by Tjibbe Stelwagen
While the birds were wintering. Last December, while most birds had left us, we happily announced that we had sufficient green lights to start project ‘Waakvogels’. Since then, we have been very active in explaining the concept of Waakvogels to site managers, conservation NGO’s, policy makers and other stakeholders, discussing which Wadden Sea managerial issues can benefit from the insights Waakvogels will provide. We did so by visualizing and contextualizing some tracking data collected in the past and are happy to have received so many encouraging responses. The examples we used come from a pool of data collected since the closure of the preceding project “Metawad” eight years ago. Regrettable as it is that those data have been gathering dust all this time (there were no funds to analyse them prior to Waakvogels), we do feel fortunate now to have the opportunity to finally study them. Besides the intrinsic value of these data, it will provide a temporal backdrop for the new data we will collect in the years to come. In other words: Our time series might in some cases end up being much longer than the actual duration of Waakvogels, which will enhance the meaning of new tracking data. It will also allow us to present results relatively quickly because some data is already there.
Research plans. So what did we set in motion so far and what are the plans? For starters, spoonbills, brent geese, bar tailed godwits and black tailed godwits have been successfully tagged. We started to study how the black tailed godwit uses the Wadden Sea. Little is known about this, as most work is done from a meadow bird perspective. For the spoonbills, habitat- and space use of the Wadden Sea are studied in relation to the tidal cycle and other spatial and environmental variables. At the same time, we will open the spoonbill data vault for spatial and demographic analysis. Brent geese tracking data will be studied to identify cascading effects of climate change and how this affects habitat use in the Wadden Sea.
Space use of bar tailed godwits is investigated in conjunction with field observations on prey quality, densities, and intake rates with special interest in a newly discovered prey. Demographic data will be revisited, now differentiating between the subspecies lapponica en taymyrensis with the aid of molecular data derived from previously collected blood samples. Sanderlings will be tagged and densities of their most important prey item, the brown shrimp,will be assessed around the island Griend which is a Sanderling hotspot. Finally, for the red knot tracking and ringing data will be studied to make a population estimate and study habitat use around the island Griend and the sand bar Richel in relation to estimating the prey carrying capacity for the red knots. Part of the data will be acquired through “Watlas” which will be expanded in the next two years to cover the entire Dutch part of the Wadden Sea.
Outreach. Though scientific scrutiny often requires years before insights can be shared, we aim with Waakvogels to share observations with site managers and the public as soon as we responsibly can. To this end we developed a communication plan with a Waakvogels website as the first, but certainly not last, point of action. We plan to launch the website in fall this year. Part of this website will (in due time) be an interactive platform which in one form or another will show the birds’ movements in near real time within a relevant context, for example spatial, temporal and environmental. From a more experimental angle, we are currently exploring possible collaborations with a variety of artists, media and initiatives. Yes, this sounds cryptic, and just as with collecting the data from the birds, we have a hunch where things are going, but we most likely won’t really know until we are actually there. But this, to us, captures exactly the exciting nature of Waakvogels! So stay tuned to see where the birds will take us this summer!
