The population of American dippers in the Black Hills is a species of greatest conservation need in South Dakota, and my research is focused on understanding how we can better support them. Based on relative abundance data from eBird, dippers in the Bighorns seem to be thriving. This makes them an especially valuable comparison population, so right now, I’m in the Bighorn Mountains hoping to learn what might be contributing to their apparent success.
We didn’t have to wait long for things to get interesting. We arrived yesterday evening and quickly located our first nest! Today, we were able to capture and band both of the adults. I consider it a great start to data collection.
The Black Hills birds have been the focus of my work for a while now, but having a comparison system like the Bighorns provides a valuable opportunity to put those observations into context. Over the next two weeks, we’ll be surveying streams, locating nests, and banding birds so we can directly compare ecological and physiological differences between populations.
As we continued scouting along the creek, we picked up signs that this system could be quite productive. We documented at least two additional adults and two juveniles, suggesting that breeding activity is already well underway throughout the area.
Stay Tuned: It’s still early days here, but the signs are encouraging.
If our first day was any indication, it’s going to be a busy and productive couple of weeks. I’ll do my best to share more updates as the work continues, hopefully with many more nests (and birds) to report.
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