National Support 



NWRC Begins Gull Monitoring Program — In 



April and May 2007, NWRC biologists from the 

 Sandusky, OH, field station and the Illinois WS 

 program banded and wing-tagged 580 nesting ring- 

 billed gulls. Prior to the banding and tagging, Illinois 

 WS personnel oiled ring-billed gull eggs in two 

 nesting colonies in Chicago. This work was done at 

 the City of Chicago's request in response to beach 

 closures, over the past few summers, attributed 

 to high bacteria counts thought to be from ring- 

 billed gulls loafing and feeding at the beaches. 

 From the tagging, biologists hope to determine 

 whether the nesting colonies are the source of gulls 

 contaminating the beaches, and whether oiling 

 the eggs of nesting gulls causes them to abandon 

 the area at the conclusion of the nesting season. 

 Beaches in Chicago were monitored throughout 

 the summer to determine if marked gulls use the 

 beaches and if there is a difference in beach use 

 between gulls that had their eggs oiled and those 

 that did not. The data are currently being evaluated 

 and will be published in 2008. 



Biologists Conduct Laughing Gull Nest Survey — In 



June 2007, biologists from the NWRC Sandusky 

 field station, the New York WS program, the NFS, 

 the Fort Authority of New York and New Jersey, 

 and other groups conducted a ground-truth census 

 of the laughing-gull nesting colony in a 600-acre 

 marsh complex in Jamaica Bay near New York 

 City. The marshes, on NFS property, are adjacent 

 to JFKIA, where gull-aircraft collisions have posed 

 a serious bird-strike problem. All gull nests were 

 counted in ten 100- x 100-foot ground-truthing plots 

 established in the marsh. Aerial photographs will be 

 taken of the entire marsh complex, and researchers 

 will obtain a nest census of the marsh by counting 

 all nests, including those in the ground-truth plots, 

 on the enlarged aerial photographs. Counts on 

 the photographs of the ground-truth plots will allow 

 for determining the accuracy of the aehal census. 

 Results of a previous census indicate that the colony 



A laughing gull. (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service photo.) 



contained about 2,500 nests in 2006, a decline of 

 66 percent from the 7,600 nests counted in 1990. 



Management programs by WS at JFKIA from 1991 

 through 2006 have reduced laughing gull-aircraft 

 collisions by 76 to 99 percent annually compared 

 to 1988-90, when the airport averaged more than 

 150 strikes per year. Although the local population 

 of laughing gulls next to JFKIA has declined as a 

 result of these management actions, the regional 

 population from Virginia to Maine has shown an 

 increase during 1990 through 2006, based on 

 analysis of North American Breeding Bird Survey 

 data. This NWRC-developed census technique is a 

 critical component of the gull management program 

 at JFKIA and may be of use in other situations 

 where colonial-nesting waterbirds conflict with 

 human activities. 



Exotic Wildlife Rapid Response Team Initiated in 

 Florida — In August 2007, two biologists from the 

 NWRC Gainesville field station and one biologist 

 from Florida WS met with representatives from 

 various State, Federal, and tribal entities to form 

 a Rapid Response Task Force for invasive animal 

 species that threaten the Everglades ecosystem. 

 This meeting was a result of the Everglades 

 Cooperative Invasive Species Management Area 

 Summit held in Miami July 25-27, 2007, where 

 groundwork was laid for cooperative education, 

 research, and funding to address management 

 of invasive animals. At the Rapid Response 

 Team meeting, WS was nominated as the primary 



Providing Wildlife Services 47 



