What can seabirds tell us about the tide?
Small global positioning system (GPS) trackers are now routinely used to study the movement and behaviour of birds at sea. If the birds rest on the water they become “drifters of opportunity” and can be used to give information about surface currents. In this paper, we use a small data set from sate...
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Language: | English |
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2018
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Online Access: | https://research.bangor.ac.uk/portal/en/researchoutputs/what-can-seabirds-tell-us-about-the-tide(b8b81a18-35be-488c-a5ee-34e5c3cceebd).html https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 https://research.bangor.ac.uk/ws/files/22295589/2018_What_can_seabirds_tell_us_about_the_tide.pdf |
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ftuwalesbangcris:oai:research.bangor.ac.uk:publications/b8b81a18-35be-488c-a5ee-34e5c3cceebd 2024-06-23T07:45:10+00:00 What can seabirds tell us about the tide? Cooper, Matt Bishop, Charles Michael Lewis, Matthew Bowers, David Bolton, Mark Owen, Ellie Dodd, Stephen 2018-11-29 application/pdf https://research.bangor.ac.uk/portal/en/researchoutputs/what-can-seabirds-tell-us-about-the-tide(b8b81a18-35be-488c-a5ee-34e5c3cceebd).html https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 https://research.bangor.ac.uk/ws/files/22295589/2018_What_can_seabirds_tell_us_about_the_tide.pdf eng eng https://research.bangor.ac.uk/portal/en/researchoutputs/what-can-seabirds-tell-us-about-the-tide(b8b81a18-35be-488c-a5ee-34e5c3cceebd).html info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess Cooper , M , Bishop , C M , Lewis , M , Bowers , D , Bolton , M , Owen , E & Dodd , S 2018 , ' What can seabirds tell us about the tide? ' , Ocean Science , vol. 14 , no. 6 , pp. 1483-1490 . https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 , https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 article 2018 ftuwalesbangcris https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 2024-05-29T23:44:57Z Small global positioning system (GPS) trackers are now routinely used to study the movement and behaviour of birds at sea. If the birds rest on the water they become “drifters of opportunity” and can be used to give information about surface currents. In this paper, we use a small data set from satellite-tracked razorbills (Alca torda) in the Irish Sea to test the potential of this idea for measuring tidal currents. Razorbills regularly rest on the sea overnight and their tracks at this time are consistent with their drifting with the tidal flows and changing direction as the flood turns to ebb and vice versa. Data from 4 years (2011–2014) have been binned in a geographical grid and analysed to give the variation of current over a mean tidal cycle in each grid element. A map of maximum current speed is consistent with a numerical model of the tidal currents in the region. The root mean square difference between observed maximum speed and that predicted by the model is 0.15 m s−1, about 15 % of typical current speeds in the area. The divergence between bird-track speed and model prediction increases in regions of the fastest tidal currents. The method clearly has its limitations, but the results of this study show that tagged birds resting on the sea have potential to provide relatively inexpensive quantitative information about surface tidal currents over an extended geographical area. Article in Journal/Newspaper Alca torda Bangor University: Research Portal Ocean Science 14 6 1483 1490 |
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Open Polar |
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Bangor University: Research Portal |
op_collection_id |
ftuwalesbangcris |
language |
English |
description |
Small global positioning system (GPS) trackers are now routinely used to study the movement and behaviour of birds at sea. If the birds rest on the water they become “drifters of opportunity” and can be used to give information about surface currents. In this paper, we use a small data set from satellite-tracked razorbills (Alca torda) in the Irish Sea to test the potential of this idea for measuring tidal currents. Razorbills regularly rest on the sea overnight and their tracks at this time are consistent with their drifting with the tidal flows and changing direction as the flood turns to ebb and vice versa. Data from 4 years (2011–2014) have been binned in a geographical grid and analysed to give the variation of current over a mean tidal cycle in each grid element. A map of maximum current speed is consistent with a numerical model of the tidal currents in the region. The root mean square difference between observed maximum speed and that predicted by the model is 0.15 m s−1, about 15 % of typical current speeds in the area. The divergence between bird-track speed and model prediction increases in regions of the fastest tidal currents. The method clearly has its limitations, but the results of this study show that tagged birds resting on the sea have potential to provide relatively inexpensive quantitative information about surface tidal currents over an extended geographical area. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Cooper, Matt Bishop, Charles Michael Lewis, Matthew Bowers, David Bolton, Mark Owen, Ellie Dodd, Stephen |
spellingShingle |
Cooper, Matt Bishop, Charles Michael Lewis, Matthew Bowers, David Bolton, Mark Owen, Ellie Dodd, Stephen What can seabirds tell us about the tide? |
author_facet |
Cooper, Matt Bishop, Charles Michael Lewis, Matthew Bowers, David Bolton, Mark Owen, Ellie Dodd, Stephen |
author_sort |
Cooper, Matt |
title |
What can seabirds tell us about the tide? |
title_short |
What can seabirds tell us about the tide? |
title_full |
What can seabirds tell us about the tide? |
title_fullStr |
What can seabirds tell us about the tide? |
title_full_unstemmed |
What can seabirds tell us about the tide? |
title_sort |
what can seabirds tell us about the tide? |
publishDate |
2018 |
url |
https://research.bangor.ac.uk/portal/en/researchoutputs/what-can-seabirds-tell-us-about-the-tide(b8b81a18-35be-488c-a5ee-34e5c3cceebd).html https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 https://research.bangor.ac.uk/ws/files/22295589/2018_What_can_seabirds_tell_us_about_the_tide.pdf |
genre |
Alca torda |
genre_facet |
Alca torda |
op_source |
Cooper , M , Bishop , C M , Lewis , M , Bowers , D , Bolton , M , Owen , E & Dodd , S 2018 , ' What can seabirds tell us about the tide? ' , Ocean Science , vol. 14 , no. 6 , pp. 1483-1490 . https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 , https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 |
op_relation |
https://research.bangor.ac.uk/portal/en/researchoutputs/what-can-seabirds-tell-us-about-the-tide(b8b81a18-35be-488c-a5ee-34e5c3cceebd).html |
op_rights |
info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/os-14-1483-2018 |
container_title |
Ocean Science |
container_volume |
14 |
container_issue |
6 |
container_start_page |
1483 |
op_container_end_page |
1490 |
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1802651727245082624 |