Sigulda Municipality (Grāfs and Grāfiene)

documenting the life on streamed black stork nests
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marika.solo
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Re: Grāfs and Grāfiene (Sigulda Municipality)

Post by marika.solo »

First, the overall context. The total length of the network of ditches around this nest within a radius of 3 km is ~ 141 km (107.7 km in state forests, 33.7 km outside them). In comparison, it is approximately the distance from Riga to Saldus, Talsi, or Smiltene, depending on the direction you choose. I am quite serious about guessing at which point on the side of this road (10 m section) 100 euros have been dropped. Each has three attempts - whoever guesses the first place (coordinates) will be able to get the mentioned 100 euros from me. For my part, I promise to announce how many happiness seekers tried to "find" and how close or far from their right place their attempts were. No matter how and if there are any, there is a high probability that the stork will find a feeder (barely 10 meters long) at some point at the end of the season, which is also in the area, where there was no water some time ago (and therefore there could be no fish and hardly worth looking for). In addition, the area where the stork looks for food extends not less than three, but at least 20 km from the nest. They are most likely to find out the places worth visiting before laying eggs (which can be determined at all or not) and during hatching, when one bird is nesting and the other has time to explore the area.

pic 8 (later)


Three birds in the feeder

More than one bird can (regularly) visit a bird in a timely feeder. At least six different birds - three ringed and at least three (seen at a time) without rings - visited the feeder set up in 2017 to catch a nesting bird nearby.
I have data from one socket with a feeder, which shows that it could give positive results. If this is indeed the case, this year's feeder should have been set up in April11 . There is one thing if the purpose of the feeder is to catch an adult bird (male) after the season when the nest was removed, or if the feeding takes place in a place where the bird feeds itself. The setting up of a feeder has a completely different context if it aims to improve the survival of the young and the bird has to find it first.

In addition, the 'given values' are such that the feeding areas of the two birds do not overlap (so there should be at least two feeders) and it is likely that sooner or later they will be found by other anglers - otter, mink, herons, wrong black storks (from another nest). or non-nests) and even white storks.

Followed by an insight into costs. Given the real prices of fish and fuel The cost per 12 feeding seasons is 3100 Euros. If suddenly a fish farm is ready to provide the necessary fish for five months for free, then 1900 euros. Materials (construction mesh, etc.) required for the installation of the feeder itself are not included, but in the general context this is an insignificant detail.

In fact, when buying at retail, the price per fish was 15 cents in 2020, and the distance to the known fish production site is much larger than used in the estimate. The car can also be more economical, but normal driving in the woods requires a more fuel-efficient (4 × 4) machine. And, I'm not sure if there will be anyone who is ready to drive and replenish the feeder every other day for 10 Euros a day, regardless of the weather for five months. I will repeat that properly and timely feeders at the nest could give positive results, but to install it for a few days, politely speaking, is a joke. Whatever the cost.

This is also because the 'feeding' of babies in the last few days before departure cannot significantly improve their condition, which is the most important precondition for a successful first migration. Even a person who has been starving for a long time will not become fat after one pass, but will rather die from overeating. There must be sufficient food at all times from hatching. From cases where it is safe to know (with or without transmitters) that poorly fed young birds have left the nest but have either died within a few tens of meters of the ground (which, from the viewer's point of view, would have "successfully flown"), or the same thing happens at different distances from the nest when you start your journey. Due to poor condition, they are unable to find their first good feeding ground and / or learn to catch fish themselves when they are in the water.
marika.solo
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Re: Grāfs and Grāfiene (Sigulda Municipality)

Post by marika.solo »

Ringing

Someone could add rings to the properties, which allow the birds to be distinguished individually. Most of the above is due to ringed birds of known age and origin. However, ringing is not a sport with the aim of "getting more bucks" (as they unfortunately do), but the main method of bird research. It should be recalled that ornithology did not become a real science until 1899, when the Danish teacher Hans Christian Cornelius Mortensen invented this method.13 . Thanks to the rings, birds could be studied as individuals and not just as species.

pic

Types of rings
Types of traditional rings used in Latvia for ringing black storks since 1990. Photo: M. Strazds
In the research of black stork, the next step in the development of rings was much more important - remotely readable plastic rings14 . These have been widely used to study this species in Europe since the first black stork conference in 1993.15 in Ķemeri. There, the participants agreed on the start of a coordinated ringing program, and also distributed the ring codes (the first sign on the ring at the bottom) is 0 for Latvia and 7 for Estonia. Lithuania joined the program later and the rings used there start with V. ringed birds have not been seen in Latvia, but it is possible.

pic

Coloured rings
The special (plastic) rings can be seen and read from a great distance even for a flying bird. On the right side of the image (B), part of image A is zoomed in. The ring code is easy to read. Photo: M. Strazds
Most live birds have been seen once and most during their first trip to Israel in the years when colleagues from other countries went there to register black stork rings. There are far fewer repeated ring readings from one bird, but they are the most valuable. Direct repetitive observations make it possible to document, for example, the movement of a bird between different nests in different years or to link a wintering site to a nesting site.

The highest number of readings is for a bird ringed in 2006 - 37. The first 36 are all from hibernation sites in Israel. The latter is from Latvia, but the place of nesting is unknown, because the LVM “expert” announced the ringed bird only in 2020, although the observation (with photos) was made only in 2015. At that time, the nest of the alleged bird was already abandoned, most likely due to undisturbed economic activity. Unfortunately, the attitude of other "experts" of this institution is similar. Some rings "don't notice", although they are clearly visible in the photos, while others who control the nests simply do not report. I will not speculate on the reasons.

Probably also lost data on a bird ringed in Estonia or Lithuania that has nested in Latvia. Attempts to look at a possible ringed bird's nest / photograph a bird a year later have so far failed in most cases. The bird may move elsewhere (even very far away) after a failed nesting and may have died. In each case, very valuable data is lost, and every vision of a ringed bird is extremely important to understanding the factors that affect survival, nesting success, and other important aspects of stork biology.

However, this has already been clarified. Almost all 2032 black stork babies ringed in Latvia are weighed and measured. The dead birds and nests in which the ringed birds have not been seen anywhere since have provided valuable knowledge. It is the condition of the babies (weight at a given age) that is the main factor determining their success. It is possible that the role of condition is even greater - feeding in the nest affects the growth of the beak (its length), but from behavioural studies with the help of photo traps there is reason to believe that the length of the beak in males is one of the ranking attributes. In other words, the niche in the nest, even if it survives, will be among those whose partners will be difficult to find. For now, this is the only version that should be checked with more data when it is stored in sufficient numbers. In turn, the analysis of the activity in the vicinity of the nests has shown that

Limited resources (seasonality and resources) do not allow all new birds to be ringed each year. But putting on a ring is a disorder that does not justify itself if it does not make any contribution to knowledge. Therefore, in recent years, we no longer ring in nests where the young have a low probability of survival (lack of food for several years, economic activity near the nest, very fragmented surrounding forest stands). The choice of sockets is also slightly affected by accessibility. In some nests, babies need to be ringed until they are small enough because they are only available on one side. However, there are no inaccessible nests in Latvia. Probably all readers understand that the current webcam socket meets all the prerequisites to put it to rest, even if the babies are there.
marika.solo
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Re: Grāfs and Grāfiene (Sigulda Municipality)

Post by marika.solo »

Notes:

1/ One might say that it is "too human lyrics" on the subject. I agree, but it is no bigger, as for many chattermen and, above all, storks, the relationship is much more human than we can imagine.
2/The first bird was definitely different from the one seen later, because it had a prominent anatomical feature. However, a bird that later visits the nest may "consist of several", as has been repeatedly observed in other nests. None of the mothers who visited the nest have been ringed, and it may not be possible to distinguish the birds from the pictures alone during a short visit.
3/ Those on the YouTube channel are invisible to the world.
4/ Many observers thought that Mom # 4 was the stork lady that nested in 2021 and arrived from Africa too late.
5/ the name given by the observer to (all) the males living in the nest.
6/ This could be ascertained by examining as many birds of a certain age as possible in different years. This is one of my "future" plans, but it takes a lot of useful material and a lot of time to test it. This work has not been done yet.
7/Although it is possible. There is a great deal in bird breeding strategies and partner choices that seem unbelievable or impossible at first. Studies with other avian species, for example, have shown that females of at least some species are able to 'store' the semen of an unpleasant partner and then dispose of it.
8/Bird droppings are a mixture of excrement and urine, where urine makes up the bulk of the mass, so they are liquid.
9/ Di-chloro Di-phenyl Tri-chloroethane, popularly known as dust
10/ Of the more than 100 known.
11/ It is possible that there would be babies in the nest by now
12/ 10 cents per fish with an average weight of 20 grams, the required security in the feeder per day is 2 kg, taking into account the losses and the fact that the feeder is replenished every two days; fuel consumption 0.144 euros per km - fuel consumption for the car 8 l per 100 km, price per liter 1.8 Euro, day trip 100 km; pay for work, assuming that no one can afford to work voluntarily all summer, 10 euros a day on hand, plus all the taxes you have to pay for it, for a period of 120 days from April to the end of July.
13/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bird_ringing
14/Since 1990, 2,031 black storks have been ringed with ordinary rings in Latvia, and 1,838 colored rings have been placed on birds. 2032 birds are ringed in the same way or the other way around. Of the ringed birds, 262 birds, or 12.9% of ringed birds, were later seen alive or found dead (including those that died in nests and found there or under nests in later-year controls). Some birds have been seen repeatedly, many only once, for a total of 814 observations / controls. In only 11 cases was the “informant” the usual ring (0.5% of ringed birds, or 4.2% of registrations).
15/ from 19 to 23 April
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Madli
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Re: Grāfs and Grāfiene (Sigulda Municipality)

Post by Madli »

June 10

I just had to take this screenshot from yesterday evening. I have never seen an adult sit like that in the nest..
Image
marika.solo
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Re: Grāfs and Grāfiene (Sigulda Municipality)

Post by marika.solo »

Madli wrote: 10 Jun 2022, 09:41
Hi Madli,
not very often but we can see also this posture - good capture!

btw. on your pic we see well that they do not sit (when they lower the body), but actually kneel

edit:
bird leg (click for big pic)
Image
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Maria L
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Re: Grāfs and Grāfiene (Sigulda Municipality)

Post by Maria L »

Super zrzut 👍🤩 - bardzo lubię ciekawie uchwycone ujęcia - dziękuję Madli.

Marika - dziękuję za wspaniały tekst zawierający tyle mądrych obserwacji 🌹.
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Madli
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Re: Sigulda Municipality (Grāfs and Grāfiene)

Post by Madli »

A few updates on Grafs:

Grafs visits the nest every day. Mostly he spends the night in the nest and leaves in the morning, comes back in the afternoon.
Occasionally, Grafiene also visits the nest, but not as frequently as Grafs. And by the way, they sometimes still even mate.

Image

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The dead trees don't look very appealing there :cry:
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Madli
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Re: Sigulda Municipality (Grāfs and Grāfiene)

Post by Madli »

June 28

It's interesting to see that even if the couple is not activly nesting this year, they both meet in the nest and their behavior is just like in spring courtship ;)

male is calling for the female.
Image

male sits down, female gently preens him.
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just for fun :lol:
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and more sweet moments.
Image
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Madli
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Re: Sigulda Municipality (Grāfs and Grāfiene)

Post by Madli »

28. June was the last time when Grafs and Grafiene were together in the nest.
29. June Grafs visited for a few hours during the day.
30. June Grafs visited for a few hours during the day.

01. July Grafs visited for a few hours during the day.
02. July Grafs visited for a few hours during the day. He stayed the night.
03. July Grafs left in the morning.
04. July No visits
05. July No visits
06. July Grafiene arrives in the evening, spends the night in the nest.
07. July Grafiene leaves at 04.42, Grafs arrives at 11.21. He leaves at 18.01. Returns late evening to spend the night at the nest.
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Madli
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Re: Sigulda Municipality (Grāfs and Grāfiene)

Post by Madli »

July 7

Grafs in the nest

Image Image Image Image
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