Page 28 - ARUBA TODAY

A28 SCIENCE
Wednesday 19 april 2017

Study: Bird population in Vermont forests drop 14.2 percent

WILSON RING biggest declines, including
Associated Press the chimney swift, the East- mont study works in the
MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) — ern phoebe and the tree middle of forests.
The bird population in Ver- swallow. But even the more “These are undistributed
mont’s forests has declined common blue jay saw a forests that we’re monitor-
14.2 percent over 25 years, 25-percent decline over ing here and we’re looking
largely due to several fac- the survey years between at those changes away
tors, including invasive spe- 1989 and 2013. from roads, away from
cies, climate change, and Meanwhile, eight species, development, so it’s a re-
the natural cycle of matur- including the American ally different picture,” said
ing forests, scientists with robin, pileated woodpeck- Strong, who once partici-
the Vermont Center for er and mourning dove, in- pated in a forest survey,
Ecostudies say. creased in population. but was not otherwise in-
The Norwich-based envi- To protect the birds, the sci- volved in the study.
ronmental research group entists recommend a com- Ken Rosenberg, a scientist
says other factors for the bination of land conserva- at the Cornell Lab of Or-
decline include acid rain tion and forest manage- nithology, said such long-
and the fragmentation of ment practices. term studies offer scientists
forestland caused by hu- “For the most part, these information they would
mans. are pretty common and not otherwise have. He
Some bird species that live widespread species,” said noted that some species,
on flying insects saw the Steven Faccio, the lead apart from the insect eat-
ers, declined over the first
decade or so of the study,
but they have since stabi-
lized or recovered.
“When I look at their data
set, I see a lot of stability,”
he said.
The Vermont study was
done by comparing results
of bird surveys of 125 bird
In this Oct. 10, 1995 file photo, a downy woodpecker sits on a species done by volun-
bird feeder in Calais, Vt. teers every June between
Associated Press 1989 and 2013. It started
with 11 survey sites across
author of the report. “We population trends of birds the state and expanded to
have a lot of forest habitat, in interior forests,” Faccio 31, all in unmanaged, ma-
but this is a really important said. ture forests from one end
time to get an understand- Allen Strong, associate of Vermont to the other.
ing of what’s going on with dean in the Rubenstein The scientists compiling the
these birds.” School of Environment and data looked at the trend
The study also proved what Natural Resources at the estimates for 34 abundant
many bird experts have no- University of Vermont, said species. It also broke down
ticed, especially declines in most information about the study by looking at dif-
species that survive by eat- bird populations comes ferent species of birds that
ing flying insects. from the North American share similar ecological
“This project was started Breeding Bird survey in traits such as foraging style
with just that goal in mind, which people collect data and nesting location, and
just to track the long term from roadsides. The Ver- migration habits.q