BIRDS
Spring Bioacoustics–Flying Squirrels, Owls, and Warblers! by Chris Kelly, Western Bird and Carolina Northern Flying Squirrel Biologist
O nce a project’s objectives have been clearly defined, bioacous- tics work boils down to three main steps: deploying equipment, retriev- ing equipment, and processing data. This quarter, we tackled all three. In April we retrieved AudioMoths from the March 2024 saw-whet owl survey. In May, Virginia Tech researchers deployed ultrasonic detectors for the launch of NCWRC’s long-term Caro- lina northern flying squirrel bioacous- tic monitoring program. Also in April and May, partners, such as Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy and USFS, deployed AudioMoths to listen for golden-winged warblers. Bioacoustics effectively allowed us to blitz more locations for this declining warbler even if we couldn’t be there in person during the peak May survey window. Deployment and retrieval of autonomous recording units are argu- ably the easiest and most enjoyable phases of a bioacoustics survey. Equipment miniaturization allows for easier deployment into even more remote, un-surveyed areas. Plus, vol- unteers and partner organizations like the U.S. Forest Service and Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy love to assist with equipment deploy- ment. Now for the tough part: data processing. Bioacoustics surveys gen- erate terabytes of .wav files. For flying squirrels and saw-whet owls, call clas- sifiers filter out the junk, producing a
spreadsheet of possible detections that require post-processing by a biologist. Our owl research partners in the Kitzes lab at University of Pittsburgh scrubbed the 2022 saw- whet owl dataset for us. NCWRC technicians spent rainy days this spring completing the review of
possible saw-whet owl “hits” from the 2022 dataset. The 2022 results alone will vastly increase the number of records for this species in the NC Natural Heritage Program database. Now on to the 2023 and 2024 owl data and the new batch of golden- winged warbler data.
NCWRC sampled five massifs for Northern saw-whet owl in 2022. Results from the Black Mountains show a gradient of percent of sample periods with detections of owl toots. Darker purple = more toots! A saw-whet(s) was particularly active around the Mt. Mitchell State Park office.
12 2024 Wildlife Diversity Program Annual Report
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