Landbird Monitoring Program in the Tłįchǫ Region

We often hear them in spring and summer in our northern boreal forests, but they’re hard to see.  They are forest landbirds that fly north to breed each year, and some species, like the Rusty Blackbird and the Olive-sided Flycatcher, both found in Wek’èezhìı, have experienced dramatic declines in their numbers in Canada. For certain species, there are as many as 70-90% fewer individuals now compared to in the 1970s.   Knowing as much as possible about landbirds can help wildlife managers develop strategies to help recover those bird populations that are in trouble.  But monitoring them isn’t easy, especially in remote forests in hard to access areas.  And spotting birds hidden in the forest canopy is challenging.  Is there a way to use their songs to learn more about them?

A unique project is collecting and analysing sounds in the northern boreal forest.  At the recent WRRB board meeting in Behchokǫ̀ in September 2015, Samuel Haché, with Environment Canada, described a new community-based landbird monitoring program that is underway in the Tłı̨chǫ region. Researchers want to find out how many bird species are breeding here, how abundant breeding species are in the region, and what their status is –in other words, how are they doing?  Are there any threats to their populations, such as climate change or various threats encountered during their migrations?   

How can researchers find the answers to these questions?  Samuel described technology that can take a snapshot of what is singing in the forest.  Autonomous Recording Units (ARUs) can record sound and show frequencies and patterns visually-- and enable researchers to literally see the song. Those patterns can be interpreted and matched to individual bird species.  ARUs have “opened a new dimension”, Samuel says. “Now a massive amount of information can be collected.”   This summer 2015, the team installed ARU’s at various sites, and now will be working on analyzing all the recorded data. 

Not only can ARU’s record bird songs, but they can collect a soundscape of other animals making sounds in the forest:

“This is a fascinating opportunity to have a better idea of the diversity of sounds coming out of the boreal forest” –

Samuel Haché, Environment Canada

After the extreme wildfire season last summer in 2014, another important research question has emerged:  “What is the effect of fire intensity and severity on the bird community?”  One of the areas this project wants to monitor is along the winter roads and the fires in areas south of Behchokǫ̀.  Some birds are adapted to fire-- “fire specialists”--and may be doing well, but others may not.  Many aerial insectivores –birds that eat insects—are declining nationally.  How is fire affecting the insect population that these birds depend on?  Researchers sampled aerial insects this summer, using collecting bags, and will use this information to help build a picture of the quality of habitat for these birds.  As well, to better understand the wintering grounds of species at risk, researchers caught and fitted an Olive-sided flycatcher with a tiny device to track its migration to see where a bird from the NWT is actually spending winter. 

It will be interesting to follow this project as is it develops.  The project team plans to share information on the landbird monitoring program with communities to present results so far and to demonstrate the technology they’re using.   There are also plans for a long-term community-based monitoring program that can involve community members –from fieldwork installing and retrieving ARU’s to using computers to run song recognizers. 

Rusty Blackbird, CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons

Fact Box:

The Landbird Monitoring Program:

• The Canadian Wildlife Service developed the Canadian Landbird Monitoring Strategy in response to the growing concern over landbirds and the need for data to develop sound conservation plans.  The purpose of the program is to provide data on the status, population trends, and population dynamics of landbirds.

Landbirds:

• Included in the many different species of landbirds are different kinds of songbirds, such as warblers and sparrows.  Songbirds begin learning their songs while still in the nest.  They perform their songs using a specialized voice box called a syrinx. 
• Why do they sing?  It’s believed that they sing to defend their territories and to impress a potential mate.
• If you hear a bird singing, it is probably a male. Females often use the shorter, simpler calls to communicate a nearby threat or to let another bird know where they are. 
• The Olive-sided Flycatcher is frequently associated with burned forests. The opened area and the abundant snags –standing dead or dying trees-- may help it to catch flying insects. The Olive-sided Flycatcher perches on tall trees or snags and waits for insects to fly by before pursuing its prey. 
• The Rusty Blackbird lives in boreal forests in wetland areas in the NWT from early May to mid-October.  It relies almost exclusively on aquatic insects and larvae for food.