Good or bad PR? (1 Viewer)

Qingcol said:

Hi Adam,
Your position sounds perfectly balanced and measured, can I ask you, if a percentage for casualties, directly attributed to trapping and processing could be calculated (The threats, plus the pitfalls in obtaining a representative ratio discussed earlier in the thread) how high would it have to be, for you to change that position?
Colin

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Colin

A link earlier in this discussion noted that "A recent study in the US that looked at mortality of birds during ringing activities (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.2041-210X.2011.00123.x/pdf), which they quantified at 0.23%. There are c. 1.2 million birds ringed in the US each year, so the resulting mortality figure stands at just under 3,000 individuals per annum. We have no comparable figures for the UK yet, but colleagues of mine are analysing the information as I type with the aim of publishing the results in a peer-reviewed journal and disseminating them more widely."

Given your concerns it would be interesting to know whether you feel a figure of 0.23% is acceptable, and if not what figure (if any) do you feel would be acceptable.

PaulD said:

Colin

A link earlier in this discussion noted that "A recent study in the US that looked at mortality of birds during ringing activities (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.2041-210X.2011.00123.x/pdf), which they quantified at 0.23%. There are c. 1.2 million birds ringed in the US each year, so the resulting mortality figure stands at just under 3,000 individuals per annum. We have no comparable figures for the UK yet, but colleagues of mine are analysing the information as I type with the aim of publishing the results in a peer-reviewed journal and disseminating them more widely."

Given your concerns it would be interesting to know whether you feel a figure of 0.23% is acceptable, and if not what figure (if any) do you feel would be acceptable.

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A mortality figure of 0.23% seems "slack" to me. Put another way, that's nearly 1 in 400. Of course, driving along the road is a risk to birds, and that risk has not been quantified#. We can't control vehicle use, of course, but ringers in the USA must surely be able to reduce the risk of mortality that their hobby / research causes.

# Actually, I remember that Chris Mead had a figure for the UK.

PaulD said:

Colin

A link earlier in this discussion noted that "A recent study in the US that looked at mortality of birds during ringing activities (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.2041-210X.2011.00123.x/pdf), which they quantified at 0.23%. There are c. 1.2 million birds ringed in the US each year, so the resulting mortality figure stands at just under 3,000 individuals per annum. We have no comparable figures for the UK yet, but colleagues of mine are analysing the information as I type with the aim of publishing the results in a peer-reviewed journal and disseminating them more widely."

Given your concerns it would be interesting to know whether you feel a figure of 0.23% is acceptable, and if not what figure (if any) do you feel would be acceptable.

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Hi Paul,
Presumably the American study you are quoting from, requested the data from the various ringing organizations, they did not directly monitor themselves, human nature being what it is, any request for that kind of data will, naturally be heavily loaded (It would be much the same as the DVL asking us to report our own personal road traffic offences) therefore, we must assume that the true casualty rate will be much higher, plus not all ringers are qualified vets, prepared to sit, spider-like, watching a line of mist-nets for any predator attacks, even they would struggle to diagnose, things like strain , internal bleeding, shock and stress in the short time they are supposed to hold a bird for ringing. I notice that the American study gave an average rate of injury of 0.59% as for the question 'what rate would I personally accept' that's a difficult one (It's the reason I asked Adam the same question) I suppose it would depend on, if the ringing activity carried out was for vital research, or for human recreation.
Colin

Allen S. Moore said:

A mortality figure of 0.23% seems "slack" to me. Put another way, that's nearly 1 in 400. Of course, driving along the road is a risk to birds, and that risk has not been quantified#. We can't control vehicle use, of course, but ringers in the USA must surely be able to reduce the risk of mortality that their hobby / research causes.

# Actually, I remember that Chris Mead had a figure for the UK.

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Any credible figure for the UK could never be arrived at by, simply analysing the data from ringers own casualty self assessment forms, there would need to be at least some element of independent monitoring, failing that, dare I suggest a more realistic rate of mortality as (1 in 200) with an injury rate of (3 in 100) as the ringer would be unaware of most fatalities and fail to diagnose most injuries, in theory they could, put up a string of nets, fail to trap a single bird, but be responsible for some unseen death or injury due to the unattended, set to catch nets. They would be extremely unlikely to follow a released, adrenalin fuelled bird into deep cover, but you can bet that there will be a predator that will, especially at a regular release site.Plus it would be impossible to follow up any injury that eventually, resulted in a fatality. I have tried to factor in all possible risks, too numerous to mention again, everything except, the early morning drive to the ringing site. There are many risks that are virtually impossible to quantify, given the right conditions I have seen large ice balls form on ground roosting birds like Skylark, smaller balls form on the toes, though much larger ones form around the rings, thorns, barbed wire, sheep's wool, plastic waste, netting and discarded fishing tackle (Industrial and recreational) are all potential snags between ring and leg.
Colin

My own suggested mortality and injury rate, is simply intended as a starting point, in the apparent absence of anything else, it has no credibility other than, the opinion of someone who has spent at least 25 years on both sides of the debate. Any further credibility to those figures can only be conferred by a refusal to comment, on a forum headed 'Ringing & Banding' is it considered to be higher or lower? Maybe I'm not looking in the right places, the only peer-reviewed articles I can find focus only on the positive effects of ringing data, never negative influences on birds. If ever we needed to be reminded of the importance of investigating the negative short, and long term effects of ringing/banding I suggest a recent article in Nature "Reliability of Flipper-Banded Penguins as Indicators of Climate Change" stating that (King Penguins flipper bands, reduced reproductive rate by 39% and survival rate by 16%) (Saraux C, Le Bohec C, Durant JM Viblanc Va Gauthier-Clerc M, et al 2011. 469:203-206, doi: 10.1038/Nature 09630)

It's obvious that not all species would be affected so drastically, there would be nothing left to study! But if King Penguin flipper bands reduced reproductive rate by 39% and survival rate by 16% you have to wonder, what the rate would be for small, multiple colour ringed passerines, like Chiffchaff and Wood Warbler, often seen carrying four bright plastic, and one metal ring?
Colin

It's easy to see that, as with the Penguins, different species would be affected in different ways. I can see on my own local estuary, a Greenshank wearing multiple colour rings has successfully returned to winter for the last ten years 'I can see that it can survive' but can it breed successfully? Is its longevity down to, simply focusing its resources on survival? It would be arrogant in the extreme to suggest that, millions of years of fine tuning to its particular niche by natural selection, plus the sexual selection of its appearance, that by, adding multiple colours, plus one metal ring would have no effect! Its not just the colour, the 'Oddity' effect plus the 'Unsymmetrical' effect all need to be considered. On the other hand a recent study of Corn Bunting, in part, undertaken at my nearest headland, involving multiple colour ringed pulli have, effectively wiped them out as a breeding bird in that location! You don't have to be an expert to see that a Gull wearing a black & White darvic ring still looks like a Gull, but a cryptic coloured Corn Bunting, wearing multiple, luminous colour rings, destroying all disruptive colouration, looks much more unlikely to die of old age.

A little off the subject, but while on the subject of multiple colour rings. It is reasonable to assume that, coordination between the bird and its environment is crucial to its survival, in the main, for concealment and advertisement. It's a no brainer that a cryptic colouration species with multiple colour rings will usually fail to minimize their contrast with the surrounding habitat. Perhaps a more important question would be, does social selection play a significant part (Do some males lose out in female mate preference?) Could some of these impressive wanderings recorded by multiple ringed individuals be unmated males, due to unnatural leg colour? In the young, is sexual imprinting for mate preferences skewed, by first seeing multiple coloured rings?
Some early study preference conclusions, using coloured leg bands with Zebra Finches (Burley,N.1986 Comparison of the band-colour preferences of two species of estrilid finches. Anim Behav 34: 1732-1741) (Burley,N.1988. Wild Zebra Finches have band-colour preferences, Anim Behav 36:1235-1237)

Qingcol said:

A little off the subject, but while on the subject of multiple colour rings. It is reasonable to assume that, coordination between the bird and its environment is crucial to its survival, in the main, for concealment and advertisement. It's a no brainer that a cryptic colouration species with multiple colour rings will usually fail to minimize their contrast with the surrounding habitat.

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Just a thought - presumably the plastics used in the colour rings have been tested for UV luminescence? Since many birds and mammals (eg potential mates and predators) are able to see into the UV end of the spectrum ...

Qingcol said:

A little off the subject, but while on the subject of multiple colour rings. It is reasonable to assume that, coordination between the bird and its environment is crucial to its survival, in the main, for concealment and advertisement. It's a no-brainer that a cryptic colouration species with multiple colour rings will usually fail to minimize their contrast with the surrounding habitat. Perhaps a more important question would be, does social selection play a significant part (Do some males lose out in female mate preference?) Could some of these impressive wanderings recorded by multiple ringed individuals be unmated males, due to unnatural leg colour? In the young, is sexual imprinting for mate preferences skewed, by first seeing multiple coloured rings?
Some early study preference conclusions, using coloured leg bands with Zebra Finches (Burley,N.1986 Comparison of the band-colour preferences of two species of estrilid finches. Anim Behav 34: 1732-1741) (Burley,N.1988. Wild Zebra Finches have band-colour preferences, Anim Behav 36:1235-1237)

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if you look at the subsequent literature on this topic you will find no significant differences or response. This was later attributed to a lab specific effect. e.g. the learned preference for food in a colored bowl etc. and lab zebs are not wild birds. This has been tested in wild birds, with brids given rings of different colours to see mating preferences and the effect is not shown at all.

but having said that if birds can determine age from a single old greater covert, or behavior then of course they will respond to color rings. The crucial thing to think about is is this response making a difference. The ringing does not claim to not make a difference to the birds at all- it never has and never would. it just suggests that in the majority of species that have been studied that there is no consistent and significant effect. This is in general- of course there are specific cases where there has been an effect and the process has been halted. There is a small passerine on an island in the tropics that was shown to have a higher mortality with rings than without, and so ringing on this bird was stopped.. etc common sense prevails sometimes.


Ringing is excellent and needs to be done. we have learnt and continue to learn far more from ringing than from bird watching and we always will. Ringers devote a huge amount of time to their chosen hobby and they deliver data to the banders/ ringers HQ to use for conservation, politics, science how the experts so choose. You only know as much as you do about birds due to ringing and banding.
Why ringers ring is a question with an answer as follows:

it is their job
it is a passion
it is a hobby

whichever is no concern- there are 1000's of people giving data and information freely to inform policy-how much data do you give? freely and how much effect does that have. How many records have you submitted? and what is their value?

re the mortality.

we have experts in the US and the UK that study this sort of thing- it is their job- leave it to them. if the weight of evidence suggests that the mortality due to ringing is significant then it will be stopped. There are sufficient ringers that do record and report every incident of cold, flopping, death to the authorities to get a good measure. yes birds die in mist nets, but you know the number of recoveries i have got from bands on birds. From a small island:
passerines:

dead in water troughs: 12
dead from cats (predation): 63
dead in mist nets (predation (cats)): 12
dead in mist nets (other predations (mainly rails)):2
dead in mist nets unknown 4
dead on the road :11
survival rate (mean) 0.44 (from retraps)
number of bird recovered alive (DATA): 988

total number banded: 8750


are these bad figures?

dantheman said:

Just a thought - presumably the plastics used in the colour rings have been tested for UV luminescence? Since many birds and mammals (eg potential mates and predators) are able to see into the UV end of the spectrum ...

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I would be surprised if the had! after all, the rings would have been developed with human perception in mind, enabling us to read and report. Birds utilise a four cone type system, humans have only three functional cone types, undoubtedly giving bird's better colour discrimination, plus ability to see colours that humans cannot, I feel sure this would include UV detection?
Colin

grahamarchy said:

(if you look at the subsequent literature on this topic you will find no significant differences or response. This was later attributed to a lab specific effect. e.g. the learned preference for food in a colored bowl etc. and lab zebs are not wild birds. This has been tested in wild birds, with brids given rings of different colours to see mating preferences and the effect is not shown at all.)

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Many thanks' for your reply (Can you point me to the source of these latest studies?)
Colin

Qingcol said:

A little off the subject, but while on the subject of multiple colour rings. It is reasonable to assume that, coordination between the bird and its environment is crucial to its survival, in the main, for concealment and advertisement. It's a no brainer that a cryptic colouration species with multiple colour rings will usually fail to minimize their contrast with the surrounding habitat.

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Your assumption about the effects of colour rings on predation risk is also not supported by scientific studies: e.g. Cresswell, W., Lind, J., L Quinn, J., Minderman, J., & Philip Whitfield, D. (2007). Ringing or colour‐banding does not increase predation mortality in redshanks Tringa totanus. Journal of Avian Biology, 38(3), 309-316.

Ross McGregor said:

Your assumption about the effects of colour rings on predation risk is also not supported by scientific studies: e.g. Cresswell, W., Lind, J., L Quinn, J., Minderman, J., & Philip Whitfield, D. (2007). Ringing or colour‐banding does not increase predation mortality in redshanks Tringa totanus. Journal of Avian Biology, 38(3), 309-316.

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A really good paper Ross, however they did state (Our conclusions are, however somewhat limited because of the statistical power of the study: our sample sizes at best were only sufficient to pick up effects that would change predation rates by at least 2.2%) even a 1% difference, in my view would be significant for some wader species.
Colin

Qingcol said:

A really good paper Ross, however they did state (Our conclusions are, however somewhat limited because of the statistical power of the study: our sample sizes at best were only sufficient to pick up effects that would change predation rates by at least 2.2%) even a 1% difference, in my view would be significant for some wader species.
Colin

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What is your reasoning that a 1% change in wader predation rate is "significant"? What do you mean by "significant"?

Ross McGregor said:

What is your reasoning that a 1% change in wader predation rate is "significant"? What do you mean by "significant"?

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By significant I mean consequential, even a tiny difference in evolutionary terms will have consequences, even a short term study that gives an advantage, no matter how small will have long term consequences. Consider a species on the imminent brink of extinction, like Spoon-Billed Sandpiper, if there is the slightest risk why take it? In such a small population surely safeguarding a few more individuals at this stage, would be worth more that data collection.
As for the Redshank study, I'm not at all surprised by their conclusions; you could conduct a similar study every winter and at different locations and come up with differing results, too many variables to factor in, also Redshank prefers 'flocking' as an effective anti predation strategy, over concealment (I have to admit I'm surprised at their overall predation rate of 50-60%)
Colin

grahamarchy said:

(re the mortality.

we have experts in the US and the UK that study this sort of thing- it is their job- leave it to them. if the weight of evidence suggests that the mortality due to ringing is significant then it will be stopped. There are sufficient ringers that do record and report every incident of cold, flopping, death to the authorities to get a good measure. yes birds die in mist nets, but you know the number of recoveries i have got from bands on birds. From a small island:
passerines:

dead in water troughs: 12
dead from cats (predation): 63
dead in mist nets (predation (cats)): 12
dead in mist nets (other predations (mainly rails)):2
dead in mist nets unknown 4
dead on the road :11
survival rate (mean) 0.44 (from retraps)
number of bird recovered alive (DATA): 988

total number banded: 8750


are these bad figures?)

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I suppose the mortality would depend on the frequency of net visits, presumably you would check a net every 20-30 minutes? By necessity leaving nets unattended for most of the time, plenty of time for a predator to make a kill without trace, plus all the other numerous risks mentioned earlier in the thread, you make no mention of injuries, shock or dazed birds.
In the end it all comes down to a question of, did your 8750 birds ringed, produce data that would improve the lot of individual birds, or species enough to warrant the loss of the 18+? Individuals and their potential gene pool contribution?

Qingcol said:

In the end it all comes down to a question of, did your 8750 birds ringed, produce data that would improve the lot of individual birds, or species enough to warrant the loss of the 18+? Individuals and their potential gene pool contribution?

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Even without knowing what data accrued, the answer will be yes. With the speed of extinction soaring, the 18 individuals may not have a gene pool to add to soon. The one chance to avoid massive loss of species in the next hundred years is to understand as much as possible about all those currently extant. Particularly important as far as ringing is concerned is the establishment of baselines in terms of annual population size, geographical limits and the demographics of fledged birds.

John Morgan said:

Even without knowing what data accrued, the answer will be yes. With the speed of extinction soaring, the 18 individuals may not have a gene pool to add to soon. The one chance to avoid massive loss of species in the next hundred years is to understand as much as possible about all those currently extant. Particularly important as far as ringing is concerned is the establishment of baselines in terms of annual population size, geographical limits and the demographics of fledged birds.

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How on earth do you intend to avoid the massive loss of species by applying yet more unnecessary pressure on them? As you say, with the speed of extinction soaring. The pile of data we already have, has made little difference so far! You might as well collect more data on human over population and climate change, incurring zero casualties, for all the good it will do. No, the mantra is always 'we need more data' we just can't resist playing god, or these day's scientist, if we don't value a wild species enough to make sacrifices, and set aside habitats for them, or the climate becomes unsuitable, they will become extinct, no amount of bird fondling or data will change that.
Colin

Qingcol said:

How on earth do you intend to avoid the massive loss of species by applying yet more unnecessary pressure on them? As you say, with the speed of extinction soaring. The pile of data we already have, has made little difference so far! You might as well collect more data on human over population and climate change, incurring zero casualties, for all the good it will do. No, the mantra is always 'we need more data' we just can't resist playing god, or these day's scientist, if we don't value a wild species enough to make sacrifices, and set aside habitats for them, or the climate becomes unsuitable, they will become extinct, no amount of bird fondling or data will change that.
Colin

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You seem not to have understood what I posted. The ringing data being collected by many schemes is now analysed relative to the date/year, Analyses occur across time, and reveal the trends which show which species are coping with threats you rightly outline, and to which they may seem to be succumbing. Conservation efforts can be directed towards those whose populations need attention.

The proposition you are promoting, that loss of individuals during monitoring operations such as ringing can effect entire populations, is frankly ludicrous. Several million, migratory, W. Palearctic passerines are killed by "hunting" as they pass through the Med and ME, yet there is little evidence that this activity does any more than hold population sizes at a lower level than would otherwise be the case.