History of Shorebird Monitoring

While shorebird monitoring began at some sites as early as the 1960’s, national shorebird monitoring in Australia started in 1981, with the Australasian Wader Studies Group’s Population Monitoring Program. The data generated from these counts is one of the most important datasets for shorebirds in Australia.

Main achievements

• Identified shorebird areas of international importance
• Mapped shorebird distribution and abundance
• 15,000 visits to over 5,800 locations when program funded from 1981-1985
• Regular counts at 29 sites for the last 27 years
• Some analysis of population trends

Limitations

There were a number of limitations with the Population Monitoring Program that have made it difficult to assess population trends for key species. These include:

1. Lack of site continuity – sites were not always counted in all years
2. Inconsistent methods, and area coverage – counts were not always done in the same way at each location over time, and counters did not always cover the same area within a site from year to year, meaning results could not be compared over time
3. Sampling not geographically representative – few counts done in remote inland or northern Australia
4. Data not made readily available to planners and site managers
5. Less areas being visited over time, and fewer counters
6. Limited data management – all of Australia’s data on shorebirds is not in one place, and inconsistent data management over the years has left a large data set that needs significant corrections