Graduate Thesis Or Dissertation
 

Assessing Renesting Rate and Survey Methods of Red Phalarope (Phalaropus fulicarius), a Polyandrous Arctic-breeding Shorebird

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https://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/concern/graduate_thesis_or_dissertations/5999nb05p

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  • The life history traits of polygamous, non-territorial shorebirds like the Red Phalarope (Phalaropus fulicarius) can make it challenging to assess their population status. There are two general approaches to statistical inference used to understand shorebird (Order: Charadriiformes) population change: design-based inference, which implements an a-priori sampling scheme with known selection probabilities, and model-based inference, which seeks to identify a stochastic model that explains observed variation in a fixed sample. Model-based approaches rely on good parameter estimates, and renesting rate is one such population parameter that is poorly understood in Red Phalaropes. I conducted a clutch-removal experiment to estimate renesting rate in Red Phalaropes breeding near Utqiaģvik, Alaska, and found that 19 of 24 males whose nests we experimentally removed (n=19) or had been abandoned/depredated (n=5) left the study area prior to the end of the laying period (Chapter 2). Three of the 19 males were observed to have paired again after clutch removal, suggesting they may have renested outside the range of my telemetry system; however, I was unable to assess renesting rate for my study population. Design-based approaches tend to minimize sampling error, but unaddressed measurement errors can affect the accuracy of their estimates. I investigated four untested assumptions of the Arctic PRISM monitoring program, which uses a double-sampling scheme to estimate shorebird population size and trends, for Red Phalaropes breeding near Utqiaģvik, Alaska. I found a weak relationship between rapid and intensive survey variables in my dataset (marginal R2 values <0.12, Chapter 3), indicating low precision of population estimates and a limited ability to improve the precision by re-summarizing existing survey data. Imperfect nest detection on intensive surveys biased population estimates low, while occurrences of polyandry and renesting biased population estimates slightly high, which taken together resulted in a 33% population underestimate for my study area in 2019 (Chapter 3). A combined approach to making Red Phalarope population estimates, which takes advantage of the strengths of a design-based sampling scheme while using model-based approaches to minimize measurement and detection errors, may optimize the accuracy of population estimates for this species.
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  • Pending Publication
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  • 2021-02-19 to 2023-03-19

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