Veery Nest Sites in a Mid-Atlantic Piedmont Forest: Vegetative Physiognomy and Use of Alien Shrubs

Effects of exotic Spartina alterniflora on the habitat patch associations of breeding saltmarsh birds at Chongming Dongtan in the Yangtze River estuary, China

“…Gan (2009) also recorded breeding failure caused by the inundation of nests in the cordgrass vegetation at Chongming Dongtan. Because exotic plants can have conflicting effects on different parts of the life history of birds (Heckscher 2004), the influence of cordgrass invasion on the breeding performance of birds in native and cordgrass-invaded habitats requires additional study.…”

“…Other studies, however, have indicated that exotic plants could provide alternative or new breeding habitats for the local birds (Schmidt et al 2005;Sogge et al 2008;Whitt et al 1999) and that the breeding success in exotic habitats is equal to or even higher than that in native habitats (Kennedy et al 2009;Schlossberg and Kings 2010). Moreover, some birds in previously degraded ecosystems might depend on the exotic plants completing life histories (Fleishman et al 2003;Heckscher 2004;Safford 1997). Overall, the impacts of exotic plants on breeding birds seem to be region-and speciesdependent.…”

Deer Impacts on Seed Banks and Saplings in Eastern New York

“…Veeries typically conceal their nests in small shrubs or forbs (Schmidt 2003, Bevier et al 2005, are common throughout the study site, and are known nest in rose, honeysuckle, and barberry (Schmidt 2003, Heckscher 2004, Heckscher et al 2014. Territories are typically 0.1-2.0 ha in size (Bertin 1975;x ¼ 1.8 ha at our site, K. Schmidt personal observation) and are aggressively defended (Holmes and Robinson 1988).…”

Occurrence and nest survival of four thrush species on a managed central Appalachian forest

“…While these descriptions were accurate for most nests we monitored, 18% of wood thrush and 9% of veery nests were within regenerating even-aged harvests four to nine years postharvest. The veery's use of dense shrubs for nesting is fairly well known (Moskoff, 1995;Heckscher, 2004), and the occasional use of early successional vegetation by adult wood thrushes for nesting and foraging also has been documented (Annand and Thompson, 1997;Pagen et al, 2000;Marshall et al, 2003). The use of such areas by wood thrush and veery calls into question their dependence upon closed-canopy forest for breeding.…”

“…They show a great deal of plasticity in their use of nest sites (Dellinger, 2005), and thus may have a competitive advantage in disturbed landscapes, and may benefit from the increased grass density associated with the stabilization of roads by seeding postharvest (Hamel, 1992). Veeries nest in dense shrubs (Heckscher, 2004), but are less abundant in new regeneration harvests (Weakland, 2000). Veeries may be an area-sensitive forest interior species (Robbins et al, 1989) and threatened by habitat fragmentation (Moskoff, 1995).…”