BirdFlow: Learning Seasonal Bird Movements from eBird Data

Fuentes, Miguel; Doren, Benjamin M. Van; Fink, Daniel; Sheldon, Daniel

doi:10.1101/2022.04.12.488057

Cited by 4 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 45 publications

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“…As pointed out by Gelb and Delacretaz (2009), there are high-collision sites that are responsible for most of the mortality. New platforms that model and predict migration traffic, such as BirdCast (https://birdcast.info/) and BirdFlow (Fuentes, Van Doren, Fink, & Sheldon, 2022), could be used for focused action (such as turning off lights) on these high-risk sites during the days with highest migration traffic as well as high visibility, yielding the greatest improvements in mitigation measures (Van Doren et al, 2021).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What causes bird-building collision risk? Seasonal dynamics and weather drivers

Scott

Danko²,

Plant

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Bird-building collisions are a major source of wild bird mortality, with hundreds of millions of fatalities each year in the United States and Canada alone. Here, we use two decades of daily citizen-science monitoring to characterize day-to-day variation in building collisions and determine the factors that predict the highest risk times in two North American cities. We use these analyses to evaluate three potential causes of increased collision risk: heightened migration traffic during benign weather, increased navigational and flight errors during inclement weather, and errors in response to reflective glass. The seasonal phenology of collisions was consistent across sites and years, with daily collision rates approximately two-fold higher in autumn as compared to spring. During autumn migration, day-to-day variation in collision rates is best explained by weather conditions around dawn with four major drivers: no precipitation, high atmospheric pressure, cold temperatures, and clear skies. In spring, collision risk was best predicted by either overnight or morning weather, driven by a lack of precipitation and warm temperatures. Based on these results, we hypothesize that collisions are influenced by two main weather-driven mechanisms. First, benign weather causes an increase in migration traffic in both spring and autumn, creating greater opportunity for collisions to occur. Second, cold clear conditions cause an additional increase in collision risk for autumnal migrants. These conditions may be particularly hazardous in autumn because of the high abundance of naive and diurnal migrants at that time of year. Our analysis also establishes that a relatively small proportion of days (15%) are responsible for 50% of the total collision mortality within a season, highlighting the importance of targeting mitigation strategies to the most hazardous times.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What causes bird-building collision risk? Seasonal dynamics and weather drivers

Scott

Danko²,

Plant

et al. 2022

Preprint

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“…Variation in thermal sensitivity across space and time may be more difficult to quantify in species that seasonally move long distances, occupy smaller ranges, or are reported less frequently, which we avoided exploring in this study. Within species that seasonally migrate long distances, seasonal variation in thermal sensitivity is difficult to measure because without knowing which sets of locations have the same individuals (e.g., information on migratory connectivity; Fuentes et al, 2022), making direct comparisons between populations over time difficult. However, recent improvements in animal tracking, even for smaller birds, will allow for direct comparisons of thermal sensitivity at the population or individual level even for migratory species (Costa-Pereira et al, 2022).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatial and seasonal variation in thermal sensitivity within North American bird species

Cohen

Fink

Zuckerberg

2023

Preprint

Self Cite

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Responses of wildlife to climate change are typically quantified at the species level, but physiological evidence suggests significant intraspecific variation in thermal sensitivity (non-stationarity) given adaptation to local and seasonal environments. Non-stationarity carries important implications for climate change vulnerability; for instance, sensitivity to extreme weather may increase in specific regions or seasons. Here, we leverage high-resolution observational data from eBird to understand regional and seasonal variation in thermal sensitivity for 20 bird species. Across their ranges, most birds demonstrated spatial and seasonal variation in both thermal optimum and breadth, or the temperature and range of temperatures of peak occurrence. Some birds demonstrated constant thermal optima or breadths (stationarity) while others varied according to local and current environmental conditions (non-stationarity). Across species, birds typically invested in either geographic or seasonal adaptation to climate. Intraspecific variation in thermal sensitivity is likely an important but neglected aspect of organismal responses to climate change.

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“…As pointed out by Gelb and Delacretaz ( 2009 ), there are high collision sites that are responsible for most of the mortality. New platforms that model and predict migration traffic, such as BirdCast ( https://birdcast.info/ ) and BirdFlow (Fuentes et al, 2022 ), could be used for focused action (such as turning off lights) on these high‐risk sites during the days with highest migration traffic as well as high visibility, yielding the greatest improvements in mitigation measures (Van Doren et al, 2021 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

What causes bird‐building collision risk? Seasonal dynamics and weather drivers

Scott

Danko²,

Plant³

et al. 2023

Ecology and Evolution

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Bird-building collisions are a major source of wild bird mortality, with hundreds of millions of fatalities each year in the United States and Canada alone. Here, we use two decades of daily citizen science monitoring to characterize day-to-day variation in building collisions and determine the factors that predict the highest risk times in two North American cities. We use these analyses to evaluate three potential causes of increased collision risk: heightened migration traffic during benign weather, increased navigational and flight errors during inclement weather, and increased errors in response to highly directional sunlight that enhances reflected images. The seasonal phenology of collisions was consistent across sites and years, with daily collision rates approximately twofold higher in autumn as compared to spring. During both migration seasons, collision risk was best predicted by the weather conditions at dawn. In spring, peak collision risk occurs on days with warm temperatures, south winds, and a lack of precipitation at dawn. In autumn, peak collision occurs on days with cool temperatures, north winds, high atmospheric pressure, a lack of precipitation, and clear conditions with high visibility. Based on these results, we hypothesize that collisions are influenced by two main weather-driven mechanisms. First, benign weather at dawn and winds that are favorable for migration cause an increase in migration traffic in both spring and autumn, creating greater opportunity for collisions to occur.Second, for autumnal migrants, cold clear conditions may cause an additional increase in collision risk. We propose that these conditions may be particularly hazardous in autumn because of the high abundance of naïve and diurnal migrants at that time of year. Our analysis also establishes that a relatively small proportion of days (15%) are responsible for 50% of the total collision mortality within a season, highlighting the importance of targeting mitigation strategies to the most hazardous times.

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BirdFlow: Learning Seasonal Bird Movements from eBird Data

Cited by 4 publications

References 45 publications

What causes bird-building collision risk? Seasonal dynamics and weather drivers

What causes bird-building collision risk? Seasonal dynamics and weather drivers

Spatial and seasonal variation in thermal sensitivity within North American bird species

What causes bird‐building collision risk? Seasonal dynamics and weather drivers

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