WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:17.206 --> 00:00:23.351
2014 marks the 27th year we've been doing the Stellwagen Christmas Bird Count.

00:00:24.591 --> 00:00:26.364
We are now recording birds.

00:00:26.464 --> 00:00:30.603
I'm recording the time, species, number of individuals, their behavior.

00:00:30.703 --> 00:00:36.276
Are they flying or sitting. Association with
a vessel or marine mammal

00:00:36.376 --> 00:00:40.303
Starting about 4 or 5 years ago we began working on

00:00:40.403 --> 00:00:45.143
the sanctuary's research vessel. This vessel the AUK.

00:00:45.243 --> 00:00:49.787
The sanctuary made it available to us throughout the entire

00:00:49.887 --> 00:00:56.893
Christmas bird count period which is between Dec. 14th and Jan. 5th.

00:00:56.993 --> 00:01:00.532
We had the luxury of being able to pick and choose

00:01:00.632 --> 00:01:02.735
exactly which days we wanted to do it on.

00:01:02.835 --> 00:01:04.835
One of the really nice things about studying seabirds

00:01:04.935 --> 00:01:07.565
is that they are often above water.

00:01:07.665 --> 00:01:10.138
They are one of the first indicators of change.

00:01:10.238 --> 00:01:12.238
We can see them easily and when anything

00:01:12.338 --> 00:01:14.822
in the environment changes they change with it.

00:01:14.922 --> 00:01:16.521
They move to different locations

00:01:16.621 --> 00:01:18.621
their behaviors are different.

00:01:18.721 --> 00:01:21.112
We can almost study them like terrestrial biologist.

00:01:21.212 --> 00:01:23.648
They are a great indicator barometer

00:01:23.748 --> 00:01:26.148
of change in the sanctuary environment.

00:01:31.764 --> 00:01:34.878
As far as I know there are no other

00:01:34.978 --> 00:01:38.600
standardized transect Christmas bird counts

00:01:38.700 --> 00:01:40.818
anywhere in North America.