Insufficient Sampling to Identify Species Affected by Turbine Collisions

Area of Science:

• Ornithology
• Wildlife Biology
• Environmental Science

Background:

• Wind energy development is expanding, necessitating effective wildlife impact assessment.
• Accurate fatality monitoring is crucial for understanding avian mortality at wind facilities.
• Current monitoring protocols may not adequately capture the full scope of avian fatalities.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the adequacy of current avian fatality monitoring efforts at North American wind facilities.
• To determine the relationship between sampling effort and the number of avian species detected.
• To identify potential underestimation of impacts on rare and conservation-concern species.

Main Methods:

• Comparative analysis of avian species detection and sampling effort across 50 North American wind facilities.
• Utilized species accumulation curves to assess sampling completeness at two long-term study sites.
• Examined the influence of sampling interval frequency and overall effort on detection rates.

Main Results:

• Facilities with higher sampling effort and shorter monitoring intervals detected more avian species.
• Species accumulation curves at two sites indicated that monitoring had not reached saturation, suggesting undersampling.
• Current monitoring efforts are likely insufficient to detect all avian species killed by turbines.

Conclusions:

• Standard avian fatality monitoring at wind facilities may be inadequate for comprehensive species detection.
• Underestimation of impacts, particularly for rare species, is a significant concern.
• Increased and optimized monitoring efforts are recommended to improve the accuracy of avian mortality assessments.