the 2009 nesting season while another 10,254 nests and/or broods were extracted from various publications, museum collections, and field notebooks.
American Pipit
In 1997, the first “stand alone” annual report of the British Columbia Nest Record Scheme was published and over the following 13 years an average of 14,204 breeding records have been added to the master collection each year. Also, during this period, special efforts have been made to add breeding information on sensitive species such as marine and terrestrial colony nesters, raptors, and fish-eating species.
Over the years the annual reports have grown in content and size to fulfill the requests of participants. Appendices are included that assist and standardize how breeding information can be recorded. These value-added sections include details on Plumage Development of Young Waterfowl, Guide to Timing of Visits to Nests of Passerine (Song) Birds, Stages of Nestling Growth, Correct Terminology for Ages of Birds, Monitoring Cavity-nesting Birds, and Aging Waterbirds.
The 2009 report is lavishly illustrated with 169 photographs and figures of birds, nests, eggs, and young as well as people. Linda Van Damme added a special section on the history and activities of long-time nest box monitors who combined logged over 50 years of volunteer effort checking 2,509 boxes. These included Carla Ahern, Kris Andrews, Lloyd and Vicky Atkins, Beverly Butcher, Vic Cousineau, Clifford Day, Willie Haras, Patricia Huet, Vi and John Lambie, Sharon Laughlin, Ivar Nygaard-Petersen, Dirk Pidcock, Sandy Proulx, Anna Roberts, Laurie Rockwell, Glenn R. Ryder, Lorna Schley, Ed and Thelma Silkens, Lorraine Scott, Betty Walker, and Rita Wege.
Carla Ahern checking a Tree Swallow nest box.
This year, regular contributors Vi and John Lambie and Mark Phinney were selected for the “Participant Profile” section of the report.
Each breeding record submitted included specific information on the nest, clutch, or brood, even for colonial-nesting species. For example, if a Cliff Swallow colony was visited and a single record (and card) was completed but if each nest within a colony was examined for contents then a colony card was completed listing the total. An additional 58,000 records were received for inconclusive breeding information such as courting behaviour, carrying nesting material, and flying with food. These observations will be added to our occurrence database with details of behaviour.
Male Black-headed Grosbeak feeding a recently fledged young.
Species with the highest totals were Glaucous-winged Gull (4,579), Eared Grebe (1,415), Yellow-headed Blackbird (1,237), Tree Swallow (901), Ring-billed Gull (872), American Coot (861), Canada Goose (815), Black Tern (783), Pelagic Cormorant (579), Red-winged Blackbird (571), and Mountain Bluebird (536).
Other noteworthy species totals included Red-necked Grebe (309), Barrow’s Goldeneye (284), Barn Swallow (267), Black Oystercatcher (258), Ruddy Duck (177), Wood Duck (143), Brewer’s Blackbird (135), Common Loon (115), Common Merganser (109), Pied-billed Grebe (103), Canvasback (93), Vesper Sparrow (54), Sora (39), Sandhill Crane (26), Anna’s Hummingbird (26), Common Nighthawk (24), and American Bittern (12).
Eighty-three instances of Brown-headed Cowbird parasitism was noted for 25 different species of which Black-throated Green Warbler and Connecticut Warbler were significant.
The large number of breeding records for Forster’s Tern (154) and Clark’s Grebe (14) was the result of soliciting historical information from various people and extracting breeding information from literature for updated species accounts published in Wildlife Afield.
The annual report also provided new provincial information on Range Expansions and Isolated Nesting, Early and Late Nesting Dates, Nesting Failures, and Unusual Nest Sites.
Copies of the 2009 nesting season report are available at www.wildlifebc.org.
Wildlife Afield (Volume 6, Number 1)
The latest issue of Wildlife Afield is now available and copies have been sent to members and contributors. All Featured Articles, Notes, and Featured Species, will be on-line by the autumn.
The 120-page publication contains 10 articles which includes a comprehensive 66-page review of the status, distribution, and biology for the Clark's Grebe in British Columbia. The results of the research shows that the species is a regular visitor to the province and an irregular breeder and should be elevated to the same ranking as the Western Grebe.
Nine other articles include topics on monitoring northeastern warblers, new breeding locations (e.g., Semipalmated Plover, Artic Tern, and Lazuli Bunting), unusual nest sites (e.g., Brown Creeper and American Marten), new distributional record (e.g., Lesser Goldfinch), and potential impact of Eastern Gray Squirrels on nesting Rufous Hummingbirds.
The Report of the Wildlife Data Centre section indicates that 132,252 new records were added to our electronic databases for the period 1 January to 30 June 2009. Of these, 57,229 were from southern Vancouver Island. The report also includes information on Website Update, British Columbia Photo File for Wildlife Records, British Columbia Nest Record Scheme, and Contributions, Gifts and Donations.
Dr. Ian McTaggart-Cowan Memorial Publication
On April 18, 2010, Dr. Ian McTaggart-Cowan passed away in Victoria, British Columbia, after a short bout with pneumonia. He was 79 days short of his 100th birthday.
In February 2010, a tribute volume of his family history, career, and personal accomplishments was initiated by the Biodiversity Centre for Wildlife Studies and is being compiled by Ron Jakimchuk, Dennis Demarchi, Wayne Campbell, and Dr. Cowan’s daughter Ann Schau. The project is continuing as a memorial publication.
The section on recollections and memories of Dr. Cowan’s former students and close friends (nearly 100), has essentially been completed. In May 2010, the compilers spent a day at the University of British Columbia copying titles and abstracts for Honours Bachelor and Master Theses, and Doctoral Dissertations for students in which Dr. Cowan was the principal advisor while in the Department of Zoology. These will be highlighted, with notations, in the book.
Ron Jakimchuck and Dennis Demarchi searching Theses titles at UBC
By the end of August, 2010, a first draft of the text will have been completed and the task of photo selection and primary editing will begin.
British Columbia Nest Record Scheme
Semipalmated Plover
For the past 13 years, since independent annual reports were started in 1997, the British Columbia Nest Record Scheme has grown exponentially averaging 14,204 breeding records a year. Physically finding a space large enough to house the entire collection became an issue and until recently all of the cards were confined to a small storage locker where access, filing new cards, and maintenance was difficult.
Originally the collection was stored in small metal 4” x 6” card files placed one on top of the other to conserve space. As the collection grew bottom tiers buckled under the weight of cards and other solutions had to be found since metal files were now being replaced by fibreboard files.
To help alleviate the problem, Wayne and Eileen Campbell personally purchased a metal microfiche cabinet in the late 1990s but it was soon apparent that several more were needed. In 2009, the Campbell’s purchased another cabinet and former Director Fred Bunnell gifted another two cabinets through his research grants and was issued a charitable tax receipt. Over the past 16 months more of the collection has been transferred from the storage locker to the four cabinets, however there is still a backlog of nest record cards from years 2006 through 2009.
Fund-raising was an option for another two cabinets when Ted Goshulak, librarian at Trinity Western University in Langley, called saying that the university was upgrading their system and two microfiche cabinets were available. On August 17th, BCFWS Directors Mark Nyhof and Wayne Campbell rented a truck and picked up the cabinets. Things went smoothly with Ted helping to load cabinets into the truck.
Ted Goshulak helping load cabinets into pickup truck in Langley (left) and BCFWS Director Mark Nyhof installing support base he built for new cabinets. (right)
A storage site in Victoria was prepared for all six cabinets that now occupy a single room with ample space to maintain and utilize the collection. Species are arranged alphabetically and numerically by national topographic grid within each species.
Each cabinet stores about 100,000 nest cards and when all six are filled they will contain over 1.4 million individual breeding records. Although there is some space for expansion another cabinet will be required in the next couple of years.
The task over the next few months will be to sort the back log of cards and arrange map grids for each species so the entire collection will finally become functional. The index tabs alone for this part of the project will cost over $1,200.
The British Columbia Nest Record Scheme operates with no administrative costs and requires the volunteer effort of five or six dedicated individuals throughout the year to co-ordinate all parts of the program including maintenance, compiling, verification, communication, correspondence, and producing the annual reports. Wildlife Library
For the past six or so years our large reference library of wildlife literature, including long runs of back issues for 108 journals and natural history publications, and field notes, has been stored in 900+ banker's boxes. From November 2009 to January 2010, part of this collection was re-organized and is now displayed on library shelves so it is accessible to researchers, students, and others interested in published information on amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals in British Columbia.
The journals still remain in storage but once shelving is obtained the publications will also become available. Many of the journal articles are not available on-line so the collection has an added value.
Database Update - January 1 to June 30, 2009
Totals are in for data entry completed for the first half of 2009. A total of 132,252 individual records were added to our electronic wildlife databases. Most records were of birds as we focused on finalizing the working database for Forster’s Tern as a “Featured Species” account (see Wildlife Afield 5(2):232-294, 2008) and started collecting literature and records for the next account that will feature Clark’s Grebe.
While most databases include seven basic fields (i.e., month, day, year, observer, general location, species, and number of individuals) we are including an additional eight fields for every record. These include specific location, NTS map grid, UTM co-ordinates, sex, age, behaviour, habitat, and elevation. Additional fields, when available, include weather, food/prey, colour phase, mortality, breeding, recognizable subspecies, band number, source of the record, and comments such as first spring arrival date, last autumn departure date, and other information that enhances the value of the record. A complete single digital record, therefore, could contain information for up to 26 different fields.
The “value-added” data fields, although significant additional time is required for data-entry, is essential if the information is to accurately reflect the general life of the animal. We have learned, for example, that recording elevations with each record has highlighted the significance of alpine habitats for migrating Baird’s Sandpipers in autumn. Recording the sex of a species has helped understand the significance of sex-segregated migration and importance of males arriving before females to establish territories. It has also posed an interesting question as to why male Belted Kingfishers spend the winter farther north than females. Recording behaviour has assisted in learning that Brandt’s Cormorants roost and feed in two quite different habitats, sometimes kilometres apart.
In the future, this information will become invaluable in assessing local developments, and their impact on wildlife. For example, developments that include new rowing facilities and boating activities, urbanization, visitor kiosks, picnic sites, trails, observation blinds, shellfish collecting, brush and driftlog removal, and seaweed gathering, have been suggested for Esquimalt Lagoon, an important brackish lagoon for waterbirds on southern Vancouver Island.
Data for birds represented 297 species with Forster’s Tern (11,207), Common Loon (11,112), and Brown-headed Cowbird (5,342) having the most number of records and accounting for 21% of the total records entered.There were 29 additional species having between 1,000 and 5,000 records: Cassin’s Vireo (4,831), Western Kingbird (4,163), Barred Owl (3,423), Anna’s Hummingbird (2,488), American Redstart (2,466), Golden-crowned Sparrow (2,406), Winter Wren (2,284), Marsh Wren (2,191), Hutton’s Vireo (1,824), Common Yellowthroat (1,792), Red-necked Grebe (1,765), Sky Lark (1,703), Horned Grebe (1,688), Bewick’s Wren (1,551), Brown Creeper (1,549), Pied-billed Grebe (1,488), Belted Kingfisher (1,462), Great Horned Owl (1,253), Killdeer (1,243), Fox Sparrow (1,187), Hammond’s Flycatcher (1,186), Spotted Towhee (1,174), Orange-crowned Warbler (1,156), Red-breasted Nuthatch (1,136), Virginia Rail (1,134), Barn Swallow (1,082), Mourning Dove (1,075), Eurasian Wigeon (1,028), and Yellow Warbler (1,002).
Cooper's Hawk
Other less reported species include those that are a challenge to see, numbers which are declining, are rare by nature, or difficult to find because of access to appropriate habitat. Thirteen such species included: Black-throated Gray Warbler (614), Cooper’s Hawk (573), Northern Shrike (537), Turkey Vulture (529), Purple Martin (462), Green Heron (443), Mute Swan (367), Caspian Tern (202), Blue Jay (165), Rock Wren (160), American Bittern (133), Marbled Godwit (116), and Northern Mockingbird (25).
The six-month database included records from 313 different locations in the province. This represents a minimum as some general locations (e.g., Victoria) may have 20 or more specific locations with UTM co-ordinates.
Southern Vancouver Island, from Ladysmith south to Sooke and Victoria and west to include the Saanich Peninsula and Gulf Islands, accounted for 43 % of the total or 57, 229 records.
Off Vancouver Island, Christina Lake, Duck Lake (Creston), Lac Le Jeune, Fawn Lake, and Theodosia Inlet combined had over 30,000 digital entries.Seabirds: Linking Global Oceans
The 1st World Seabird Conference (WSC) is being held in Victoria, BC, from September 7 - 11, 2010
Fork-tailed Storm-Petrel
The goal of this conference is to bring the world's seabird research community and others interested in marine waterbirds together to discuss seabird conservation and management issues on a global scale. To learn more about how you can participate and support the conference click hereNesting Season - 2010
Discoveries
Sora, August 17, 2010
Double-crested Cormorant, August 8, 2010
Swainson's Hawk, August 6, 2010
Dark-eyed Junco, July 29, 2010
American Redstart, July 27, 2010
Osprey, July 26, 2010
Western Kingbird, July 24, 2010
American Coot, July 23, 2010
Common Loon, July 23, 2010
Lewis's Woodpecker, July 19, 2010
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Mountain Chickadee, July 19, 2010
Violet-green Swallow, July 19, 2010
Willow Flycatcher, July 18, 2010
Cliff Swallow, July 17, 2010
Cedar Waxwing, July 16, 2010
Townsend's Solitaire/ Brown-headed Cowbird, July 15, 2010
American Goldfinch, July 15, 2010
Rock Pigeon, July 15, 2010
Dusky Flycatcher, July 15, 2010
Red-winged Blackbird, July 14, 2010
Western Wood-Pewee, July 13, 2010
Western Bluebird, July 12, 2010
Mountain Bluebird, July 11, 2010
Warbling Vireo/ Brown-headed Cowbird, July 10, 2010
Yellow Warbler, July 10, 2010
Tree Swallow, July 9, 2010
White-crowned Sparrow, July 6, 2010
Dusky Flycatcher, July 4, 2010
Violet-green Swallow, July 4, 2010
Bewick's Wren, July 1, 2010
Black Tern, June 29, 2010
Ruddy Duck, June 27, 2010
Redhead, June 27, 2010
Pied-billed Grebe, June 27, 2010
Marsh Wren, June 27, 2010
Horned Grebe, June 27, 2010
Common Nighthawk, June 26, 2010
Willow Flycatcher, June 25, 2010
Bullock's Oriole, June 23, 2010
American Coot/ Ruddy Duck/ Canvasback/ Lesser Scaup, June 23, 2010
Mountain Chickadee, June 21, 2010
Red-necked Grebe, June 21, 2010
Eastern Kingbird, June 20, 2010
American Redstart, June 19, 2010
Vesper Sparrow, June 18, 2010
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Swainson's Thrush, June 18, 2010
Barn Swallow, June 17, 2010
Cedar Waxwing, June 17, 2010
House Wren, June 16, 2010
Olive-sided Flycatcher, June 16, 2010
Pacific-slope Flycatcher/Brown-headed Cowbird, June 16, 2010
American Robin, June 16, 2010
Common Loon, June 13, 2010
Lesser Scaup, June 13, 2010
Canada Goose, June 13, 2010
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Red-necked Grebe, June 13, 2010
Black Tern, June 13, 2010
Pacific-slope Flycatcher, June 13, 2010
Bushtit, June 11, 2010
Spotted Sandpiper, June 10, 2010
Common Goldeneye, June 10, 2010
Long-eared Owl, June 9, 2010
Gray Catbird, June 9, 2010
Mountain Bluebird, June 8, 2010
Black-headed Grosbeak, June 8, 2010 (interior and coast)
Brewer's Blackbird, June 7, 2010
Sandhill Crane, June 6, 2010
Townsend's Warbler, June 5, 2010
Red-breasted Nuthatch, June 4, 2010
Mallard, June 3, 2010
Chipping Sparrow, June 3, 2010
Wood Duck, June 2, 2010
Rufous Hummingbird, June 2, 2010
Say's Phoebe, June 2, 2010
Yellow Warbler/Brown-headed Cowbird, June 1, 2010
Brewer's Blackbird, May 30, 2010
Canada Goose, May 27, 2010
Red-tailed Hawk, May 23, 2010
Barred Owl, May 17, 2010
Rufous Hummingbird, May 16, 2010
Long-eared Owl, May 11, 2010
Song Sparrow, May 9, 2010
Red-winged Blackbird, May 9, 2010
Chestnut-backed Chickadee, May 8, 2010
Brown Creeper, May 8, 2010 May 24, 2010
House Finch, May 8, 2010
Canada Goose, May 5, 2010
Dark-eyed Junco, May 4, 2010
Orange-crowned Warbler, May 3, 2010
Spotted Towhee, May 1, 2010
Killdeer, April 30, 2010
American Crow, April 30, 2010
American Robin, April 25, 2010
Canada Goose, April 22, 2010
Black-billed Magpie, April 20, 2010
Great Horned Owl, April 11, 2010
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Killdeer, April 9, 2010
Anna's Hummingbird, March 28, 2010
Northern Saw-whet Owl, March 27, 2010
Great Horned Owl, March 17, 2010
Anna's Hummingbird, February 25, 2010
