U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service breeding bird surveys: How can they be used in forest management?

Abstract

Since 1965, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife and Canadian Wildlife Services have sponsored annual Brceding Bird Surveys (BBSs), which are done in the United States and Canada using standard procedures. Data resulting from individual surveys may have Cptential to answer certain management questions or serve to fill information gaps for relatively small geographic areas. A BBS route was begun near Downieville, California, in 1975, giving 13 years of continuous information on birds. Results suggest that, collectively, the numbers of birds and species in the area are generally stable. However, some species (for example, American robin, Turdus migratorius) show increasing trends, and others (for example, pileated woodpecker, Dryocopus pileaus) show declining sends. Increases and decreases of certain species may be correlated with such factors as altered vegetation or adverse weather conditions. Trend information for species is extremely valuable to forest managers as they make decisions that will altcr the structure and armpsition of vegetationover the landscape. Although the information from asingle BBS route appears to be useful to landmanagers, mtain problems could result in erroneous interpretations. These include (I) encounter frequencies for some species that are too low la wtablisl~ meaningful trends and (2) failure of observers to detect all species presen

Citation

Laudenslayer, William F. 1988. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service breeding bird surveys: How can they be used in forest management? Transactions of the Western Section of the Wildlife Society. 24: 115-120.