The Power of a Connected Network

In 2022, the Migratory Bird Initiative started touring round North America supporting the rising community of Motus stations put in by Audubon and its companions. We helped construct stations within the cougar-inhabited backcountry of Audubon’s Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary,  up north in polar bear nation alongside the shores of Hudson Bay house to the Weenusk First Nation, and plenty of locations in between. Throughout these adventures, one factor turned abundantly clear, not solely does Audubon love migratory birds, however we perceive that monitoring their seasonal actions is a crucial step to full annual cycle, hemispheric conservation, a goal of Audubon’s Flight Plan. 

A very distinctive energy of Audubon is our deep, intensive community of Facilities, Sanctuaries, State and Regional Workplaces, and Neighborhood and Campus Chapters throughout the US in addition to our partnerships with native communities and conservation organizations in Canada, Latin America, and throughout the hemisphere. These all intersect to contribute to a really astounding community keen about migratory chicken conservation.  

As investments in chicken monitoring expertise expanded over the previous a number of years, Audubon discovered itself at an inflection level. We have been rising past Audubon teams specializing in their very own vital questions to deal with native conservation issues, and prepared for a extra coordinated effort, harnessing the ability of Audubon’s intensive community to reply hemispheric-scale questions utilizing a holistic, built-in strategy. 

Enter the Migratory Chicken Monitoring Program, which is able to coordinate and help monitoring efforts throughout the group to make sure alignment with Flight Plan. The Monitoring Program will interact individuals to determine and tackle the components inflicting chicken inhabitants declines, essential data vital to assist bend the bird curve. The Monitoring Program may even present assets and steering to make sure that monitoring efforts throughout Audubon are scalable to deal with broad conservation challenges. Over the subsequent a number of months hold an eye fixed out for these assets to change into out there to the Audubon community. 

There’s nonetheless a lot to study migratory birds utilizing monitoring units. A current evaluation of monitoring information carried out by Audubon, Georgetown College and the Smithsonian Establishment demonstrated that over half of migratory birds that breed in North America have not been tracked utilizing monitoring units. Some examples of vital insights  delivered to mild by monitoring research  embody an ongoing study carried out by Audubon South Carolina, Audubon Delta, and others utilizing barometric strain geolocators on Prothonotary Warblers to raised perceive their stopover wants and vulnerability to offshore wind throughout migration; Audubon Nice Lakes has been tracking Black Terns with Motus and recognized that extreme climate occasions, corresponding to storms and flooding, disrupt nesting websites, and at last, Audubon Americas and native companions are utilizing Motus to trace Lesser Yellowlegs to assist farmers handle their land in Colombia’s Cauca Valley whereas supporting nonbreeding habitat.  

As migratory birds embark on their journeys throughout the hemisphere, they encounter countless obstacles earlier than reaching their locations. Solely with coordinated monitoring research can we unravel the mysteries of which conservation challenges are inflicting migratory chicken inhabitants declines and what seasons are most vital for fixing these conservation dilemmas. As Audubon’s Migratory Chicken Monitoring Program matures, we’ll make sure that native conservation efforts scale up throughout Audubon to contribute to the success of our Flight Plan, making certain that our hemispheric perspectives translate to local conservation actions on the bottom.

The success of the Monitoring Program is determined by the participation of your entire Audubon community. Audubon Facilities, Sanctuaries, Chapters, State and Regional Workplaces in addition to Audubon Americas and our companions throughout the hemisphere all have a task to play. This new Migratory Chicken Monitoring Program would be the newest instance of Audubon’s actually hemispheric conservation agenda to safe a future for migratory birds. For extra data on the Migratory Chicken Monitoring Program, please attain out to Alicia Brunner, Program Supervisor of Migratory Chicken Monitoring.