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Nest cameras do not affect nest survival in a meadow-nesting shorebird

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

VOLKER SALEWSKI Open the ORCID record for VOLKER SALEWSKI [Opens in a new window]  and
LUIS SCHMIDT
VOLKER SALEWSKI*
Affiliation:
Michael-Otto-Institut im NABU, Goosstroot 1, 24861 Bergenhusen, Germany.
LUIS SCHMIDT
Affiliation:
Michael-Otto-Institut im NABU, Goosstroot 1, 24861 Bergenhusen, Germany.
*
*Author for correspondence; email: Volker.Salewski@NABU.de
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Summary

Identifying the fate of birds’ nests and the causes of breeding failure is often crucial for the development of conservation strategies for threatened species. However, collecting these data by repeatedly visiting nests might itself contribute to nest failure or bias. To solve this dilemma, automatic cameras have increasingly been used as a time-efficient means for nest monitoring. Here, we consider whether the use of cameras itself may influence hatching success of nests of the Black-tailed Godwit Limosa limosa at two long-term study sites in northern Germany. Annually between 2013 and 2019, cameras were used to monitor godwit nests. In 2014 and 2019, nests were randomly equipped with cameras or not, and nest survival checked independently of the cameras. Nest-survival models indicated that survival probabilities varied between years, sites and with time of the season, but were unaffected by the presence of cameras. Even though predation is the main cause of hatching failure in our study system, we conclude that predators did not learn to associate cameras with food either when the cameras were initially installed or after they had been used for several years. Cameras were thus an effective and non-deleterious tool to collect data for conservation in this case. As other bird species may react differently to cameras at their nests, and as other sets of predators may differ in their ability to associate cameras with food, the effect of cameras on breeding success should be carefully monitored when they are used in a new study system.

Keywords

Black-tailed Godwithatching successLimosa limosanest predationcamera
Type
Research Article
Information
Bird Conservation International , Volume 32 , Issue 1 , March 2022 , pp. 127 - 136
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of BirdLife International

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