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Telemetry Research:
Long-tailed Ducks
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Long-tailed Duck. Photo courtesy Wolfgang Wander, Wikimedia. (View full size image on Wikimedia) |
The Cape Wind energy project proposes to put 130 wind turbines in Nantucket Sound on Horseshoe Shoal. As part of the federal environmental review for this project, Mass Audubon has been studying the use of the Sound by waterfowl. Nantucket Sound is the winter home for large numbers of sea ducks, particularly Long-tailed Duck (Clangula hyemalis), all three North American scoters, and Common Eider.
Each day at dawn, hundreds of thousands of Long-tailed Ducks (LTDU) exit the Sound and commute to feeding sites on Nantucket Shoals and return to roosting sites in the Sound at dusk. However, prior to our studies, it was not known where in the Sound the LTDUs were roosting.
In particular, we needed to know whether Horseshoe Shoal is used by large numbers of LTDUs as a nighttime roosting site or staging area as they exit or return to the Sound. If the answer to this question is yes, then the LTDUs are potentially at risk of collision with wind turbines when the ducks enter, exit, or otherwise move within the project area.
Between 2003 and 2006, Mass Audubon staff conducted extensive aerial surveys of the Sound during daylight hours when the vast majority of LTDUs are absent from the Sound. Then, beginning in winter 2007-2008, Mass Audubon staff, in partnership with USGS, began using satellite telemetry to gather information on nighttime roosting locations for Long-tailed Duck in Nantucket Sound.
During our first two winter seasons we surgically implanted satellite transmitters into twenty-two LTDUs and plotted their locations in and around Nantucket Sound.
LTDU research information from USGS
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