Wetland Coffee Break: How are water drawdowns affecting nest survival of marsh birds?

Moist-soil management is a wetland management practice that uses spring/summer water drawdowns to promote diverse and abundant plant growth. However, water is a critically important barrier to land-based predators, and in wetlands, vulnerable marsh birds select their nest sites over water for this reason. The problem here is that managed sites implement drawdowns after marsh birds have started nesting and this may be placing them in riskier environments than they selected. Hear about how nest cameras helped researchers to explore the impact of water drawdowns on predator access to and survival of marsh bird nests.

Stephanie Schmidt, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Recorded May 7, 2021.

Stephanie Schmidt earned her bachelor’s degree in zoology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2018. She is currently a graduate student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where she is pursuing her master’s degree in natural resources and environmental sciences. She loves the Midwest and wetland birds.

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