Huntable UK waterbird data ...

Life history characteristics, harvest data, population trends and conservation statuses of huntable waterbirds in the UK. Wintering bird populations for the UK were obtained from the latest published estimates (Frost et al. 2019). The estimate for mallard was increased by 2.6 million birds to accoun...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ellis, Matthew, Cameron, Thomas
Format: Dataset
Language:English
Published: Dryad 2022
Subjects:
Online Access:https://dx.doi.org/10.5061/dryad.3tx95x6k2
https://datadryad.org/stash/dataset/doi:10.5061/dryad.3tx95x6k2
Description
Summary:Life history characteristics, harvest data, population trends and conservation statuses of huntable waterbirds in the UK. Wintering bird populations for the UK were obtained from the latest published estimates (Frost et al. 2019). The estimate for mallard was increased by 2.6 million birds to account for the annual release of captive-raised birds for shooting purposes (Madden 2021). We estimated a standard deviation for the population estimates by averaging the Wetland Bird Survey (WeBS; Frost et al. 2021) index for each species for the winters 2012/13 – 2016/17, which corresponded to the period used to estimate duck populations. We treated this mean index as equal to the estimate from Frost et al. (2019) and then calculated population estimates for each year based on their WeBS indices and calculated the standard deviation of these estimates. Population estimates for greylag goose, pink-footed goose, golden plover, snipe and woodcock were based on single years, but the same time frame was applied to ... : We modelled the resident and migratory populations of greylag geese and woodcock separately. The resident woodcock population was estimated as three times the number of breeding males. This was subtracted from the total estimated overwintering woodcock population to provide an estimate of the migratory woodcock population. Resident woodcock harvest was estimated as equal to the proportion of breeding birds in the overwinter population (13%) The remaining 87% of total harvest was assigned to migratory woodcock. We recognise that further mortality of UK breeding woodcock will occur outside the UK in southern Europe, but we have no estimate of this mortality and can only consider the contribution of UK hunters to the harvest of birds that winter in the UK in this initial assessment. Population estimates for Icelandic and British greylag geese overwintering in the UK are reported separately and no adjustment is needed. An estimated harvest of migratory Icelandic greylag geese in the UK (Frederiksen 2002) was ...