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!