Łukasz Krajewski
Ornis Polonica 2016, 57: 1–11
https://doi.org/10.12657/ornis.2016.1.0
Abstract: This study aimed to investigate habitat preferences of the Citrine Wagtail breeding at the Biebrza fen mires by comparing characteristics of the species breeding sites with those of randomly selected plots. Citrine Wagtails avoided nesting near shrubs and tree clumps, but showed preferences for areas with neighbouring reedbeds. Breeding pairs were encountered most often in irregularly mown places, while regularly mown and unmown sites were avoided. Most territories of the Citrine Wagtail (64%) were located at fen mires at a distance of >1000 m from the river or an old river-bed. Only 24% of breeding localities were found <100 m from the river or an old river-bed. The paper also presents some aspects of breeding phenology of the species and changes in population size. In 2012–2014 numbers at four annually surveyed study plots was estimated at 24–26, 22–23 and 18–20 pairs respectively. The whole Biebrza marshes population was estimated at 60–130 breeding pairs. This estimate might not be precise due to relatively low penetration of suitable nesting habitats and includes observations of pairs, singing males and single individuals (not nest finding) and difficulties in the species detection.
Keywords: Biebrza marshes, breeding biology, Citrine Wagtail, habitat selection, Motacilla citreola
