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The Design of Artificial Nestboxes for the Study of Secondary Hole-Nesting Birds: A Review of Methodological Inconsistencies and Potential Biases

2010; Polish Academy of Sciences; Volume: 45; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.3161/000164510x516047

1734-8471

Marcel M. Lambrechts, Frank Adriaensen, Daniel R. Ardia, A. V. Artemyev, Francisco Borrás Atiénzar, Jerzy Bańbura, Emilio Barba, Jean‐Charles Bouvier, Jordi Camprodón, Caren B. Cooper, Russell D. Dawson, Marcel Eens, Tapio Eeva, Bruno Faivre, László Zsolt Garamszegi, Anne E. Goodenough, Andrew Gosler, Arnaud Grégoire, Simon C. Griffith, Lars Gustafsson, L. Scott Johnson, Wojciech Kania, Oskars Keišs, Paulo E. Llambías, Mark C. Mainwaring, Raivo Mänd, Bruno Massa, Tomasz D. Mazgajski, Anders Pape Møller, Juan Moreno, Beat Naef‐Daenzer, Jan‐Åke Nilsson, Ana Cláudia Norte, Markku Orell, Ken A. Otter, Chan‐Ryul Park, Christopher M. Perrins, Jan Pinowski, Jiří Porkert, Jaime Potti, Vladimír Remeš, Heinz Richner, Seppo Rytkönen, Ming-Tang Shiao, Bengt Silverin, Tore Slagsvold, Henrik G. Smith, Alberto Sorace, Martyn J. Stenning, Ian Stewart, Charles F. Thompson, Piotr Tryjanowski, János Török, Arie J. van Noordwijk, David W. Winkler, Nadia Ziane,

Animal Behavior and Reproduction

The widespread use of artificial nestboxes has led to significant advances in our knowledge of the ecology, behaviour and physiology of cavity nesting birds, especially small passerines. Nestboxes have made it easier to perform routine monitoring and experimental manipulation of eggs or nestlings, and also repeatedly to capture, identify and manipulate the parents. However, when comparing results across study sites the use of nestboxes may also introduce a potentially significant confounding variable in the form of differences in nestbox design amongst studies, such as their physical dimensions, placement height, and the way in which they are constructed and maintained. However, the use of nestboxes may also introduce an unconsidered and potentially significant confounding variable due to differences in nestbox design amongst studies, such as their physical dimensions, placement height, and the way in which they are constructed and maintained. Here we review to what extent the characteristics of artificial nestboxes (e.g. size, shape, construction material, colour) are documented in the ‘methods’ sections of publications involving hole-nesting passerine birds using natural or excavated cavities or artificial nestboxes for reproduction and roosting. Despite explicit previous recommendations that authors describe in detail the characteristics of the nestboxes used, we found that the description of nestbox characteristics in most recent publications remains poor and insufficient. We therefore list the types of descriptive data that should be included in the methods sections of relevant manuscripts and justify this by discussing how variation in nestbox characteristics can affect or confound conclusions from nestbox studies. We also propose several recommendations to improve the reliability and usefulness of research based on long-term studies of any secondary hole-nesting species using artificial nestboxes for breeding or roosting.