November, 2013

Tanner Gue, Katherine Mehl, and Brett Goodwin, University of North Dakota

Johann Walker and Scott Stephens, Ducks Unlimited

Jeffrey Gleason, Charles Loesch, and Ronald Reynolds, USFWS

The effects of a large scale wind farm on breeding season survival of female mallards and blue-winged teal in the Prairie Pothole Region (PPR)

National Wind Coordinating Collaborative, Research Webinar

Journal of Wildlife Management 77(7):1360-1371

Average Annual Wind Speed at 80 m

National Renewable Energy Laboratory

www.nrel.gov/gis/wind.html

Critical Concerns

• Increased mortality

Hypothetical direct mortality exposure curve for a breeding female mallard in the PPR

pre-nesting

clutch formation

incubation

brood rearing

Objectives: • Quantify collision mortality

• Determine the influence of wind turbines on breeding season survival of females

PPR

ND

SD

National Renewable Energy Laboratory

www.nrel.gov/gis/wind.html

Study Area

• Capture and Marking – Trap pre-nesting female mallards

• Decoy traps

– Trap nesting females

• Walk-in traps/ mist net

– 9 gram transmitter

Methods

Methods

• Monitoring

Data Analysis

• Covariates

• SITE

• YEAR

• DATE

• DATE2

• Program MARK

• Ragged entry design

Total number of marked females and exposure days (in parentheses)

included in the survival analysis by species, site and year.

2009 2010

REF TWF REF TWF Total

MALL

25 33 45 44 147

(1293.5) (1567.5) (2261.5) (2125.5) (7248)

BWTE

29 40 46 48 163

(851.5) (1376.5) (1800) (1754) (5782)

Total

54 73 91 92 310

(2145) (2944) (4061.5) (3879.5) (13030)

Results

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Fem

ale

s

Week after initiation of marking

MALL 2009

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Fem

ale

s

Week after initiation of marking

MALL 2010

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Fem

ale

s

Week after initiation of marking

BWTE 2009

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Fem

ale

s

Week after initiation of marking

BWTE 2010

Total number of radio-marked females included in analyses for each

day of the 14-week study period (mid-April – mid-July).

Results

Mortalities by species, site, year and mortality factor.

COLLISION PREDATOR OTHER TOTAL

REF MALL 0 2 1 3

2009 BWTE 0 3 0 3

TWF MALL 1 1 0 2

BWTE 0 8 0 8

REF MALL 0 3 2 5

2010 BWTE 0 5 0 5

TWF MALL 1 7 5 13

BWTE 0 7 0 7

TOTAL 2 36 8 46

Results

DSR MODEL ΔAICc Model Weight Parameters

SITE*YEAR+DATE2 0.00 0.33 6

YEAR+DATE2 0.28 0.29 4

SITE+DATE2 1.65 0.15 4

SITE*YEAR 3.38 0.06 4

SITE+YEAR 3.80 0.05 3

YEAR 4.01 0.05 2

SITE*YEAR+DATE 4.80 0.03 5

CONSTANT 5.30 0.02 1

SITE 5.40 0.02 2

Mallard daily survival rate model selection results.

* denotes an interaction between variables.

Results

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.98

0.985

0.99

0.995

1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14Week after initiation of marking

Pro

portio

n o

f females in

cub

atin

g

Da

ily

su

rviv

al

rate

REF 2009

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.98

0.985

0.99

0.995

1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14Week after initiation of marking

Pro

portio

n o

f females in

cub

atin

g

Da

ily

su

rviv

al

rate

TWF 2009

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.98

0.985

0.99

0.995

1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14Week after initiation of marking

Pro

portio

n o

f females in

cub

atin

g

Da

ily

su

rviv

al

rate

REF 2010

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.98

0.985

0.99

0.995

1

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14Week after initiation of marking

Pro

portio

n o

f females in

cub

atin

g

Da

ily

su

rviv

al

rate

TWF 2010

Relationship between within-season time trends as a quadratic (DATE2) and Daily Survival

Rate of female mallards. Estimates are predicted by DSR = SITE*YEAR+DATE2.

DSR MODEL ΔAICc Model Weight Parameters

CONSTANT 0.00 0.29 1

SITE 0.84 0.19 2

YEAR 1.18 0.16 2

SITE+DATE2 2.23 0.10 4

SITE+YEAR 2.23 0.10 3

YEAR+DATE2 2.35 0.09 4

SITE*YEAR 4.21 0.04 4

SITE*YEAR+DATE2 5.37 0.02 6

SITE*YEAR+DATE 5.89 0.02 5

Blue-winged teal daily survival rate model selection results.

* denotes an interaction between variables.

Results

0.83

0.62

0.90 0.84

0.64

0.76

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1

REF TWF

Su

rviv

al

Pro

bab

ilit

y

BWTE 93-Day Survival

0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1

REF 2009 REF 2010 TWF 2009 TWF 2010

Su

rviv

al

Pro

bab

ilit

y

MALL 93-Day Survival Estimates predicted by DSR = SITE*YEAR+DATE2

Estimates predicted by DSR = SITE

Summary

• Most mortalities caused by predators

• 1 mallard collision mortality

• Collision mortality of breeding females of least concern

• Only modest support for difference in survival between sites

• What are the effects of wind energy development on duck predator communities?

• USFWS, Kulm Wetland Management District – Mick Erickson, Della Holmgren, Dave Peterson, Brenda Newton

• North Dakota Game and Fish – Mike Johnson, Mike Szymanski, Kyle Skildum

• USFWS Region 6 Habitat and Population Evaluation Team – Shawn Bayless, Billie Yantzer, Barbie Reynolds

• USGS, Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center – D. Brandt, M. Sherfy, C. Dovichin, T. Buhl, M. Anteau, J. Shaffer, D. Johnson

• University of North Dakota – Robert Newman, Brad Rundquist

• Ducks Unlimited, Inc. – Chad Billat

• Prairie Pothole Joint Venture

• NextEra Energy

• Acciona Energy

• Louisiana State University – Matt Pieron

• Ducks Unlimited, Canada

• South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks

• Nebraska Game and Parks Commission – Mark Vrtiska, Zach Cunningham

• University of Minnesota - Brandt Meixell, Alex Primus, Dr. Patrick Redig

• Landowners

• Field Crew

2009 - Matt Bisson, Danielle DeVito,

Andy Dinges, Jason Tarwater

2010 - John Hallagan, Cam King, Jake Meier,

Tait Ronningen, Wendy Macziewski,

Anthony Wolf

THANKS!

Breeding Duck Pair Density in the Prairie Pothole Region