Frequency of Bird Sightings in Danby Woodland

On September 28th from 3:30-5:30pm, a field experiment was conducted in the Danby Woods of York Uiversity. Weather conditions were cloudy, grey, drizzling, and wind chill around 18 degrees Celsius. The grassland was a field with overgrown grass and plantlife and few tress. The woodland was densely populated with trees and mosty covered by leaves in the air space. An hypothesis set for this experiment is that we would observe more birds in open space grassland than in the woodlot due to the lack of trees and other structures in the way. This dataset shows the frequency of birds sighted within a 3 minute interval at a transect in both habitats. Each habitat has 5 transect trials where along each trial we observe variables such as wind speed and distance from transect line. In this data set, there was a spotting of Blue Jays, Cyanpsitta cristata) more frequently than sparrows and seagulls. Also there are more bird sightings in total in the grassland than in the woodland as hypothesized. With each new trial, the 30m transect line was moved to a position between 10-15 m away from the previous position. At a distance of 3 m (horizontally) to the north and south of the line (6m total) was our observational field, disregarding height from transect to bird in the air. Movement in the woodland was restricted to 5-10 meters due to the obstruction of trees. At each observation the birds were counted as they flew within the 30mx6m observational field or perched on a tree as seen in the woodlands. Also considered was the wind speed via Beaufort Scale, distance along the transect, distance from the transect and thhe number of birds sighted. Because a belt transect was used in this experiment, it is possible to cover a larger area in a short time. This allows the experimenter to learn more about the proper use of transects as well as random sampling in observing an abundance of organisms. Lab performed with group members Felicia O., Richer L., Dylan C.,Brandon B. split into teams.