Bird Count in Grassland and Woodlot

Variables

Frequency: The frequency refers to number
of times birds came over the region marked with the transect

Wind speed: Was collected in km/h by a phone app and then converted into the
Beaufort scale

Species: Number of different kinds of birds observed

Distance: An estimate of a bird’s distance to the ground directly below it

Hypothesis

If it rains, then more flocks of birds
would gather because worms surface to the top and they are a good source of
food for the birds. I predict that due to the high amounts of rain earlier in
the day that there would be more birds present in big groups on the grassland.

Methods

The experiment was done on grassland and woodlots found on York
University property on September 26, 2016 around 2:45pm.There was a light
drizzle of rain and at the start of the experiment, the temperature was around
15 degrees. A transect was placed on the ground and was 9m long for each replicate.
For each replicate, 5 minutes were allocated for watching above for any birds.
After the 5 minutes, species, frequency of birds and distance were jotted down
and the next replicate was started. The first 5 replicates, were from the
grassland and replicates 6-10 were in the woodlots.

Sources of error

In the data collected, no birds were
counted over each replicate but big groups of birds were seen feeding in the
grasslands. When observing the frequency and birds, we may have been too close
to the transect which may have scared the birds away. Only one type of bird was
seen (seagulls) majority of the time and this may be due to the cooler weather.
The cooler weather would force smaller birds such as sparrows to shelter such
that they can conserve energy.