ArdeaPub Date : 2023-07-05DOI: 10.5253/arde.2022.a38
W. Bil, Asso Armel Asso, Pam van Eekelen, C. Both, J. Ouwehand
{"title":"Living on the Forest Edge: Flexible Habitat Use in Sedentary Pied Flycatchers Ficedula Hypoleuca during the Non-Breeding Season","authors":"W. Bil, Asso Armel Asso, Pam van Eekelen, C. Both, J. Ouwehand","doi":"10.5253/arde.2022.a38","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2022.a38","url":null,"abstract":"Seasonality affects the availability of resources within the African non-breeding environment of migratory songbirds. We are generally unaware of how songbirds respond to such seasonal dynamics, especially at small spatial scales that are relevant for individual birds. In this study we focus on the question of how migratory songbirds use small scale variation in seasonality in their non-breeding environment. Therefore, we measured individual movements of European Pied Flycatchers Ficedula hypoleuca in relation to habitat differences in foliation in a non-breeding site in Comoé National Park, Ivory Coast. Through a combination of remote sensing and radio tracking we show that flycatchers change their habitat use during the second half of the non-breeding season, where at the start of this period flycatchers occupy both savannah and forest, whereas with progressing foliation, after savannah burning and with the onset of the first rainfall, they narrow their site use in favour of savannah. Further measurements of arthropod abundance show that this behaviour is related to increasing numbers of particular arthropod groups during foliation, which indicates that flycatchers might track seasonal changes in food availability by moving between habitats on a small spatial scale. We hypothesize that individuals reduce their susceptibility to seasonality by establishing territories on the forest edge, where they can access both savannah and forest habitat, and thereby explore a wider variety of resources under different circumstances. In conclusion, these findings indicate that small-scale heterogeneity likely plays a key role in the ability of flycatchers to cope with seasonal dynamics on a local scale.","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42099316","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-07-05DOI: 10.5253/arde.2022.a26
L. Zwarts, R. Bijlsma, J. Kamp
{"title":"Granivorous Birds in the Sahel: Is Seed Supply Limiting Bird Numbers?","authors":"L. Zwarts, R. Bijlsma, J. Kamp","doi":"10.5253/arde.2022.a26","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2022.a26","url":null,"abstract":"During the dry season four billion African and European granivorous birds in the Sahel consume, by grand average, 15 g seeds/ha/day, equivalent to an average annual consumption of 4.5 kg/ha. This represents only 4–15% of the estimated average total soil seed bank of some 30–100 kg/ha in the early dry season. Despite this apparent abundance of food, there are many reasons to presume that the number of seed-eating birds is limited by their food supply. First, the birds have to share the seed supply with rodents and insects that eat more seeds than all the birds combined. Second, granivorous birds are constrained by foraging time available to them. They avoid foraging during the midday heat and feeding time is mostly restricted to the early morning and late afternoon, totalling about 4 h per day. This forces them to achieve high intake rates and thus to select feeding sites where the available seeds can be handled quickly and/or are so abundant that the encounter rate is high. Third, only a proportion of the seeds lies on the surface where they are easy to find. Most grass seeds are tiny and even small birds need to eat thousands per day. Because they have so little time to look for food, they cannot afford to search for seeds hidden in the sand. Doves rapidly swallow seeds whole, but all smaller seedeaters have to separate the husk from the seed, a process that takes time too. Fourth, seed-eating birds in the Sahel discriminate between seeds. They ignore ‘empty seeds’ (husks) and also avoid feeding on common graminoids whose seeds have long awns (Aristida) or spines (Cenchrus) and which are time-consuming to process. Occasionally, granivorous birds may select seeds from forbs, but these, being low in digestibility, are not the preferred choice. Granivorous birds prefer the seeds of Panicum grass and other grass species with highly soluble carbohydrate fractions. Birds switch to marginal seed types at the end of the dry season, when the seed bank of the preferred species is depleted. Fifth, soil seed bank of preferred grass species is much reduced in dry years. Panicum and other preferred annual grasses are found mostly on riverine floodplains and in depressions that are prone to ephemeral flooding during the rainy season. Such sites attract many seed-eating birds, but the total surface area of floodplains is relatively small compared to the extensive drylands, on top of being very much smaller in dry years, circumstances that account for high mortality among seed-eating birds in drought years. The final argument for food-limitation is that the mounting grazing pressure of livestock over the last decades has severely reduced the annual soil seed bank and changed the plant community (preferred grass species replaced by non-preferred grasses and forbs). The combination of these factors caused a very large decline of seed-eating bird populations in the Sahel between the 1970s and 2010, including a handful of Eurasian species. The Sahel is still home to","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45233681","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-07-05DOI: 10.5253/arde.2022.a19
L. Zwarts, R. Bijlsma, J. D. Kamp
{"title":"Savannah Trees Attract More Migratory Bird Species Than Residents, But Why?","authors":"L. Zwarts, R. Bijlsma, J. D. Kamp","doi":"10.5253/arde.2022.a19","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2022.a19","url":null,"abstract":"Arboreal bird species occurring in the wide transient zone between Sahara and tropical rain forest are unequally distributed across the rainfall zones. As this also holds for the woody plant species which they select for foraging, it is possible that birds are bound to specific rainfall zones because their preferred woody species are common there. But it may also be the other way around, i.e. that the distribution of birds is primarily determined by their selection of a specific rainfall zone, with the choice of particular woody plants being collateral. We made maps of the predicted distribution of birds based on their occurrence in different woody species (such as measured from field study sites) multiplied by the average density at which bird species forage in those woody plant species. We then compared these maps with the observed distribution of 13 bird species (7 Afro-Palearctic migrants and 6 Afro-tropical residents). This comparison shows that the distribution of birds is largely determined by the distribution of their preferred woody species rather than rainfall. However, there are small, but systematic differences between observed and predicted bird densities in the most arid and most humid parts of their distributions. Most migrants are commoner than predicted in the semi-arid and arid zone (100–600 mm rainfall/year) and most residents commoner in the humid zone. This was confirmed in a separate analysis of the densities at which these bird species forage in five common and bird-rich tree species occurring over a wide range of rainfall zones. There are no empirical data to support the idea that migrants and residents are spatially separated to avoid interspecific competition, so the question remains what migrants gain by their preference for trees from the (semi)arid zone. In the (semi)arid zones, preferred trees are as fully leafed in the dry season as the same trees farther south, but insectivorous birds in the arid zone had a higher capture rate in those trees, suggesting a larger supply of insect prey. In addition, the driest zones held far fewer avian predators than any other vegetation zone in the sub-Sahara, indicating a lower predation risk. We suggest that arboreal birds find better living conditions in the dry zones than in the more humid zones. But there is a trade-off: arid regions have a higher overall probability of very low rainfall years when trees lose their leaves or even die, than do the more humid regions. In those years, mortality among birds in the arid zones will be disproportionally high.","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42958279","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-07-05DOI: 10.5253/arde.2022.a31
T. Piersma, E. M. EL-HACEN
{"title":"To See, Hear and Speak: How Counts of Birds in Individual Trees Help Address the Environmental Causes of the Sahel","authors":"T. Piersma, E. M. EL-HACEN","doi":"10.5253/arde.2022.a31","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2022.a31","url":null,"abstract":"the three ‘wise monkeys’ originating in Japanese and Chinese philosophical traditions going back at least 1000 years. Mizaru was the monkey that covered its eyes, Kikazaru plugged both ears with fingers, and Iwazaru held its mouth shut with a clasping hand. Together they “saw no evil, heard no evil and spoke no evil”, a wonderful ambiguity, because is it really a virtue to withdraw? Or is it a virtue to see and hear attentively, and thus sense the state of the world around us; and then speak about it? This special issue of ARDEA is filled with papers painstakingly reporting the work of a small and dedicated team who set out to map the birds across the entire Sahel (an area the size of the USA!). Although mapping is inherently biased by the knowledge and cognitive facilities, as well as the interests, of the mappers (Malavasi 2020), within the limits of their sensibilities, and negotiating serious political and safety realities, the team tried to do this in temporally and spatially unbiased and methodologically robust and repeatable ways. The way that single trees and bushes disperse across the landscape of the Sahel, rather than connect-up into a dense forest, inspired a mapping approach that is both brilliant and unique. Rather than taking ‘an area’ as the spatial unit to measure bird abundance, the team began with ‘individual trees’ (Figure 1), with the plots in which these trees occurred being carefully pre-selected along trajectories that could be travelled “easily” (i.e. within the reach of a 4×4 vehicle). In their ensemble, the effort would give unbiased measurements of birds ánd trees across the entire Sahel, from Senegal in the west to Ethiopia in the east. This design also enabled assessments of the consequences of the steep latitudinal gradients in rainfall as one moves south from the Sahara sands towards the Sudan forests across 1000 km, and sometimes less. Theunis Piersma & El-Hacen M. El-Hacen","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47949047","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-07-05DOI: 10.5253/arde.2022.a17
L. Zwarts, R. Bijlsma, J. D. Kamp, Marten Sikkema
{"title":"Distribution and Numbers of Arboreal Birds between the Hyper-Arid Sahara and the Hyper-Humid Guinea Forests","authors":"L. Zwarts, R. Bijlsma, J. D. Kamp, Marten Sikkema","doi":"10.5253/arde.2022.a17","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2022.a17","url":null,"abstract":"This study quantifies the spatial variation in the density of 50 arboreal bird species (17 insectivorous Afro-Palearctic migrants and 33 Afro-tropical residents: 20 insectivores, 7 frugivores and 6 sunbirds) in the transition zone between the arid Sahara and the humid Guinea zone, measured during the dry season in 2011–2019. The distribution of bird species was related to annual rainfall, with Afro-Palearctic migrants found mainly in the relatively dry zone and Afro-tropical residents in the more humid zone. As woody cover increases with rainfall, bird species from the dry zone are by default found in more open habitats than species from the humid zone. This effect of woody cover largely dissolves when corrected for rainfall. The data – pertaining to absolute bird counts in stratified random sites – were used to estimate the total number of birds in this region. To assess the reliability of these estimations, population sizes were calculated separately per species on half-split data. The two estimates deviated about 10% from the averages calculated for the full data set. Among arboreal birds (1322 million), insectivorous residents were most abundant (547 million), followed by insectivorous migrants (326 million), nectarivorous residents (272 million) and frugivorous residents (177 million). The two most numerous arboreal bird species were insectivorous residents: Tawny-flanked Prinia Prinia subflava (128 million) and Green-backed Camaroptera Camaroptera brachyura (103 million). Among the migrants, the three most abundant were Subalpine Warbler Curruca iberiae + subalpina + cantillans (62 million), Lesser Whitethroat Curruca curruca (48 million) and Western Bonelli's Warbler Phylloscopus bonelli (30 million).","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49564813","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-07-05DOI: 10.5253/arde.2022.a30
L. Zwarts, R. Bijlsma, Jan van der Kamp
{"title":"Frequent Agonistic Interactions among Arboreal Birds in Savannahs But Not in Humid Forests of Africa","authors":"L. Zwarts, R. Bijlsma, Jan van der Kamp","doi":"10.5253/arde.2022.a30","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2022.a30","url":null,"abstract":"Arboreal birds in the Sahel are highly selective in their tree choice. Most migrant, but also resident, birds are found in a few tree species and within those species often only in trees with abundant leaves and flowers. For this reason alone, preferred trees were expected to teem with birds. This was not the case. Most bird species were present in trees as singletons, even half of the Senegal Eremomela Eremomela pusilla – the most social species of all – were recorded as solitary birds. The probability that two different bird species were in the same tree was also very small, 2.8% on average. Mixed-group foraging flocks of arboreal birds, as so often reported for tropical forests, did not occur in the Sahel. Perhaps birds forage singly because they have no need to fear the raptors that are common in the forests further south. Some species, such as European Pied Flycatcher Ficedula hypoleuca and Common Redstart Phoenicurus phoenicurus, defend winter territories, but for other species individual home ranges show overlap. In the humid forests further south, and among resident species in the Sahel, few agonistic interactions were seen, but migratory birds were often agonistic with congeners and even more frequently with birds of other species. Larger bird species usually won agonistic interactions, but Western Olivaceous Warblers Iduna opaca chased off birds twice their own body size. Subalpine Warbler Curruca iberiae + subalpina + cantillans and other Curruca species, with the exception of Lesser Whitethroat Curruca curruca, were also intolerant. Western Bonelli's Warblers Phylloscopus bonelli, and during migration also Willow Warblers Phylloscopus trochilus, were most often on the receiving end of agonistic interactions. Far fewer agonistic interactions were recorded in the more humid regions to the south of the Sahel. This disparity may hinge on the higher intra- and interspecific encounter rate in the Sahel, where a greater fraction of trees are occupied by birds, than in the humid forests.","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-07-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49303862","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-06-23DOI: 10.5253/arde.2023.a1
A. Opaev, Ekaterina Shishkina, A. Rubtsov
{"title":"Responses of Yellowhammer Emberiza citrinella, Pine Bunting E. leucocephalos and Their Hybrids to Playbacks of Con- and Heterospecific Songs and Calls in a Hybrid Zone","authors":"A. Opaev, Ekaterina Shishkina, A. Rubtsov","doi":"10.5253/arde.2023.a1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2023.a1","url":null,"abstract":"Yellowhammers Emberiza citrinella and Pine Buntings E. leucocephalos hybridize in a c. 2500 km wide sympatric zone in northwest Asia. In the centre of this zone, over the last 50 years males with Yellowhammer and intermediate (i.e. hybrid) phenotypes have been replacing the Pine Bunting phenotype. In the southern part of the zone by contrast, the Pine Bunting phenotype is still common. In this study, we asked if there is a behavioural asymmetry between males depending on their phenotypes and whether this asymmetry can explain phenotypic compositions observed in different parts of the hybrid zone. This study was performed in 2017–2019 in Altai Republic, Russia, in the southern part of the hybrid zone. Songs of Yellowhammer and Pine Bunting are generally similar, although they differ in details. The species also differ in usage of call repertoires: the ‘see’ call is more characteristic for Yellowhammer, while the ‘zieh’ call is used more frequently by Pine Bunting. We performed playback experiments using contrasting stimuli to evaluate responses towards (1) Pine Bunting song vs. Yellowhammer song and (2) songs coupled with ‘zieh’ calls vs. songs coupled with ‘see’ calls. Experiments showed that Yellowhammer and hybrid males were more aggressive towards other males than were birds with the Pine Bunting phenotype. Therefore, the latter might be at a disadvantage in territory acquisition and maintenance. At the same time, males of any phenotype responded more strongly to Yellowhammer playback than to Pine Bunting playback, and to the ‘see’ call than to the ‘zieh’ call. This might counterbalance the competitive ability of different phenotypes in territorial competition, thus allowing Pine Bunting males to avoid being displaced by more aggressive Yellowhammer and hybrid males in the southern part of the hybrid zone.","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-06-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47523762","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-06-23DOI: 10.5253/arde.2023.a5
H. V. van Oosten
{"title":"Food Provisioning and Body Mass of Nestling Meadow Pipits and Cuckoos","authors":"H. V. van Oosten","doi":"10.5253/arde.2023.a5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2023.a5","url":null,"abstract":"Common Cuckoos Cuculus canorus are obligate brood parasites, laying eggs in nests of other species. Cuckoo nestlings are often thought to be insatiable, compared to host broods. However, in Reed Warblers Acrocephalus scirpaceus and a few other species, cuckoo nestlings are fed at most only as frequently as a host brood. To add to the small body of knowledge on feeding frequencies and body mass development of Cuckoo nestlings, I studied Cuckoos using another host, the Meadow Pipit Anthus pratensis, in the Dutch dunes (2019–2021). By filming feeding parents (hosts) I determined the provisioning frequency for broods of Pipits and for nestling Cuckoos. I found that nestling Cuckoos receive on average fewer feeds per hour than broods of Meadow Pipits. Furthermore, overall Cuckoos received as many feeds during their 22-day nestling period as a brood of Pipits during their 13 days in the nest. At 13 days of age (day 1 is the day of hatching), the single Cuckoo was as heavy as a brood of four Meadow Pipits. At 22 days, the maximum weights of the nestling Cuckoos were greater than the Meadow Pipit broods and varied between 91 and 105 g. Thus, although Cuckoos are being fed less frequently, young Cuckoos are heavier at fledging than a whole brood of Pipits. This could be because Cuckoos are fed larger prey. Alternatively, Cuckoos may require less food because their thermoregulatory costs could be smaller: they have almost black skin which absorbs solar radiation efficiently, do not have to compete with siblings in the nest and, once older and feathered, have a smaller surface-to-volume ratio than a Pipit brood of four nestlings.","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-06-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47612415","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-06-23DOI: 10.5253/arde.2023.a2
Ruben C. Fijn, Rob S.A. van Bemmelen
{"title":"Sandwich Tern Feeds Juvenile on Wintering Grounds in Southern Namibia","authors":"Ruben C. Fijn, Rob S.A. van Bemmelen","doi":"10.5253/arde.2023.a2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2023.a2","url":null,"abstract":"The duration of parental care varies widely among bird species. The crested terns Thalasseus spp. continue to feed their chicks at least sporadically for several months after fledgling. We recorded provisioning of a juvenile Sandwich Tern T. sandvicensis by its suspected parent at the wintering grounds in southern Namibia, more than 10,000 km away from the nearest breeding site and more than six months after fledging.","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-06-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135903220","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ArdeaPub Date : 2023-04-26DOI: 10.5253/arde.2022.a13
N. Oliveira, Patrícia Abreu, H. Alonso, A. I. Fagundes, Alice Macq, P. Geraldes, Joana Andrade
{"title":"The Effect of Environmental Conditions on Captures, Survival and Breeding Success of a Winter-Breeding Seabird.","authors":"N. Oliveira, Patrícia Abreu, H. Alonso, A. I. Fagundes, Alice Macq, P. Geraldes, Joana Andrade","doi":"10.5253/arde.2022.a13","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5253/arde.2022.a13","url":null,"abstract":"Few studies have explored local and global environmental effects on the demographic rates of small seabird species such as storm-petrels. We analysed ringing data (from 2011–2022) to investigate the demographic parameters of a breeding population of Band-rumped Storm-petrels Hydrobates castro, which nest on Farilhão Grande Islet, Berlengas archipelago, Portugal. We used capture-mark-recapture analyses to estimate annual capture probabilities, apparent survival and abundance. The effects of environmental and capture effort-related variables on demographic parameters were then evaluated. The mean annual survival estimate was low (0.68 ± 0.02 SE) in comparison to other storm-petrel species, but this estimate substantially increased to 0.79 ± 0.02 after removing transient individuals. During the study period we determined breeding success in 10 years. In four of these years we also monitored breeding attempts with automatic cameras (2014–2017). Breeding success was low (0.56 ± 0.12 fledglings per active nest) with some observed cases of predation by Yellow-legged Gull Larus michahellis of both adults and chicks. The size of the Band-rumped Storm-petrel population was estimated at 1511.0 ± 266.3 SE individuals in 2017 when the mist netting effort was highest. There is no evidence that this population experienced a large decrease over the last 27 years and the trend from the previous 11 years seems to indicate a fluctuation rather than a clear decrease. The North Atlantic Oscillation Index showed a positive effect on the number of captured birds, while there was a negative effect from moonlight and local winds. We conclude that mist netting is a valuable method for long-term demographic studies on ground-nesting seabirds in which nests are difficult to access, but estimates of demographic parameters are influenced by environmental and capture effort-related variables.","PeriodicalId":55463,"journal":{"name":"Ardea","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2023-04-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49091237","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"生物学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}