ࡱ> RTQ3 HFbjbjKK .Z)w)wHBl <2  " $ $B b, , , 0 000,   0, 0~0's @~8 ?s0G, ^s0WeBS Local Organiser Advisory Committee: 1st Meeting 19th July 2007 Attendees Chair: Nick Mason (Deben) Attendees: Graham Austin (BTO), Dawn Balmer (BTO), Alex Banks (BTO), Neil Bielby (Central), Neil Calbrade (BTO), Mark Collier (BTO), Richard Hearn (WWT), Gilly Jones (Staffs), Rowena Langston (RSPB), Neil McCulloch (EHS), Heidi Mellan (BTO), Andy Musgrove (BTO), Pete Reay (Devon), Mark Rehfisch (BTO), David Shackleton (Cumbria). 1 Apologies for absence Helen Baker (JNCC), Rhion Pritchard (Caernarvonshire), Bob Swann (Moray), David Stroud (JNCC). 2 Welcome and introductions All attendees of the WeBS Local Organiser Advisory Committee (LOAC) introduced themselves. AM welcomed everyone and gave a brief background to WeBS, which is jointly organised and funded by four partner organisations BTO, WWT, RSPB and JNCC (on behalf of NE, SNH, CCW, EHS-NI). The partners meet as a Steering Group twice yearly to discuss strategy, funding issues, etc. Day to day WeBS work consists of BTO staff interacting with Local Organisers and counters, administering WeBS data, reporting on the counts and providing data as and when requested. One critical issue is maintaining coverage by volunteer counters and hence the role of the WeBS Local Organiser (LO) is crucial. There were currently over 3000 counters marshalled by 160 LOs, although there were 20 LO vacancies. It was acknowledged that the LO role is very varied; no two LOs have exactly the same job. 3 Confidentiality and conflicts of interest Members of the LOAC were asked to note that agenda items marked with an asterisk should be regarded as strictly confidential. The LOAC may add or remove asterisks during the meeting. LOAC members are asked to notify the Chair of any conflict of interest for any particular item and to absent themselves from the discussion, decision or vote for this item as appropriate. 4 Minutes of last meeting This being the first meeting of the LOAC no previous minutes existed. 5 Matters arising This being the first meeting of the LOAC there were no matters arising. 6 Remit of the WeBS Local Organiser Advisory Committee There had not previously been a formal set up for WeBS LOs and counters to make comments. The BTO has a Regional Network Committee (RNC) where BTO Regional Representatives meet to discuss issues relating to surveys. The RNC has no remit over WeBS and so the creation of the LOAC was felt to be valuable. The LOAC should provide an opportunity for the counter network to communicate opinion as to whether WeBS staff are doing things right or wrong. Conversely, staff will be able to explain why some things are done in the way they are. It is far preferable for partners to receive negative comments from a handful of LOs, rather than have hundreds of counters leave without having had a forum to express dissatisfaction. The LOAC is, however, an advisory committee. It has no remit to make decisions, especially concerning funding and spending issues (which is the role of the WeBS Steering Group). Its role is instead to advise and provide ideas and feedback. All members of the LOAC agreed that their contact details should be made available to all LOs to enable comment and feedback to be channelled to the LOAC. Action Point: Contact details of all LOs on LOAC to be distributed to all other LOs to allow for communication with LOAC. The minutes of LOAC meetings will be passed to the WeBS Steering Group and vice versa, and it is intended that both sets of minutes be posted on the WeBS website ( HYPERLINK "http://www.bto.org/webs" www.bto.org/webs). Paper copies will be sent to LOs who do are not online. The wider WeBS counter network will be informed of the LOAC in the next WeBS News. Action Point: Minutes of LOAC meetings to be passed to WeBS Steering Group, posted on WeBS website and brought to attention of all LOs and (via WeBS News) the wider counter network. The initial membership of the LOAC was selected in part by geographical location, with four from England, two from Scotland, and one each from Wales and Northern Ireland. In trying to maintain a wide geographic spread the hope is that every LO will have someone reasonably local to them on the LOAC. The role of LOAC members was to act as a conduit for counter/LO opinion in their region, and not to undertake work that was the responsibility of the full-time WeBS staff (e.g. chasing other LOs for late count data, etc). The frequency of LOAC meetings was discussed, with the main options being for one or two meetings per year. The possibility of having two meetings a year to start with then cutting them down to an annual meeting was discussed. Overall, the consensus was that initially at least, meetings should be more frequently than once per year, with an aim of cutting back to once per year when more settled. Should any major issues come to the attention of LOAC members, however, they should be sent to HM immediately and these can be distributed more widely around LOAC members in advance of the next meeting if appropriate. An email will be sent to Committee members two weeks before each meeting to see whether there are any issues that need to be discussed. Action point: Any major issues to be sent to HM immediately. Action point: Issues for discussion to be canvassed at least two weeks in advance of each meeting. 7 New committee members It was decided that there should be eight Committee members plus a Chair. Potential new recruits were discussed. If anything needs to be put to a vote only the Committee members will be able to vote, BTO staff will only advise, and the Chair will have the casting vote. It was also decided that committee members should be replaced on a staggered rotation. Two members will step down after the second year and two more every year after that. The Chair will be replaced every three years and the new chair will be chosen from the current Committee members. Local Organisers will be approached about joining the committee but a good geographical spread should be maintained. If no suitable replacements can be found the LOAC members terms can be extended. Action point: All WeBS Local Organisers should be approached about whether they might be interested in joining the LOAC at some point in the future. 8 Counter Network Although there are about 3000 known WeBS counters, there is constant change in the network. Moreover, it is felt that there may be many counters whose existence is unknown to the WeBS office, and it would be helpful to maintain as complete as list as possible. The size and dedication of the volunteer counter network is widely envied across other parts of the world, especially away from northern Europe. The ability to recruit and retain counters varies widely between different LOs, some finding it difficult to locate new counters whilst others have few problems. Potential ways of improving recruitment and retention were discussed and included: Attracting new members WeBS staff to visit areas with low counter coverage to give talks to help raise awareness/interest. Approach new distribution atlas participants to see if they would like to join WeBS (after atlas ends). Use Bird Track to find new counters. Advertise in local birding newsletters and magazines Advertise at local Bird Club meetings Sell a half day birding with a Local Organiser on EBay or offer such as a prize in school fair etc(!) Use university students to count sites as they can put volunteer work on their CVs Use discussion groups online to advertise for counters. Give out business cards at talks, bird clubs etc Make clear how enjoyable WeBS counts are! Retaining counters Start new counters off by pairing them with an experienced counter Give them smaller sites to help them gain confidence before moving to larger sites Give additional guidance about counting large flocks of birds. Give regular feedback. Generally it was felt that while we would like to recruit younger counters their work/family commitments dont always give them enough time to make a full commitment to the scheme. People who have retired are more able to give time to counting. It was also felt that LOs with a large number of sites/counters might not have the time to prioritise recruitment and that perhaps selecting an Assistant Local Organiser might be helpful. It was stressed that all sites are valuable even if they are not counted regularly. All data are useful even if they reveal an absence of birds at a site. Training was discussed and it was generally felt that it would be a good idea to trial the offer of training (count techniques, identification, use of optics, etc) as a way to recruit more members and also to assess their abilities. It would be beneficial to use a mixture of full-time WeBS staff and volunteers on these courses. 9 Website and WeBS Online Andy Musgrove gave a presentation about the new WeBS website and WeBS Online. It was acknowledged that a few people registering with WeBS Online had experienced problem mostly due to slight differences between the address that they had entered and the address we had on file for them. Additionally, for some counters we do not have up-to-date information on which sites they count. Such problems are straightforward to address if counters to contact the WeBS office to report the problem. Local Organisers can input data for any site within their region and counters can ask for access to extra sites as required. If LOs enter data on someone elses behalf they can enter the counters name in the notes section. Suggestions on improving the site: Making it possible to tab down the species list instead of going across the page Making it possible to duplicate date etc over several counts so that you dont have to type it in for every count. Making it possible for counters to add Dippers, raptors, etc so they dont have to keep additional records. Either set up everyone in a region for every site they might possibly visit or make it possible for Local Organisers to set up their counters. The potential for links between WeBS Online and Birdtrack was discussed. The major difficulty at present was the lack of clearly defined boundaries for sites within Birdtrack. It was stressed that LOs will either be able to see all the counts for their region online or updates will be sent to LOs without online facilities. To ensure that site boundaries remain the same each year, maps for sites that counters or LOs have access to are available online corrections to any of these maps are very welcome. If a Local Organiser finds that a count has been entered incorrectly it can be edited only if it is a recent entry. If the data have been validated (put forward to be used in the annual report) then the WeBS office needs contacting directly to make the alteration. It was felt that using WeBS Online makes the data accessible far more quickly than by sending in the forms. Online data are available immediately whereas the forms are analysed following receipt at the end of the count year (June). Encouraging LOs/Counters to us WeBS Online will make it easier for county recorders to get up-to-date data for local reports etc. It was recognised that some people might have been put off WeBS Online at first sight but WeBS staff are happy to tweak the system if feedback is provided. Also, once the new Atlas is online, time will be available for further development. However, if counters do not wish to use WeBS Online then they should not be made to feel pushed the first priority is to maintain and enhance coverage, whether by paper or online. The issue of double-counting of birds, especially between adjacent sectors on large estuaries, was discussed. With paper forms, LOs would tend to remove double-counts to ensure site totals were correct. The possibility was discussed that it might be possible to allow counters or LOs to flag certain counts as likely double-counts using WeBS Online. With WeBS Online it is now possible to download a regions counts to give to local bird report authors. However, if the counts have not been fully validated it is possible that some mistakes might slip through. Therefore, report authors need to add a note in their reports saying something along the lines of These data are based on WeBS data but they have not been fully validated for official WeBS data please contact the WeBS Office at BTO. 10 Next distribution atlas DB gave a short presentation setting out the aims and objectives of the forthcoming distribution atlas project, covering four winters (Nov-Feb) and four breeding seasons (Apr-Jul) and beginning in Nov 2007. The two separate recording methods (Timed Tetrad Visits and Roving Recorders) were described. WeBS data will be used as roving records to feed into final atlas maps. However, it was not possible to satisfactorily come up with a method to enable a WeBS count and a TTV to be carried out simultaneously. It was envisaged that many counters would do both surveys consecutively on a single visit (or by stopping the clock within the TTV). WeBS counters could also help by looking for evidence of breeding when carrying out counts in spring and summer. It was hoped that the atlas could act as a source of new recruits for WeBS at the end of the four-year project. 11 Reports from partners WWT RH discussed the WWT/JNCC Goose and Swan Monitoring Programme, which involves a mixture of volunteer and professional counters providing data complementary to those gathered through WeBS, as well as productivity information. Forthcoming WWT surveys included: Greenland Barnacle Goose (March 2008) Scottish Greylag Goose counts (August 2008, perhaps extended and ideally to cover all Scotland). Naturalised Goose survey (possibly to run in 2009, last done in 2000). Winter swan census (2010.) RSPB RL explained how the RSPB uses WeBS for a whole range of subjects, especially specific casework on designated sites. Port expansion proposals are prime examples of where WeBS data are used to provide baseline data. The Countryside Rights of Way Act legislation is being extended to the coast in the next few years, and WeBS data will be relevant to ensure disturbance to waterbirds is minimised. In addition, many counters and LOs are RSPB staff. BTO MR gave a short summary of some non-WeBS waterbird work being carried out at BTO, including assessments of the effects of non-native waterbirds across the world, the effects of climate change on non-breeding waterbirds, the value and precision of aerial survey techniques for monitoring offshore birds, and the measurement of waterbird turnover at wetlands, the latter using a combination of counters and ringers (initially being trialled at the Stour & Orwell Estuaries). 12 Data requests MC outlined the WeBS data request system. Requests were very numerous, in excess of 250 in the previous year. These come from a variety of sources, including WeBS partner staff, environmental consultancies, students and researchers, bird clubs and counters. The data request service is carefully standardised to ensure consistent outputs are sent to all users of the data. It is hoped that WeBS Online will increase access to WeBS data by partners, counters and bird reports editors. Interpretative issues are always very important to consider, as WeBS is a highly complex survey that has evolved over time. Therefore, it is important that for all commercial uses of WeBS data, and for any that are likely to be contentious and/or sensitive, data should be provided direct from the WeBS Office to ensure consistency and to avoid misinterpretation. 13 Stratification of WeBS MR explained how WeBS was excellent at what it already covers (mostly larger sites) but coverage was much poorer for other habitats, such as open coast, rivers, small pools. As a result, analyses of data might not fully reflect the situation on these other habitats, with an unknown proportion of the populations of a number of species not being counted. WeBS staff have started trying to address this issue, with an inventory of UK waterbodies being created and initial assessments of the proportions of different sized waterbodies being covered. In the future, it is intended that WeBS would try to aim for a more representative coverage of all wetland habitats, to enable indices and population estimates to be as accurate as possible. Clearly, however, coverage of the major sites will always be a priority. Initial possibilities could be more regular coverage of the Non-estuarine Coastal Waterbird Survey (NEWS) sections (at least once annually rather than every nine years) 14 Any other business Several items initially raised had been covered in discussion of other agenda items. 15 Date and place of next meeting The next meeting of the WeBS LOAC would take place at the Nunnery, Thetford, provisionally on 24th or 31st January 2008. 79D Y [ u v   Q   +4Sa &&&(|))44,8E8F8J8=:B:< <==IAcA>ESEEE.F0F6F8FGFHF *\H*\6]6\\60JjU jUaJ5 5H*\5\J5DEOPj/0LMxy Z [ u v $ ;^`;a$$ a$$a$HF   Q R '(./QR~]^ $ a$  ^$ ;^`;a$RS  DE:;R F |  $ a$ !^!!!!!"L"""""##$$I%J%&&&&(({)|)) $ a$))f**c+d+,,,,b-c-m.n.00112244445577*8$ a$*8+8,8E8F8J8K8,9-9O9v99 :<:=:B:C:<< < <=====l?m?HA$ a$HAIAcAdACCDDETEUEEEEEGFHF$ a$,1h. 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