Citizen science: What a QUACKING survey!

East Park in Hull, how calm and relaxing does this look? A hidden gem within a busy city. 

Firstly, how beautiful is East Park in Hull? 

Myself and my fellow practical Conservationists travelled to East Park in Hull. We volunteered our time to surveying non-breeding wetland birds. East Park has two ponds containing a large variety of wetland birds, which come during wintering, breeding and stopovers for many birds during migration. This is important especially during migration at national and international levels.

Why should we care?

Here is a curious Greylag goose, this goose
walked straight into the middle of our group
to say hello!

In 2008 Whelan stated that birds are a vital part of the worldwide biodiversity, and that they provide us with ecological services and without them the ecosystem would suffer the loss of predator and prey food chains, scavengers’, pollinators and ecosystem engineers. 

Migratory species, link ecosystem processes and fluxes that are divided by great distance and time. Wetland birds are important within the UK countryside, do you remember going to the park to feed the ducks? Imagine future generations might not get to experience this.

Europe is home to more than 500 wild species of birds, and a shocking number of 32% of EU birds are currently in poor conservation status, the Bird Directive aim to protect all wild species of bird that occur naturally within the EU. 

Whats is a WeBS survey and how do we do it?

We carried out a ‘mock’ BTO’s (British Trust for Ornithology) Wetland Bird Survey (WeBS) which monitors non-breeding water birds within the UK. The aims of WeBS are to identify population size, determine trends within numbers and the distribution and to identify important sites for these waterbirds. 

This beautiful Mallard is easily
distinguishable due to his
brightly coloured head. 

WeBS is done between September – March with all species recorded that are on the water, or 100 meters around the wetland.

To do this we walked slowly and quietly around the lake using a clicker to count all birds, especially if there was a large number of them, its quicker and more accurate. Writing down what we species we saw and how many. We used a species identifier if we didn’t know what it was. Most birds are used to people at East Park so binoculars weren’t required, however they can be useful.  


What we found

That is a lot of birds!
makes it difficult to reliably
count them!

We found 16 different species, the most common being the Greylag Goose (who liked to come say hello!) during this we had to take human error into consideration. It all comes down to knowledge and ability to identify a species, and when they start flying round because of a dog barking it really is quite a challenge. This is common in citizen science surveys like this! 

Volunteering is crucial!

Volunteers play a crucial role in these surveys. Without their time and efforts, we wouldn’t have access to a large quantity of data. These long running surveys show us the fluctuation between the years. This identifies species that are at risk within the UK, allowing for conservation efforts to be targeted in the habitats that have specific species in need, it also allows us to identify areas that are more impacted by human disturbance, so that these areas can be protected.

Please don't feed the ducks bread! and please keep your

dog on a lead whilst around the pond, many birds die due

to loose dogs.

This where you come in!

Volunteers are needed all over the UK to actively take part in these surveys, without you species in need won’t be noticed! Volunteers are the only reason WeBS is able to function. 

How to get involved?

There are many ways that you can get involved, you don’t have to be a professional bird watcher, but you have to be able to identify most wetland birds, this is a skill that you can gain from using a species identifier, or you can attend a course run by WeBS, its usually a 1 day course which focuses on bird surveying. (Find out more here.) 

You can take part in bird surveys from home, the easiest one is Big Garden Birdwatch (RSPB)
If you would like you can become a member of BTO for £3 a month or donate!

Thanks for reading!

C.

P.S here are some more photos from the day!

Bat your eyes on these beauties!

My fellow conservationists and I travelled to Tophill Low Nature Reserve (@tophilllow), and spent the morning travelling through the woodland surveying the local bats with East Yorkshire Bat Group (@EYBG1).

Soprano pipistrelle (Pipistrellus 

    pygmaeus) found at Tophill.

A little information on Tophill Low; its an active water treatment site, established in 1959 and officially opened as a nature reserve in 1993. It’s a 300-acre site bordering the River Hull. Surprisingly enough not much is left to nature, it’s under constant management; if you want to keep up to date with everything they do give their blog a read!

Getting acquainted with Geoff and his team from EYBG was a pleasure, they talked about what they do for bats all over the country, from professional research to household advice. Their surveys allow for the protection of bats, in the case of building development within the area.


During the walk, a record of all the bats seen was taken, this helps us increase our knowledge and understanding of bats ecology. We checked a total of 11 bat boxes that morning and found a total of 12 bats, 8 of them were male and 4 of them female. Some of the bat boxes had fresh droppings in, suggesting that it had been used recently. Unfortunately, I only saw one species Soprano pipistrelle (Pipistrellus pygmaeus).

Getting ready to fly! Geoff is showing us them shivering
to warm themselves up so they can fly away.

The bats that were removed out of the bat boxes were cold and dormant, and it took them some time to warm up and get ready to fly, if you handled them for too long off they flew!

Interesting fact for you... a pip weights 5g when fully grown... that is the same weight as a 20p coin.

What’s the point in bat conservation?

Apart from them being really cute and cuddly, why do we need to protect them? Because the countryside and Wildlife Act 1981 says so? Well yes obviously... but why?

This is a male and female Pip; they
were found in the same box.

Bats play a crucial role in their environment, as they are an indicator species. Changes within the bat populations could be an indicator of biodiversity change. They are a natural form of pest control for insects and pollinate several plant species.

In 2005 Battersby stated that there had been significant declines within European countries bat populations, including Britain, this being due to a reduction within the diversity of insects as a consequence of the loss of hedgerows, and over grazed agricultural pastures. However now according to the IUCN red list they are listed as being a 'least concern' with a stable population. 

One of the EYBG volunteers
climbing the ladder
to demonstrate. 

Stebbings stated that with large scale management of the landscape over time the population of bats can be restored to their full glory, by managing the landscape it enables us to create shelter and optimal insects for the bats to feast on all night long (stopping them from feasting on us!). Bats need roosts near habitats in which they can forage, such as Tophill low, with woodland and water, with safe passageways such as 

hedgerows to shelter them from predators.

How can you get involved? 

You can sign up to EYBG for a small fee, information for this can be found on their blog, or you can donate a bat box which you can build at home, read a simple guide on how to here!

If you want to go and survey bats please don’t go out on your own, please set something up with EYBG! You’ll be doing plenty of walking with them, and some ladder climbing, so come prepared, (comfy walking shoes, warm clothing) read more information here!

Or if you just fancy a day out to enjoy the scenery and to see what sort of cool things they get up to at Tophill Low you can visit them for the day between 9am to 6pm for a small entrance fee (£3.50 per adult).

(Google Maps, 2018)

Thanks for reading!

C.



P.S. here are some more photos from the day!

Welcome!

Hey all,


Welcome to my Blog!


Let me introduce myself to you really quick, I'm Charlotte but most people call me Charly. I'm currently a final year Zoology student at the University of Hull. You can find me on twitter @ZoologyCharly I tweet sometimes!

So... I'm taking this module called practical conservation where i go out and do some volunteering, come home tell you all about it, why its important and ultimately how you can get involved, pretty cool huh?

This blog is going to have a lot of cute animals on, but there is also going to be some serious topics to discuss to, for example did you know that approximately 30,000 species per year which is works out about three per hour are being driven to extinction (Harvard University)


Stick around and see how you can help from home!



Chat soon,


C.