Chris Merkord

Indeed, CITES listings and findings on permit applications could not be made without this knowledge.

Well said!

Building up your network of colleagues is also important when you start applying for jobs.  It's nice to have other people in the field who you can ask questions of when developing application materials or trying to find out more about a potential employer.

We welcome comments, but just to keep them all in one place, please post them on the blog version of this article.

We fixed a problem that prevented some of you from downloading the RFP linked to above. If you had trouble yesterday, try again now. You do have to be signed in to download it.

Consequently, I encourage any member of the ornithological community who has given serious thought to the issue of a new SfO to post his or her questions, concerns, and/or preferences on the Ornithological Exchange and/or to send them directly to committee members for consideration.-- Mercedes

Great idea Mercedes! To make it easier to provide feedback on the SFO planning process, we've created a new forum just for that purpose.

Photos from the meeting were posted here on Google Plus: https://plus.google.com/photos/111868492024708616895/albums/5707869102110312913

So, birds should avoid having brood size? How do they do that?

I think they mean that juveniles from larger broods (more nestlings) had lower survival than those from smaller broods. Although according to the results the effect was small.

Related items:

• Article: AOU and Other Societies to Evolve Into New Society for Ornithology
  
• Download: AOU 20XX Annual Meeting Presentation.pdf
  
• Topic: Comments about the Society for Ornithology
  

An article about the proposal was published in the magazine BirdWatching:

AOU president-elect describes proposed new American ornithological society

Posted Thu, Oct 6 2011 10:25 AM by Matt Mendenhall

Additional comments have been posted on the Comments about the Society for Ornithology forum topic, and it is possible to comment on the AOU 20XX Annual Meeting Presentation download, so be sure to check both of those places if interested in the subject (and who isn't?).

You can download a PDF of the paper, courtesy of co-author Mike Reed, here:

http://ornithologyexchange.org/forums/files/file/5-lattin-et-al-2011-feather-cort/

Summary

1. The capture of birds using mist nets is a widely utilized technique for monitoring avian populations. While the method is assumed to be safe, very few studies have addressed how frequently injuries and mortalities occur and the associated risks have not been formally evaluated.

2. We quantified the rates of mortality and injury at 22 banding organizations in the United States and Canada and used capture data from five organizations to determine what kinds of incidents occur most frequently. Analyses focused on passerines and near-passerines, but other groups were included. We evaluated whether body mass, age, sex, mist net mesh size, month and time of day or frequency of capture are related to the risk or type of incident. We also compared the recapture histories over time between birds that were injured and those that were never injured for 16 species.

3. The average rate of injury was 0·59%, while mortality was 0·23%. Birds captured frequently were less at risk to incident. Body mass was positively correlated with incident and larger birds were at greater risk to predation, leg injuries, broken legs, internal bleeding and cuts, while smaller birds were more prone to stress, tangling-related injuries and wing strain. Rates of incident varied among species, with some at greater risk than others. We found no evidence for increased mortality over time of injured birds compared with uninjured birds.

4. We provide the first comprehensive evaluation of the risks associated with mist netting. Our results indicate that (1) injury and mortality rates below one percent can be achieved during mist netting and (2) injured birds are likely to survive in comparable numbers to uninjured birds after release. While overall risks are low, this study identified vulnerable species and traits that may increase a bird’s susceptibility to incident that should be considered in banding protocols aimed at minimizing injury and mortality. Projects using mist nets should monitor their performance and compare their results to those of other organizations.