Abstract
While testing a commercially manufactured wildlife video system, we developed a method for using this technology to monitor continuously the reproductive behaviors of wild birds during the nesting period. Two passerine bird nests, Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis) and Red-winged Blackbird (Agelaius phoeniceus), were monitored using miniature video cameras at the nests. Cameras were connected to a 24-h time-lapse video recorder located up to 18 m from each nest. System installation required approximately 20 min and nests were monitored for 20 and 15 d, respectively. Significant events recorded on videotape included: egg laying, incubation, egg hatching, nestling rearing, fledging, mammalian depredation of inviable eggs after fledging, and reptilian depredation of nestlings prior to fledging. This technology reliably provided a highly detailed, non-intrusive means of observing nesting behavior and predation events equally well during day and night operations and under extreme environmental conditions. Each commercially manufactured video system and associated equipment used in this study cost approximately US $4000.
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