Landbird Monitoring in the National Park Service’s San Francisco Bay Area Network: 2005 Annual Report

Humple, Diana; Gardali, Thomas

A Summary Report of the 2005 Field Activities for:Golden Gate National Recreation Area, John Muir National Historic Site, Pinnacles National Monument and Point Reyes National Seashore. PRBO Conservation Science has been conducting landbird monitoring since 1965 in the Point Reyes National Seashore, when the organization was founded and work began (see Ballard et al. 2003, Howell and Gardali 2003). In addition, PRBO has been conducting annual, standardized point count surveys, nest searching, and constant effort mist-netting at other locations within the Point Reyes National Seashore (PORE) and the Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GOGA) for nearly a decade (Holmes et al. 1998, Scoggin et al. 2000, Gardali et al. 2003a, Gardali et al. 2003b, Michaud et al. 2004, Samuels et al. 2005). Over the last five years, however, PRBO conducted more comprehensive habitat-specific landbird inventories within PORE, GOGA, Pinnacles National Monument (PINN), and John Muir National Historic Site (JOMU) (Flannery et al. 2001, Hammond and Geupel 2003, Haff et al. 2003), primarily focusing on the breeding season. In 2004, PRBO continued monitoring at many of these long-term sites, some of them year-round, and initiated a pilot monitoring program at others (e.g., PINN, JOMU; see Humple and Gardali 2004). These sites, with a few additions, continued to be monitored in 2005. Most of these sites are being instituted as long-term monitoring sites and will be surveyed annually. Additions or changes may be made once the landbird monitoring protocols are finalized. Fieldwork was conducted primarily during the breeding season, except in GOGA where some monitoring was also done in fall and PORE where monitoring occurs year-round at some sites. Some of this monitoring, especially at the Palomarin Field Station, is funded by sources other than the NPS, including members, private donors, and foundations, and while not officially part of the SFBAN monitoring program is included herein.

Landbird Monitoring in the National Park Service’s San Francisco Bay Area Network: 2005 Annual Report

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