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RESPONDENT
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Mikhail Soloviev
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SITE NAME
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Verkhnyaya Taimyra River mouth, central Taimyr Peninsula, Russia
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| Contact details
(phone/fax//e-mail//address): |
| (495)9394424 // mikhail-soloviev@yandex.ru // Dept. of Vertebrate Zoology, Biological Faculty, Moscow State University, 119992 Moscow, Russia
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PROJECT DETAILS |
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Project name:
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Wader Monitoring Project on Taimyr
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Start of survey:
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End
of survey: |
Team
size: |
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11.06
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9.08
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5
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WEATHER
CONDITIONS
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| Season phenology: |
average
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Weather conditions: |
| Snow melted on 50% of flat surface in 2006 on 15 June, which was an intermediate date between late melting in 2004 (20 June) and early melting in 2005 (9 June). However, most phenological events in plants and insects occurred in 2006 later than in 2004-2005 due to colder weather in June. Thus, mosquitoes appeared only on 11 July, compared with 5 July in 2004 and 27 June in 2005. Mean daily air temperatures did not exceed +8øC until 5 July, while in two previous years they reached +15øC by 25 June. July temperatures in 2006 did not differ so markedly from the previous years, although the first half of month was slightly colder and the second slightly warmer than in 2004-2005. Number of days with precipitation in June 2006 was notably higher than in 2004-2005, while in July it was close to this parameter in relatively wet season 2005. Accordingly, snowmelt was close to average in 2006, but June was cold and wet , while July - moderately warm and also wet. Extreme weather events were not recorded.
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| Date of 50%
snow-cover: |
15.06
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| Date of ice-break on
rivers: |
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| Date of final loss of
snow: |
4 July
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BIOTIC
CONDITIONS
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| Rodents abundance evaluation: |
low
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Breeding conditions:
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Arctic Foxes did not bred in 2006 in study area (86 sq.km), where 7 inhabited dens were recorded in 2005. Adult Ermine was regularly observed in the camp vicinity from mid June to early August, apparently contributed to destroying of nests of passerine birds. Snowy Owls and Rough-legged Buzzards did not breed in the study area, although adult birds were recorded there during the whole season. Snowy Owls were observed hunting successfully incubating White-fronted Geese. Pomarine Skuas did not breed, while Arctic Skuas nested successfully at a usual for this species very low density. Only 3 nests of Long-tailed Skuas were found in 2006, and all of them failed. Nest of Peregrine Falcon, found with 1 egg on 13 June, contained 4 chicks on 24 July.
Most species of birds in 2006 nested earlier than in 2004 and later than in 2005 in accordance with annual differences in snowmelt timing. Grey Phalaropes reached record high density in 2006 in the floodplain of Bolshoi Island (81,3 nest/sq.km), while numbers of Little Stints, in contrast, were the lowest for 3 years in most habitats. Numbers of Curlew Sandpipers, Pectoral Sandpipers and Ruffs were low in most habitats in 2006. Generally, numbers of common species of birds in principal habitats were intermediate in 2006 between numbers in 2004 and 2005. Noteworthy is the confirmed breeding record of Dotterel in the area.
In spite of low lemming abundance nest success of birds was not low in 2006. Proportion of nests, successfully surviving to hatching, was 63.2ñ4% (n=144) in waders, 53.4ñ6.5% (n=58) in other non-passerine birds and 88.6ñ3.1% (n=105) in passerines, which at least in waders was above values recorded in 2004-2005 when lemming numbers were considerably higher. This, apparently was due to low abundance of Arctic Foxes and skuas. Nest success of ducks and skuas was low, while White-fronted and Red-breasted geese, in contrast, were unusually successful (81.8ñ8.2% (n=22) and 100ñ0% (n=5), respectively). White-fronted Geese were, apparently, capable to protect their nests from skuas, while numbers of Arctic Foxes were low. All 5 nests of Red-breasted Geese found in 2006 were located in the vicinity of a Peregrine Falcon nest, which provided them with the protection against predators.
Breeding success of waders was difficult to evaluate as we did not control fate of individual broods until fledging. However, most broods with individually marked adults disappeared soon after hatching and numbers of wader broods were generally low, which indicated strong predation pressure of skuas on chicks.
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Rodent dynamics:
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| Lemming numbers were low in 2006, following the peak abundance in 2005. Five observers recorded 4 Siberian Lemmings in total during the period of surveys, which is a record low abundance since the start of monitoring project in 1994. On completion of snowmelt, on 30 June, lemming undersnow nests were counted on a transect, located on the slopes of the first river terrace and watershed slopes. A density of 1.25 nest/km was low, although not as small as could have been expected based on the number of rodents recorded in summer (4), given that the nest density was 3.25 per km in 2005 when 725 lemmings were reported during field season by 4 observers.
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Rodent species recorded:
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| Latin | Abundance |
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| Lemmus sibiricus | rare |
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Summary
of fauna studies: |
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