![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/files\/2017\/10\/black_oystercatcher_20.jpg\")
<\/a>Move over Ochre Star, there’s a new keystone species in town<\/p><\/div>\n
The populations of Black Oystercatchers appear to be regulated by their availability of quality nesting sites as well as healthy foraging habitat. This means that they are particularly sensitive to both natural, as well as human disturbances, and I’m sure you can guess which affects their populations more. Vessel wakes at high tide can soak nests and kill young, habitat is often encroached by oceanfront houses, nests are trampled, exotic predators can introduced, and Pollution like oil spills and industrial waste can cause a complete breakdown of the intertidal community on which these birds depend\u00a0(Tessler 2007)<\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n It’s not hard to imagine how something as simple as wake from a large boat could disrupt this nesting site.<\/p><\/div>\n The real value in using the Black Oystercatcher as a sentinel species, is that scientists can gauge the health of the intertidal community following a disaster of some sort. This is accomplished by observing the presence and survival of these birds and their chicks. During events like the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989, Black Oystercatchers are often extirpated from an area, and return of Oystercatchers into the area will often signal to naturalists that prey has not only returned to the area, but that it is no longer dangerously toxic (Tessler 2007)!<\/p>\n A Clever poster<\/p><\/div>\n On the other side of the coin, When Oystercatchers are removed from an area due to nesting habitat loss, it has major ramifications on the intertidal ecosystem. Because Black Oystercatchers feed on grazers, such as limpets and snails, the removal of these birds from an ecosystem allows nearly unchecked growth by the grazers, which means that the algae on which they graze are nearly completely removed from the area. This means a lack of food for other creatures who depend on small bits of particulate matter, as well as loss of breeding and nesting habitat for many smaller invertebrates and fishes (Robinson 2016). This bird plays a key role in the health of our marine ecosystems, and it is no wonder that environmental groups along the coast are pushing for closer studies into all sorts of aspects of the Black Oystercatchers lifestyle, in an effort to gain more baseline data.<\/p>\n For all these reasons, this species is listed as a species of high concern within the United States and Canada, and is a part of Pacific shorebird conservation plans. The Black Oystercatcher is on the Audubon Society\u2019s\u00a0 watch list, and was listed as a Bird of Conservation Concern by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Tessler 2007). It is good to know that our governments are keeping an eye on the Black Oystercatcher, but we as citizens need to be aware as well. That includes supporting habitat protection programs and keeping points of potential oil spills out of our waters. If this sounds like something you are interested in, check out this link and sign the petition!\u00a0https:\/\/dogwoodbc.ca\/campaigns\/no-tankers\/<\/a><\/p>\n Not on our coast, thanks!<\/p><\/div>\n References:<\/strong><\/p>\n Paine, R. T. 1969. A note on trophic complexity and community stability.\u00a0<\/span>The American Naturalist<\/i>\u00a0<\/span>103:<\/i><\/strong>\u00a091-93. Retrieved October 22, 2017 from\u00a0<\/span>https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1086\/282586<\/a><\/p>\n Robinson, B. H. 2016.\u00a0<\/span>Feeding ecology of Black Oystercatcher (Haematopus bachmani) chicks<\/i>. University of Alaska Fairbanks. Masters Thesis. Retrieved on October 22, 2017 from\u00a0<\/span>https:\/\/search.proquest.com\/docview\/1786926216<\/a><\/p>\n Tessler, D. F.,\u00a0Johnson, J. A., Andres, B. A., Thomas, S., & Lanctot, R. B. 2007. Black Oystercatcher (Haematopus bachmani) conservation action plan.\u00a0International Black Oystercatcher Working Group, Alaska Department of Fish and Game, Anchorage, Alaska, US Fish and Wildlife Service, Anchorage, Alaska, and Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences, Manomet, Massachusetts<\/i>. Retrieved October 18, 2017 from http:\/\/www.whsrn.org\/shorebirds\/conservation_plans.html<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Black Oystercatcher is a Keystone Species in the Pacific North West (Tessler 2007). The late Robert T. Paine coined the phrase “keystone species” back in 1969, as a species […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":609,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-659","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/609"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=659"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":791,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659\/revisions\/791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.viu.ca\/biol325\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/a><\/a>