St. Johns and Flagler Shorebird Partnership Pre-season Meeting Agenda March 24 th, 9AM 12PM Alligator Farm, St. Augustine 10:00: Sign 9:00: Introductions All We had 21 meeting participants!: Peggy Cook- St. Johns Audubon Sue Killeen- Volunteer with FWC and Anastasia State Park, St. Johns Audubon member Brittany McDermott- Anastasia State Park, Park Services Specialist Diane Reed- GTMNERR volunteer Jess Rodriguez- FWC Ocala, Volunteer Coordinator Anna Deyle- FWC Ocala, Assistant Regional Species Conservation Biologist Alex Kropp- FWC Ocala, Regional Species Conservation Biologist Tara Dodson- Saint Johns County, Beaches Mike Golubovich- Saint Johns County, Beaches Doug Brace- Saint Johns County Sheriff s Office, Natural Resource Deputy Kevin Roberts- Saint Johns County Sheriff s Office, Natural Resource Deputy Frank Quinn- President of Flagler Audubon Jean Rolke- President of St. Johns Audubon Richard Cullen- Volunteer Chris Farrell- Audubon Florida, Policy Associate for NE Florida (taking over from Stephanie Nagid) Kurt Foote- National Parks Service, Ft Matanzas NM Marge Rooyakkers- Volunteer, located in Flagler County Joanne Samuelson- Volunteer Linda Avery- Volunteer, St. Johns Audubon Jason DePue-Florida Park Service Allegra Buyer- Florida Park Sevice, new exotic plant biologist 9:10: Pre-season summaries by partners All (5-10 minutes each) GTMNERR Diane Reed Lia Sansom will continue to enter the data, Diane will continue to monitor this route.
No nesting shorebirds here for the last several years. Porpoise Point Tara Dodson, Sue Killeen Sue went out for the count window this week- a lot of car tracks behind the signs and human trackshad an issue the other day with dogs off leash in the dunes. Has had a lot of erosion. A lot of wash-over over the course of the last several months. Mike and Tara saw two WIPLS, some BLSK, and one LETE there yesterday (3/23/15). Some high and dry beach on the point. A large slough running through the center portion- part of the posted area last season. The gates are open 24-7 right now, tracks from cars could be from cars driving there at night. Sue can cover this route again. ICW/Julia s Island? Peak downy LETE count of 15 last year, peak feathered count last year 9, peak flight capable juvenile count 22 (not sure if all of those really came from Julia s Island). Our FWRI folks did some surveys there. I think Stefanie Nagid did some as well. Alex thinks The Fish and Wildlife Research Institute (FWRI) posted it last year. *Need volunteers with boats for stewarding Lia Sansom can do surveys there this year. Post meeting update: FWRI staff will be doing surveys here once a week this year, Lia Sansom will also do surveys. FWRI staff will coordinate posting of the island for this year. Anastasia State Park Jason DePue, Sue Killeen Jason- FWC was heavily involved to make sure weekly counts on the LETE colony were done last year. A lot of great shorebird stewards! Law enforcement- Tara s group came out a number of times- no incidents that he knows of. Put cones up on the escarpment so no one would fall off of it. First count of the active LETE colony for 2014 was on May 7 th with a count of 59 nests. Peak nest count of 178 on May 28 th. Peak flight capable juvenile count of 86 on June 26 th. *The largest flight capable LETE count on the entire east coast of Florida last year. 124 young counted total- a record year- the most yet. Concerned about what will happen this year- vegetation, sea oats, in the former colony area at the south end of the park. But are areas all around it that are more open and less vegetated- so the birds may choose to go a little bit north this year, perhaps to the area where people access the beach. There is also a nice area all the way on the north side of the park that has been accreting that would be a good place for them to nest.
The north end of the park hasn t looked this good since 2007/2008 when there were peak counts of 170 nests on south end and 150 nests on north end. If they split up into smaller colonies across the park they may not be as productive as if they were in 1 big group- so that would be a kind of scary scenario. No issues with predation last year- park staff trapped behind the dunes prior to nesting season as they always do. A lot of house cats at Pope Road parking area. Downside to nesting on the north end- if a person comes up in a boat and runs through the colony- or there is some other type of disturbance it s not as visible and we may not see it or know about it. Sue and Jason will coordinate route surveys again. We will pre-post signs (probably not twine) at both the south end and the north end today. WIPLs- a good year. At least 3 nests within the LETE colony all successful- one we lost track of a little bit. This year we will put poles on the back side of the colony and mark with numbers or at least flag individually- so it makes it easier to count the colony. If end up stewarding at the north end- how will stewards take their equipment up there? Plus they will have to be scheduled around the tides because you can t drive all the way up there during high tide. Park staff can coordinate with stewards and get them up to the north end with carts at the park. Brittany can coordinate this and work directly with Sue. At least four groups of WIPLs 2 weeks ago on the 16 th or 17th- and several territorial males going at it at the north end. Sue and Jason will do route surveys today to hit the March count window. The park has hired USDA to trap using soft leghold traps. *Merge routes 1 and 2 into one route, keep route 3 as a separate route (sometimes we don t have time to run it). 10 mile stretch between ASP and FMNM Tara Dodson, Jade Dupuis, others? Peggy, Jade, and Tara did this last year (drove on the beach) and hit all 6 count windows. Didn t see any nesting birds. Tara and Jade can cover this route again. A Street to fort Matanzas- then A street to Pope Road- a 14.5 mile stretch. Need to set up a new route of the full thing?
Fort Matanzas NM and CWA Kurt Foote, Peggy Cook Susan Bergman and Kurt s assistant Candace also assist with surveys. Their first official survey will be this afternoon at 1:30pm. LETE- according to Whitney s summary from the database the other day- 9 nests (Kurt s records say 10), 12 flight capable juveniles (Kurt s records say 15)- Kurt will double check his records. 1/3 rd of nesting habitat is gone- has eroded away. In 2014 there were: 10 instances of human trespass in the colony, 8 of dogs (tracks documented) Raccoons on 5 different occasions Live trapping didn t catch anything-one of the traps was vandalized beyond repair March 12 th of this year- 11 WIPLs cuddling up to each other. Huge high tide the other day up into the dunes. Kurt and Peggy- will survey Ft Matanzas and Rattlesnake Island again this year. Summer Haven Tara Dodson, Linda Avery Linda was there last Friday or Saturday to run the March count window route and observed extreme wash-overs. Almost the entire colony area is being washed over by the ocean right now. The north end looks promising- but last year and the year before the birds kept choosing the slough area at the south end. About 6 Wilson s there the other day-not anywhere near a good site for them to nest. John Troup can t volunteer this year. Greg Lepera is sometimes available, but not always. North end seems a little bit drier, south end is definitely wet. Pre-post or wait? Linda- thinks she would wait a little while to see where the birds set up. Linda- check for another volunteer or two to run the route with her this year (Jess will look for volunteers). Marge Rooyaker, new volunteer in Flagler County will volunteer with Linda and Linda will train her up on how to monitor. *Make sure Linda has a GPS to get GPS location of any WIPL nests this year. Post Meeting Update: We will be pre-posting a smaller area than years past at Summer Haven in the next couple of weeks.
Other St Johns Routes: Tolomato River: FWRI? Gaps in routes- north of where Diane is covering and some south of it. Tara- turtle patrol is out there every single morning- they complete a datasheet every morning- Alex we would love it if they could fill out a datasheet on that northern end of St Johns County for us. Melanie Cavanough- Tara can get us in touch with her. A gap from Summer Haven to the county line- Beth Liger does turtle patrol there- there might be WIPLs in that area. Flagler County Ground Sites and Routes Laura Ostapko, others? Frank Quinn (President of Flagler of Audubon): GRSP Restoration Area- new construction- trying to get it back to a marsh status, continue mitigation. That marsh area has a lot of flooding- probably not a good nesting site. Jason DePue: Recommends we remove the route from the FSD because it is a marsh (not suitable for shorebird nesting). NP_GR State Park Route- Frank and Jason can run the route- Jason will coordinate the route. Have seen 70 or so willets on the beach before with more than half of those juveniles- must be nesting somewhere (most likely the marshes nearby). Keep it as a Flagler County route in the FSD. WOGSP#1 Route- not a very good nesting area with coquina rock outcroppings and vertical shore. Won t find nesting birds. Jason DePue will cover- usually runs on the way back from ASP, Joe Woodberry person on site-just have to get manager approval for him to be out there. *Missing beach coverage- Marineland to Washington Oaks. Extend Summer Haven route and make it longer (an extra half mile or so) and get Linda Avery a helper or two? T Flagler and St. Johns Rooftop Sites: Rooftop Monitors Flagler County Rooftops: Frank- LETE observed on 3 rooftops although none appeared to be successful -2 failed early- Laura Ostapko said that the remaining rooftops should be retired- no longer suitable for nesting- will draft an email to FWC about this. Publix at Belle Ter- Laura Ostapko can still do House at 2083 N central in flagler beach- Debbie Black and Marianne Andreychak will monitor it Ocean Palm Villas at Flagler Beach- Laura will monitor with Jill Dempsey St Johns County Rooftops: St John s County Jail- Sue Killeen- it was very successful last year. They are doing a 1ply roof- can t put gravel on it- they are re-roofing it. Tara has been telling them- you have to push the reroof now or wait. Can t do it while there are birds nesting there. Alex will probably go up there with Tara before they start the construction.
Tara- Have added wording to the land development guidelines for St Johns County about considering rooftop nesting shorebird colonies before reroofing buildings. But need some sort of alternative to gravel and asphalt roofs because they are not very energy efficient. Law Enforcement Activities County Natural Resource Deputies and FWC LE HCP deputies- keep a daily log of what time they visit these sites and whether they have any violations. They then forward that information to Kevin Roberts or Sgt Briggs, then forward to Tara or Jade. Numbers of violations were fairly low last year given how often they were present at these sites- a good reflection on their visibility. Only had to write one citation- everything else was first time offenders- written warnings or verbal warnings. They keep a record of names for first incident- if the person is contacted again in the futurethey take it to the next level (write a citation). They will provide weekly logs this year like they did last year. Leash law- dogs can be off-leash if in water below low tide line- difficult for us to determine where low tide line is- as a dog owner it is hard to keep your dog in that area- you are responsible for the dog, as soon as the dog comes out of water you are subject to being contacted by LE. Dog must be under your physical control. The St Augustine Beach police department has a fulltime officer available now, so they will have more presence at Anastasia State Park this year. No FWC LE were in attendance at this meeting. Impromptu Agenda Items: Stewarding needs: Anastasia State Park, Summer Haven, Julia s Island- Stefanie coordinated stewards on busy holiday weekends last year (4 th of July) Chris Farrell- may have Audubon volunteers who want to help out Summer Haven stewards- Frank can do some stewarding and try to get some Boy Scouts involved a little bit A stewardship training for St Johns- the week of Monday, April 27 th. Could be during the week, weekend, or evening during week. This Doodle poll is located here: http://doodle.com/t887bp9y6eykmprf and is open until 5pm on Wednesday, 4/1. We might do a monitoring training as well. To do a data entry training you need a computer lab- or everyone brings a laptop with wifi. Could this be done in the picnic area at Anastasia State Park?
Who is going to coordinate the stewards? Chris Farrell- will send out email to his volunteer lists from the past. He can coordinate stewards for weekends and holidays for sites that need it. He can coordinate with Sue and Brittany for stewards at Porpoise Point and ASP. He can coordinate with Peggy Cook for Matanzas. Chris will take the lead on coordinating stewards at Summer Haven and Julia s Island. Also coordinate with Jess Rodriguez for volunteers. Jess is looking into setting up an online calendar on the Google group to coordinate stewarding. Sue can train new stewards for Summer Haven. Chris can send them her way. Sue and Peggy have vests for stewards. 10:20: Data summaries from 2014 Alex Alex had to skip this because we ran out of time. The PDF of this presentation has been sent out with the meeting minutes. 10:40: BREAK 10:50: Sign up for routes and rooftops - All St. Johns routes/roofs Flagler routes/roofs See above notes under pre-season summaries. We did this with the summaries. 11:30: Quiz on Monitoring Protocol Anna See the attached PDF document of the quiz that was sent out with the meeting minutes. 11:45: Wrap-up 12:00: Lunch 1:30: Optional: Meet at Anastasia State Park to pre-post north end