Storm Petrels on the news !

The work by A Sanz-Aguilar and A. Rotger on the first tracks of Storm Petrels breeding in the Balearic Archipelago hit the news! here

 

Storm Petrel 2nd Campaign

The second Storm Petrel campaign in the Balearic archipelago has began. Birds are breeding late this year and expecially in this colony. Keep posted to know the foraging tracks!

New publication on Vultures and lead!

Arrondo, E., [..], Cortés-Avizanda, A., [...], Donázar, J.A. 2020. Dust and bullets: Stable isotopes and GPS tracking disentangle lead sources for a large avian scavenger. Enviornmental Pollution, in press https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2020.115022

Abstract: Lead intoxication is an important threat to human health and a large number of wildlife species. Animals are exposed to several sources of lead highlighting hunting ammunition and lead that is bioavailable in topsoil. Disentangling the role of each in lead exposure is an important conservation issue, particularly for species potentially affected by lead poisoning, such as vultures. The identification of lead sources in vultures and other species has been classically addressed by means of stable-isotope comparisons, but the extremely varied isotope signatures found in ammunition hinders this identification when it overlaps with topsoil signatures.

In addition, assumptions related to the exposure of individual vultures to lead sources have been made without knowledge of the actual feeding grounds exploited by the birds. Here, we combine lead concentration analysis in blood, novel stable isotope approaches to assign the origin of the lead and GPS tracking data to investigate the main foraging grounds of two Iberian griffon vulture populations (N = 58) whose foraging ranges differ in terms of topsoil lead concentration and intensity of big game hunting activity. We found that the lead signature in vultures was closer to topsoil than to ammunition, but this similarity decreased significantly in the area with higher big game hunting activity. In addition, attending to the individual home ranges of the tracked birds, models accounting for the intensity of hunting activity better explained the higher blood lead concentration in vultures than topsoil exposure. In spite of that, our finding also show that lead exposure from topsoil is more important than previously thought

Storm Petrel campaign 2020 just began

The Storm-Petrel campaign is on the starting blocks. The first visit to the colony in the Balearic Islands has been success despite the rough sea conditions and ... a lack of oxigen.

The Shearwater campaign 2020 on the starting blocks

The Shearwater campaign is on the starting blocks. With no boats, the water appears even more spectacular than usual.
 

We are anxious to assess the 2020 nest occupation rate after some bad news on the state of the species in Northern Africa.

Keep in touch.

New Publication on Lapped-faced vulture !

Santangeli A., Pakanen, V-M, Bridgeford, P., Boorman, M., Kolberg, H., and Sanz-Aguilar, A. 2020. The relative contribution of camera trap technology and citizen science for estimating survival of an endangered African vulture. Biological Conservation, vol, 246 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2020.108593

Photo:wikipedia.org

Abstract: Technological advances such as camera traps, and citizen science, coupled with advanced quantitative approaches, can help fill existing knowledge gaps and aid effective conservation. We combine citizen and camera trap observations to estimate survival of the Endangered lappet-faced vulture, assess the relative contribution of data from camera traps and citizens, as well as impact of loss of individual marks (wing tags), on survival estimates.  We used data from 762 lappet-faced vultures wing tagged as nestlings during 2006-2017 in western Namibia. Observations of wing tagged individuals were provided by citizens or via camera traps.
We formulated a multievent capture-mark-recapture model to estimate survival while accounting for probabilities of resighting by citizens and/or camera traps, recovery of dead individuals, and loss of the wing tag.  Survival was relatively high for juveniles (0.79), and increased with age to 0.95. Citizen observations of live and dead birds were low in number. However, when combined with camera trap resightings of live individuals, citizen observations increased the precision of survival estimates of birds older than one year compared to using data from either sources separately. Wing tag loss was high after 5–6 years of tag age. If neglected, tag loss can result in severe underestimation of survival of the older age classes. Overall, we show that filling ecological knowledge gaps is possible through the efficient use of data provided by different sources, and by applying state-of the art approaches that minimise potential biases, such as those due to tag loss.

Birds and lockdown

The Audouin's gull breed again on the islets off Mallorca thank to the lockdown ! 

It was about eight years that the species did not breed in this islet. 

Unfortuntaley, there were some (illegal) visitors. Let 's hope nobody will disturb the new colony for three more weeks.

Fingers crossed.

Congratulations ! Top downloaded paper 2018-2019

The work by Ana Sanz-Aguilar & Jaume Badia-Boher in the Journal of Applied Ecology (here) among the top downloaded articles in 2018-2019. Well done Ana!