Dataset for: Utilizing high-resolution genetic markers to track population-level exposure of migratory birds to renewable energy development

With new motivation to increase the proportion of energy demands met by
zero-carbon sources, there is a greater focus on efforts to assess and
mitigate the impacts of renewable energy development on sensitive
ecosystems and wildlife, of which birds are of particular interest. One
challenge for researchers, due in part to a lack of appropriate tools, has
been estimating the effects from such development on individual breeding
populations of migratory birds. To help address this, we utilize a newly
developed, high-resolution genetic tagging method to rapidly identify the
breeding population of origin of carcasses recovered from renewable energy
facilities and combine them with maps of genetic variation across
geographic space (called ‘genoscapes’) for five species of migratory birds
known to be exposed to energy development, to assess the extent of
population-level effects on migratory birds. We demonstrate that most
avian remains collected were from the largest populations of a given
species. In contrast, those remains from smaller, declining populations
made up a smaller percentage of the total number of birds assayed. Results
suggest that application of this genetic tagging method can successfully
define population-level exposure to renewable energy development and may
be a powerful tool to inform future siting and mitigation activities
associated with renewable energy programs.