3.5 Land-based Marine Shoreline Surveys (Harlequin Ducks)

Recommendations: Land-based surveys are recommended for determining presence and relative abundance of local wintering and moulting flocks of harlequins. These surveys are recommended for shorelines that can be accessed or viewed easily through a spotting scope. Land-based marine shoreline surveys are effective and recommended at the local and management unit scales.

Land-based surveys are commonly used to survey migrating and wintering waterfowl, shorebirds, and gulls along marine shorelines (e.g., Butler and Cannings 1989; Bradley and Bradley 1993). This survey method involves counting all birds visible from preselected land-based points and/or by walking the shoreline and observing. Ground survey data can be used to determine presence/not detected (possible) and relative abundance at a given time. For this inventory group it is useful for harlequins in local areas where they frequent coastlines accessible by land.

This method is currently being used to study harlequin winter site fidelity and moulting chronology near White Rock, British Columbia (Savard 1988; G. Robertson pers. comm.). It is not useful for dippers or kingfishers because they do not occur along marine shorelines frequently enough to warrant surveys, although small numbers of kingfishers may winter along estuary shorelines.

Advantages

• Methodologically simple and requires very little specialized equipment.
• Since methodology is simple, a large number of experienced amateur bird watchers can be trained quickly and used to survey many study areas.
• Inexpensive.
• Thorough coverage of visible shorelines is possible.
• Multiple counts are easily feasible and improve the accuracy of estimates.
• Notes on habitat use and other environmental factors can be easily documented at the same time as the counts.
• Facilitates band reading of harlequins.

Disadvantages

• Misidentification at a distance can be a problem, so counts may be inflated.
• Labour intensive.
• Only land-accessible areas can be censused. Impractical to census remote regions.
• Ground-based counts are not instantaneous. This increases the potential error due to movement of birds (e.g., the same birds may be counted twice or some birds not counted at all because they have moved).
• Suitable for harlequins only.

Office Procedures

• Review the section, Conducting a Wildlife Inventory, in the manual Species Inventory Fundamentals (No. 1).
• Obtain relevant maps for project area (e.g. Nautical charts, 1:50 000 air photo maps, 1:20 000 forest cover maps, 1:20 000 TRIM maps, 1:50 000 NTS topographic maps).
• Determine Biogeoclimatic zones and subzones, Ecoregion, Ecosection, and Broad Ecosystem Units for project and study areas from maps.
• Select study areas from 1:20,000 maps using personal experience and, existing data.
• Plan the survey route (transect) and observation points (stations) to maximize efficiency in travelling and covering all habitat.
• Plan timing of surveys to coincide with tides and seasons that will show peak numbers, unless surveys are year round.
• Prepare and gather equipment and supplies.
• Organize availability of personnel.
• Prior to the survey, personnel should meet to standardize recording. Team members should review maps of the area.

Sampling Design

• Survey observation points should cover all habitat in a study area.
• Time surveys to coincide with tides and seasons that will show peak numbers, unless surveys are year round.
• Several study areas should be covered each day or part day.

Sampling Effort

• Time requirements dependent mainly on travel time to observation stations. Several study areas should be covered each day or part day.
• Multiple counts are easily feasible and improve the accuracy of estimates.

Personnel

• Observers should be experienced in identifying, aging, and sexing harlequins and keeping records.
• At least one person should be familiar with the collection of habitat data.

Equipment

• Waterproof notebooks, data forms and mechanical pencils.
• 20-60X spotting scope.
• 7-10X binoculars.

Field Procedures

• Scan habitat with binoculars and count visible birds from preselected land-based observation stations or while walking the shoreline (a transect).
• Use the scope to scan more distant areas, to count clusters of birds, and to age and sex birds where possible.
• If birds are flying, note their direction and the time of detection, to avoid double counting. This is especially imprint if counts are occurring simultaneously at other observation stations.
• Check for alpha-numeric coloured leg bands on legs of harlequins that are out of water.
• Record data as birds are observed.

Data Analysis

• Same as for Section 3.4 - Marine Boat Offshore Islands Surveys.