Florida Project: Overwintering survival of shorebirds on Florida's Panhandle

Florida Project

Overwintering survival of shorebirds on Florida's Panhandle

June 2018 - December 2020

Personnel

Participating Agencies

US Fish and Wildlife Service

Molly Tuma, Florida Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit, surveys Piping Plovers overwintering on Florida's Panhandle.

The beaches and coastal bayside wetlands along Florida’s panhandle are important to migrant and resident shorebirds, including species of conservation concern including Piping Plovers (Charadrius melodus) and Red Knots (Calidris canutus). Human disturbance and development, dredged and hardened inlets, and sea level rise have impacted much of the natural beach habitat in this region. Systematic surveys for non-breeding shorebirds have taken place either biweekly or monthly for the past 3-5 years. The objectives of this study are to use existing data and collect additional field data to:
(1) summarize/analyze regional data on non-breeding shorebirds using public lands along Florida’s Panhandle region, and (2) where data on banded birds permits, determine overwintering survival of select species (e.g. Piping Plover, Red Knot) at targeted sites along NW Florida beaches. This work will inform managers of potential areas that may need additional protection or alternative management to enhance survival of migrating and overwintering shorebirds.

Research Publications

Research Publications	Publication Date
Tuma, M. E. and A. N. Powell. 2021. The southeastern U.S. as a complex of use sites for nonbreeding rufa Red Knots: fifteen years of band-encounter data. Wader Study 128(3): 265-273. doi:10.18194/ws.00256 \| Abstract	December 2021	Shorebirds have been banded for decades and monitoring programs have helped to accumulate large band-encounter datasets from across the globe; however, many of these datasets are left largely unused, particularly those collected by citizen scientists. These datasets can provide valuable insight into<br>the migration and movement strategies of shorebirds and the threats they face throughout their migratory cycle. We used long-term (2003–2018) band-encounter data of Red Knots Calidris canutus rufa in North America to determine: (1) the spatiotemporal distribution during the nonbreeding season, (2) site fidelity to nonbreeding sites, and (3) migratory connectivity of knots using the southeastern United States (Southeast), an important overwintering and stopover area for this subspecies. Annual mean site fidelity ranged from 0% to 86% across 24 sites. We found movement between sites across the Southeast during migratory and wintering periods, indicating that knots are using the region as interconnected sites, as opposed to relying on a single site or a cluster of adjacent sites. We identified ‘hop migration’ as a common strategy for knots in the region, and showed regular within-year movement between sites in South Carolina, Georgia,<br>and Florida. The Southeast is an understudied part of the rufa range; our results show the importance of the region to the subspecies both as a stopover and wintering area. Despite the inherent biases in the data and imperfect detection due to inconsistent survey effort, the data showed large-scale movements and confirmed the region as a complex of sites connected by knots.

Presentations

Presentations	Presentation Date
Tuma, M. E., P. Kelly, R. Pruner, and A. Powell. 2018. Why should we care about nonbreeding shorebirds in Florida? Poster presented Florida Chapter of The Wildlife Society Annual Meeting, Crystal River, FL	April 2018
Tuma, M. E. and A. N. Powell. 2019. Movement and distribution of red knots (Calidris canutus) in the southeastern U.S. American Ornithological Society, Anchorage, AK.	June 2019
Tuma, M. E. and A. N. Powell. Survival and habitat selection of piping plovers (Charadrius melodies) in the Florida Panhandle. Florida Chapter of TWS Annual Meeting.	April 2019
Taylor, A.R., R.B. Lanctot, and A.N. Powell. 2008. Abundance and distribution of staging shorebirds on Alaska's Chukchi and Beaufort coasts. 13th Alaska Bird Conference.	March 2008

Theses and Dissertations

Theses and Dissertations	Publication Date
Tuma, Molly E. 2020. Survival, site fidelity, and movement of two migratory shorebirds in the southeastern U.S. M.S. Thesis, University of Florida.	May 2020

Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Units Program: Florida Education, Research and Technical Assistance for Managing Our Natural Resources

Florida Project

Overwintering survival of shorebirds on Florida's Panhandle

June 2018 - December 2020

Personnel

Participating Agencies

Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Units Program: Florida
Education, Research and Technical Assistance for Managing Our Natural Resources