I have received details of two tetrads. I can't remember whether I am to do both of these this spring? Or was the idea that I do one this spring and one in winter or next spring?

There are two components to the Atlas - breeding and wintering. We aim to get every tetrad covered for at least one breeding season and one wintering season during the next three years. It is up to you to decide which to do and when. But there has been a great response to the Atlas and we are trying to get as many tetrads as possible covered during this 2004 breeding season and the winter 2004/05. If you are able to do both of yours, well done and thanks! When you've thought about it, if you decide to postpone doing one of yours until next year, please let the Area Coordinator know; this is so that we don't start chasing you inadvertently, or think that there is a 'gap' and try to recruit another surveyor.

Owls tend to have ceased, or very much reduced calls and "song" by the time of the survey period (April/ May/ June). Should the survey not recommend listening for these species in, say, February/ March?

The survey isn't 'restricted' in time but we don't want records of birds at odd times of year when they're probably not on territory, so April - June is the 'core' period. For some species, that's too early (Hobby, for instance). However, although some owls may well call best in February/ March, the best way of getting confirmed breeding is by finding adults being mobbed in daytime near a nest-hole, usually in May (June for Barn Owls, but most of them are known about by the Barn Owl groups anyway). February would get us lots of calling birds but not many definite breeding records. Also, February is in our defined 'wintering' period!

A landowner in my tetrad doesn't want his site to be publicised: what can I tell him?

The only mapping for the Atlas will be as one dot per tetrad, covering the record(s) for the whole of the tetrad, so individual sites will not be identified. This is all that has ever been done, in the first Cheshire and Wirral breeding bird atlas and elsewhere.

A farmer in my tetrad is asking me about 'biosecurity': what is it?

Especially since the 2001 foot and mouth disease outbreak, the agricultural community has become much more aware of the possibility of disease transmission by humans and vehicles. All surveyors should be prepared to comply with whatever precautions are advised by the farmer. These may include disinfecting footwear and possibly your vehicle. Ask the farmer which disinfectants he wants you to use.

Am I covered by insurance whilst I’m doing the survey work?

All fieldworkers are volunteering to take part in this survey as part of their hobby, and do so at their own risk. CAWOS are not responsible for and do not maintain any of the land that the volunteers will use and therefore cannot be held responsible for any injuries to their members. Surveyors who cause damage to third party property or injury should have cover under their own household insurance for their personal liability.

I can't get along a public footpath because it is blocked. What can I do?

We have agreed with the Public Rights of Way Unit in Cheshire County Council to notify them of any impassable footpaths. Please contact David Cogger (01606 832517; e-mail memsec@cawos.org) with the grid reference. He will pass it on to the Public Rights of Way Unit in Cheshire County Council or the local authorities of Halton, Warrington and Wirral.

The Peak and Northern Footpaths Society campaigns to ‘preserve and defend’ public footpaths and bridleways, and is keen to hear of any such obstruction to these rights of way. A problem report form can be found at their web site at www.peakandnorthern.org.uk.

When can I say that a tetrad has been completed?

This could become like 'How long is a piece of string?'! I would probably define 'completed' to mean 'when all significant habitats have been visited and all species that can reasonably be expected there have been recorded'.

How was the list of species on the paper forms compiled?

They were selected mainly from the last five years of Cheshire and Wirral Bird Reports and listing mostly those species that have bred during that time. One or two that are very rare breeders are not on the printed list. I expect there to be some additions, which is why we have provided several lines for 'write-in' species. The wintering list will obviously be very different.

I walk in my tetrad almost every day. What should I put on the form for ‘dates of your visits’ and ‘total time spent (approx)’?

Just put something like ‘about five times a week throughout the season’ and ‘at least 100 hours’ or whatever. These are not supposed to be exact figures, but obviously someone visiting an area frequently would usually find a higher proportion of the birds present than someone able to make only two visits. It will help in the analysis to have an estimate of the amount of effort put in.

The guidance notes suggest that each tetrad needs only to be surveyed in one of the three years and that any surveying in subsequent years would serve mainly as a year-on-year comparison. I was expecting that visits in subsequent years would help to record species that had been missed in earlier visits, and indeed to cover parts of a tetrad not visited in a previous year.

As a minimum, each tetrad needs only to be surveyed in one of the three years. That is a minimum but tetrads visited in two or three years are welcome. For tetrads visited in more than one year, all of the species will be aggregated across all two or three years, and the highest level of breeding for each species in any of the years will be used.

However, returning in a subsequent year 'to cover parts of a tetrad not visited in a previous year' is definitely not encouraged. This is because of the variation in effort. If some tetrads are visited for all three years and some for only one year, there are ways of trying to calibrate for that variation (which is why surveyors are asked to complete the sections at the top of the recording form on 'dates of visits' and 'total time spent (approx)'). Indeed, one of the ways is by comparing the results in different years from tetrads visited in more than one year. But if only part of a tetrad is visited in one year, and a different part in another year, unless we have details of that, it will be difficult to calibrate. And, with the best will in the world, not everyone would be able to return to a different part of their tetrad in a subsequent year even if they intended to do so.

Cheshire and Wirral’s first breeding bird atlas took seven years of fieldwork. Why is this one only lasting for three years?

The main reason to try to keep the survey as short as realistically possible is that birds can change from year to year, in distribution and population. With some tetrads being covered in different years this could lead to misleading maps. The last breeding bird atlas took far too long, especially because 1978-84 was a time of big change for many birds, with some species declining by a factor of two or more during that time (e.g. Grey Partridge and Tree Sparrow). Of course we didn't know at the time but it was bad luck that that period of major decline happened to coincide with the first Atlas. Whole areas in southern Cheshire were only visited in the last year and absences of some species could well be because of the population decline rather than a true difference in distribution.

BREEDING CODES

There is a rookery just outside my tetrad and I have seen parents feeding young within my tetrad. Should I mark Rook down as RF?

If you are sure that there are no Rooks actually nesting in the tetrad please don't include the record, but submit a supplementary form for the adjacent tetrad just in case they've been missed. This is how we'll handle e.g. colonies of Grey Heron, Sand Martin and so on. Otherwise, the maps over-state the distribution.

What code should I use for ‘drumming’ Great Spotted Woodpeckers?

This is ‘S: Singing male heard, or breeding calls heard’. There are several other ‘breeding calls’ that aren’t normally thought of as song, including the Woodcock’s roding calls, the drumming of a Snipe, a Nightjar’s churring and a Bittern’s booming. Any of these would be really exciting records for the Atlas, of course.

I am getting frustrated in trying to move birds 'up the list' to a higher level of breeding status.

Probably the best advice is to 'give it time'. Early in the season most records will be S, P, D, etc, but later on, adults of most species will stop singing or displaying and move on to alarm-calling, carrying food for their young and so on.

I’m not familiar with the term ‘nidifugous’: what does it mean?

Nidifugous means 'fleeing the nest', so it applies to all species where the young leave the nest before they can fly, such as waterfowl (swans, geese, ducks, Moorhen, Coot, etc), gamebirds (partridges, Pheasant), waders (Lapwing, Oystercatcher, etc).

What breeding status code should I use for waterfowl on water accompanied by small young? The young were very small and following their parents closely: is this NY or RF?

NY is the right code. This applies to any nest where the chicks have not yet flown. RF is for chicks that can fly (Recently Fledged) such as the spotty Robins or fluffy House Sparrows or brown Starlings that you see following their parents and pestering them for food.

RF indicates a nest that must have been successful whereas NE or NY could still fail, so why are they regarded as higher levels of breeding status?

This survey is intended to map the species breeding in each tetrad, but not measuring their success or failure. Some RF chicks, especially Starlings for instance, can actually have moved some distance, quite possibly from an adjacent tetrad, which is why NY is regarded as a higher level of proof of breeding at that site. Flightless swans, geese, ducks, Lapwings etc can often be moved 400-800m (or more) by their parents, as well.

HABITAT RECORDING

A lot of my tetrad is farmland with Hawthorn hedge boundaries. Obviously a Lapwing nesting in the middle of the field is E1 or E4 habitat, but what about a Crow's nest in a single Oak tree in the middle of the field?

The habitat is not the same as the nest-site. A Crow nesting in a tree in the middle of the field is still using habitat E1 or E4.

What is ‘improved’ grassland?

'Improved' grassland is a great misnomer, meaning it has been improved from the point of view of agricultural production by putting vast amounts of fertiliser on it. The grass is typically lush and looks bright green. Unimproved grassland tends to be a yellowish-green colour and is much later coming into full growth. Unfortunately, there is not much unimproved grassland left in Cheshire.

When does suburban become rural? What is the difference between urban and suburban?

This is mostly a matter of judgment for the observer. Isolated dwellings surrounded by
countryside would be classed as rural. The houses on the edge of a fairly small village would probably be rural whereas the houses on the edge of a town would probably be suburban.

In general, urban areas normally have relatively few gardens, and most of their green areas tend to be well-tended and manicured. Remember that ‘urban’ does not just mean occupied dwellings and such areas could be made up of factories, warehouses, etc. No-one is going to quibble over the individual surveyor's assessment of whether it's urban or suburban: he/ she can make up his/ her own mind. If there are any real surprises (maybe a warbler breeding in an urban area?) please add a comment on the record.

Is there a category that covers golf courses?

There is no specific category for golf courses. Look at the area from the bird's point of view. They don't much care who built it, what it's being used for, and so on. To most birds I suspect that a golf course looks like E1, 'improved' (i.e. heavily fertilised, lush growth) grassland. Similarly the ponds, copses and other features within a golf course should be coded as G1, B1 or whatever is appropriate. If there's a lot of records or some significant ones (maybe birds that are only found there and nowhere else) it is very helpful if the recorder can put a note in the comments.

I have several horse paddocks in my tetrad. Would you call them E1 (Improved Grassland) or F3 (Rural Human Sites)?

I'd put paddocks (like golf courses) as E1 because it's more descriptive of what the habitat looks like.

Presumably urban/suburban covers gardens but does it also include parkland, cemetries etc within these areas?

If the parkland/ cemetery etc is big enough that a bird spends all, or almost all, of its time in it, I think the bird doesn't much care that there are buildings on the outside, so I'd put it as woodland or scrubland depending on the state of growth of the trees. On the other hand, if it's a small urban cemetery with little vegetation then it's probably just F1 (urban human site).

How big does a group of trees have to be before being classed as woodland?

Again, look at it from the birds' point of view. If the group is big enough to attract woodland species, then it's probably a wood! But in any case parkland – scattered trees and grassy areas – also is included in the woodland habitat category, so the trees don't necessarily have to be close together.

You say you require records for every habitat in the tetrad but the recording form has only sufficient space for one Breeding Status Code. Do we assume the single highest status found in the square applies to all habitats or try and enter a different code for each habitat?

Please just fill in one breeding code, corresponding to the 'highest level of proof' that you find for the species in the tetrad. In the 'Habitats' column please put as many habitat codes as you like, corresponding to all the different habitat types in which you find the species showing any type of breeding activity. That's why the 'Habitats' column is wide, and the 'Br.' column narrow. For many species there may well only be one habitat type (e.g. there's perhaps only one breeding Mute Swan in the tetrad, say, or all of the birds in the tetrad occupy the same habitat type, which could apply to species that are quite numerous and widespread, maybe Skylark?), but some species will be found in lots of habitat types (especially the passerines near to the start of the systematic list like Robin, Blackbird etc).

DATA SUBMISSION

When I come to submit my records electronically, do you want two submissions (one for the Bird Atlas and one for the CAWOS database) or do we submit only once?

You only need to submit each record once. Everything that goes in for the Atlas will be included in the CAWOS database. Please also use the tetrad name/ number, but feel free to put more specific site information if you wish.

Do I need to submit a Breeding atlas Record Card for each of the two surveys or one combined one showing the best of the two visits?

We only want one record form for the whole season.

Downloads

2005 Breeding instructions (wordfile)

2005 Recording forms
(csv file 43k)

The above 'recording form' should
be downloaded, filled in, saved
and emailed to..

Atlas submissions

Breeding supplementary recording form