{"id":11029,"date":"2019-01-10T08:46:32","date_gmt":"2019-01-10T13:46:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/currents\/?p=11029"},"modified":"2024-05-21T15:54:07","modified_gmt":"2024-05-21T19:54:07","slug":"how-stable-is-the-oystercatcher-population","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/how-stable-is-the-oystercatcher-population\/","title":{"rendered":"How Stable Is the Oystercatcher Population?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Above: American oystercatchers.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Due to continuing coastal threats to the American oystercatcher \u2014 and because the bird\u2019s small population had been in decline until recently \u2014 the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission classified the species of \u201cgreatest conservation need.\u201d To better understand if the oystercatcher population is imperiled, a North Carolina Sea Grant study looked at a key indicator of species stability: the ratio of males to females.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_11054\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-11054\" style=\"width: 353px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11054\" src=\"http:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/currents\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2019\/01\/measuring-CN0.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"353\" height=\"334\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-11054\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shilo K. Felton: \u201cThrough capture and recapture analyses we also found that sex, hatch site, and breeding site all influenced survival.\u201d<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cFor a monogamous breeder like the oystercatcher, the number of available male-female pairs is critical,\u201d says Shilo K. Felton, a recent doctoral graduate in fisheries, wildlife, and conservation biology from North Carolina State University. \u201cMany models assume an even ratio of breeding males to females, but this assumption can lead to misleading projections of population growth or extinction.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Natural resource managers rely on accurate estimates of population status and growth when making decisions to conserve species of interest. A previous study by Felton and her research partners suggested nearly stable oystercatcher populations in North Carolina, but prior research also has shown that the number of breeding pairs in certain protected areas decreased by almost 50 percent in the past decade.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSkewed male-female ratios are common in avian species,\u201d Felton says. \u201cWe wanted to know if North Carolina\u2019s American oystercatcher population likewise had an uneven ratio. If so, the population wouldn\u2019t be as stable as the previous study implied.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Felton and Audubon North Carolina colleague Lindsay M. Addison combed through feather samples that <a href=\"https:\/\/cals.ncsu.edu\/applied-ecology\/people\/simons\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Theodore R. Simon<\/a>\u2019s lab at NCSU had collected from over 600 oystercatchers during a 13-year period. In turn, a lab at the University of Porto in Portugal then sexed the samples.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_11039\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-11039\" style=\"width: 336px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11039\" src=\"http:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/currents\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2019\/01\/Eggs-cropped-and-delicious.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"336\" height=\"347\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-11039\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Oystercatcher eggs on Sunset Beach, N.C.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The feather samples indicated even female-male ratios for both juveniles and breeding adults in all but one year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThrough capture and recapture analyses we also found that sex, hatch site, and breeding site all influenced survival,\u201d Felton says. \u201cIn addition, the effects of each varied with life stage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Overall, Felton and Addison say their results suggest oystercatchers may remain part of the state\u2019s ecosystems for years to come, as long as the various habitats the species requires are available.<\/p>\n<p><em>This study received a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/funding-opps\/grants\/minigrants\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"broken_link\">North Carolina Sea Grant minigrant<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Photo credits:<em> oystercatcher pair, courtesy of RussImages under a <a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/2.0\/deed.en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">CC BY SA 2.0 license<\/a>; oystercatcher in hand, courtesy of Lindsay M. Addison; the nest, courtesy of Dick Daniels, under a <a href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/3.0\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0 license<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For a monogamous bird like the oystercatcher, the number of available male-female pairs is critical to the stability of its population.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":63,"featured_media":11046,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ncst_custom_author":"","ncst_show_custom_author":false,"ncst_dynamicHeaderBlockName":"","ncst_dynamicHeaderData":"","ncst_content_audit_freq":"","ncst_content_audit_date":"","ncst_content_audit_display":false,"ncst_backToTopFlag":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[761],"tags":[],"_ncst_magazine_issue":[],"class_list":["post-11029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-currents"],"displayCategory":null,"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How Stable Is the Oystercatcher Population? 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