Latest blog entries
The MLSG held its third symposium in association with the European Ornithologists Union biennial conference this August in Cluj- Napoca, Romania. Forty-eight delegates from 18 countries were present for two days of talks, workshops and a brainstorming session to reinvigorate a COST application for a wider migratory bird research network. The symposium was held over a hot and lively weekend, with a local festival going on in the city surroundings.
By Samuel Temidayo Osinubi, FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology
Migration strategies within the tropics are still poorly understood as are the drivers of movement and the degree of connectivity between sites in migrant birds that have their global range and life cycle exclusively on a single continent – intra-continental migrants. On this side of the Atlantic, the plan is to establish an intra-African bird migration project.
Recent publications
Omotoriogun TC 2019. Ornithology and conservation activities in Elizade University: promot-ing bird and habitat conservation in Nigeria
Airola DA, Estep JA, Krolick DE, et al 2019. Wintering Areas and Migration Characteristics of Swainsons Hawks That Breed in the Central Valley of California. Journal of Raptor Research 131: 561 View online
Norevik G, Åkesson S, Artois T, et al 2019. Wind?associated detours promote seasonal migratory connectivity in a flapping flying long?distance avian migrant. Journal of Animal Ecology : 215219. View online
Rittenhouse JL, Robart AR, Watts HE 2019. Variation in chronotype is associated with migratory timing in a songbird. Biology Letters : 133-154 View online
Jiguet F, Robert A, Lorrillière R, et al 2019. Unravelling migration connectivity reveals unsustainable hunting of the declining ortolan bunting. Science Advances 121: View online
Latest news
MLSG at “Migrant Birds as Indicators of Climate Change” conference, Gdańsk
From Dec 13th – 16th 2018 the Bird Migration Research Station (BMRS) from the University of Gdańsk, together with the Operation Baltic Foundation, hosted the international conference on “Migrant Birds as Indicators of Climate Change”. This event was part of a larger project, “Building an Early Warning System for Biodiversity in the Face of Climate Change”, jointly funded by the National Centre for Research and Development (Poland) and the National Research Foundation (South Africa), within a research cooperation agreement between the two countries. In total 65 participants from Poland, Holland, Denmark, France, Belgium, England and South Africa gathered in Hotel Orle in at Sobieszewo Island’s Baltic coast in southern Gdańsk.
13 - 16 December, Gdansk, Poland
A joint conference of the "Birds as Early Warning Systems" of the Poland–South Africa collaboration project, the Migrant Landbird Study Group, and the Polish Network of Bird Ringing Stations (KSSOP) - more info here
Deadline has been extended to 14 October!
More info and to sign up, see here
Point Blue Conservation Science is seeking one volunteer research assistant to work on Southeast Farallon Island, 30 miles west of San Francisco, California as part of a study examining the migratory movement of parulid warblers.
Insectivorous birds consume an estimated 400-500 million tons of prey annually
The Science of Nature
https://doi.org/10.1007/s00114-018-1571-z
By Martin Nyffeler, Çağan Şekercioğlu & Christopher Whelan
For the first time, the predation impact of the insectivorous birds has been quantified on a global scale based on 103 (for the most part published) studies of prey consumption (kg per ha per season) of insectivorous birds in seven terrestrial biome types (i.e., tropical forests, temperate/boreal forests, tropical grasslands/savannas, temperate grasslands, croplands, deserts, and Arctic tundra).
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