Stag Beetle Conference – Richmond Park 19/11/05
Welcome
In welcoming members, Nigel Reeve (Royal Park Community Ecologists), thanked all project volunteers for their dedicated work. He said this was still the only large-scale project of its kind, and was producing urgently needed information. John Hatto (Project Coordinator) thanked Nigel for his support and that of other staff and referred to the apologies received from Simon Richards & his Deputy Jo Scrivener, both of whom had long standing family engagements. John had also received apologies from the following volunteers: Sascha & Richard, Laura & Paul, John Fellows and Ian. He reminded the delegates of the Conference aims as previously circulated which could be summarised as:
- What to do differently next year?
- What different things should we do next year?
1 - Stag beetles in the Park: what next? Nigel Reeve
Nigel opened the Conference by reviewing some of the year’s activities, and by discussing how we had progressed in filling in some of the blank spaces in the stag beetle map of south London and how we might further expand our interest from stag beetles to other saproxylic species. This would support a proposed widening of the Parks’ species research activities to include more saproxylic invertebrate communities for which Richmond Park is National Nature Reserve and is designated a European Special Area for Conservation for its stag beetles. He reported on a recent survey of lying dead wood volumes in 33 non-enclosed woodland areas. This showed for these areas in the Park the average was 35m3 ha-1 but the distribution is uneven with one area having 180 whilst nineteen other areas had 20 or less m3 ha-1.
Nigel also mentioned the Park’s efforts to work in concert with other land/tree managers, including the publication of the ‘Decaying Wood Leaflet’ (see here to download a PDF file 1.6Mb), all of which we hope to building in the coming year. Finally he mentioned our efforts in support of the PTES buckets project (see here), the recent walk leaflet, NNR public notice boards and the open weekend planned for the Park on 15-16th July 2006
2 - Novel ways of helping Beetles to breed – John Hatto & Maria Fremlin
John reminded the Conference that broad statistical data had been circulated prior to the Conference and that he would be talking later about our attempts to monitor flying beetles this year and that Mark would be dealing with more detailed aspects of the year’s data this afternoon, this session was the first of 3 trying to look at how other people approached the study of beetle. John explained that he wanted to start by adding to what Nigel had said about buckets (see above) by describing how some of these had been sited in the Park to form ‘ecological steeping stones’ between sites currently used by beetles and potential sites currently not occupied. Obviously, if female beetles only move a short way from where they emerged such stepping stones would take several generations to bridge the gap – so it could be 20 years or more before expansion was achieved.
The main part of this talk was a slide presentation prepared by Pat Robinson, a Supervisor in the Park Rangers Team for London Borough of Ealing, who was currently abroad. John had contacted Pat through Maria’s website and had visited the Southfields Park, where the story unfolded, because he was interested in finding further ways to encourage beetles to breed in new areas. He described the site as looking like a typical urban park of about 4 hectares with trees around the edge and enclosed on 3 sides by housing and some commercial buildings. With a pair of battered hard surface tennis courts, with young trees planned in groups along their North & South edges. These trees were planted in 1997 and at the time of planting the surface had been pre-treated with wood chip mulch to suppress the grass. After about 3 yrs Pat wanted to put a path through the wood but had no money, so they excavated a metre wide path trench 15cm deep and 120m long and filled it with wood chip from street tree work. Whilst digging this shallow trench they found about 20 or 30 possible larvae but no dead wood. The path was regularly topped up with additional wood chip twice per year. A year later they extended the path by 15M & found several more larvae & adult males.
Discovering a big Breeding Ground - In 2005 funding was secured for a hogging path so they dug out woodchip path and recovered 753 larvae and 2 adult males. These were placed in the wooded area long mound of wood chip and dead wood about 30M in total length.
Discussion from the Floor - There was general agreement that the most likely source of beetle larvae was the wood mulch which looked as if it had been standing and degrading before being brought to site. Subsequent to the Conference, Pat has said "The wood chip mulch laid down for the tree planting had been piled up on a site in the west of the borough. It had almost certainly been sitting there for a while, several months perhaps. Subsequent deliveries of woodchip used to create and top up the path were fresh. Local people have reported seeing Stag Beetles in the Southfields area, before the ranger service was set up in 1997/98. During the summers of 1999 to present I've seen Stag Beetles in and around the nature area, all were males, although females have been observed around the Ranger Lodge garden (some 250M to the North)." The lack of previous beetles at the site may have led to greater breeding success in those beetles which subsequently emerged as the potential predators where inexperienced.
Netherlands playgrounds - Stag beetle nesting studies in Holland by a stag beetle enthusiast, Paul Hendriks, hmph@dds.nl, Tolbert, The Netherlands; presented by Maria Fremlin
In Holland there are some very stable isolated stag beetle populations, some of which are in urban areas; interestingly they correlate well with places where old forests used to be a long time ago. It is a very much "stay-at-home" kind of beetle.
Stag beetles were found breeding in woodchips in school playgrounds in the Veluwe region. They were sharing this habitat with the rhinoceros beetle Oryctes nasicornis (Coleoptera, Scarabaeidae), which is a common beetle in the continent. These playgrounds were built 25 years ago, 30cm deep over a Nicolon membrane. They are topped up every 5 years with fresh woodchips from local hardwood trees. There are stag beetles in this area.
Successful easy to monitor "breeding places" have been designed; they are built with aligned vertical posts of decayed oak buried 80cm deep. For monitoring them all that is needed is to dig a ring around the posts, 60cm deep, and by hand carefully scrape the soil around the wood. This is not done from June to September so as not to disturb the pupation stage. In one of these, built in 1999 in a stag beetle area, larvae were found 4 years later.
Conclusion:
There is great future in the role of hardwood chips for maintaining, and possibly increasing, the range of stag beetles. Future artificial nests should be built with these important findings (Ealing and Veluwe) in mind. In any case, all artificial nesting places must be topped up regularly with woodchips, including old pyramids and log piles; maintenance is very important.
References:
http://maria.fremlin.de/stagbeetles/london_veluwe.html.
3 - Monitoring Flight and Abundance in Urban Areas – Colin Hawes
Colin Hawes (A Stag Beetle Expert – currently doing a PhD on them at Royal Holloway College and member of the Member of National Stag Beetle Biodiversity Action Planning Group (NSBBAPG) made a slide presentation – this is his summary.
To date, in the UK, stag beetle flight has been monitored using field observation and capture-mark-release-recapture experiments. Field observation of flight in natural light is difficult, as the beetle is crepuscular, most activity occurring at dusk from approximately 21.30 to 22.00 hours. Monitoring the flight of marked beetles is achievable and has given good results. Capture-mark-release-recapture experiments have proved successful in determining the beetles’ dispersal range.
A recent grant, awarded by English Nature, has enabled the purchase of radio-tracking equipment, which will be used in 2006 to monitor stag beetle flight and range of dispersal more accurately.
Several methods for monitoring stag beetle numbers have been trialled over the period 2000-2005. Of these, road casualty surveys have proved to be very effective in obtaining figures, which give a measure of the beetles’ abundance. Repeated annually, these surveys have been used to calculate an annual index of abundance.
4 - Stag beetles suburban behaviour – Maria Fremlin
Maria Fremlin (A Stag Beetle Enthusiast and webmaster for http://maria.fremlin.de./stagbeetles), made a slide presentation – this is her summary.
Stag beetles were monitored in a chosen suburban area daily at dusk, from May 12 till July 6. They emerged on May 25, males and females, mostly in an alleyway where, for a couple of weeks, intensive courtship behaviour took place around stationary females, followed by very competitive mating displays nearby, June 9 and 13. There was a mass flight on June 17 when many Stag beetles were seen flying even over very tall trees. Shortly after this dispersal females were often seen flying as well.
In total, over 190 beetles were monitored. The percentage of live beetles, 93%, found was much higher than in Richmond Park, 7%. A crude analysis of the weather data, done by D.H. Fremlin, suggests that beetles appeared more often when the temperature was relatively high and the humidity relatively low, and that these are acting to some degree independently, with the temperature being more important. For flying and mating beetles, the most important parameter remained temperature, but wind became relevant, perhaps as important as humidity.
Conclusion:
Suburban habitats seem to be easier to monitor than open spaces and also to provide a relatively safer haven for the Stag beetles. Future studies could include Lesser Stag Beetles as well. The phenology studies need to be repeated, ideally, in several locations in England and abroad. Maria Fremlin, 25 Ireton Road, Colchester, Essex, CO3 3AT, maria@fremlin.de
References:
Julian Best - Weather in Colchester, Essex - AWS, http://www.jbest.net/weather/weatherNow.aspx
Maria Fremlin - Stag Beetles for Everyone - http://maria.fremlin.de/stagbeetles
Colin Hawes - The Stag Beetle Lucanus cervus (L.) (Coleoptera: Lucanidae) in the County of Suffolk England: Distribution and Monitoring. Proceedings of the 3rd Symposium and Workshop on the Conservation of Saproxylic Beetles. Riga Latvia, July 2004.
Colin Hawes - Stag Beetles 2004: White Admiral 60, http://www.boxvalley.co.uk/nature/sns/wad60/w60-21.html
Christer Juren - The evolution and the life cycle of the stag beetle (Lucanus cervus) as a multiparameter system, http://www.irf.se/~christer/stagbeetle.html
PTES - Stag beetles, Findings of the 1998 National Survey.
PTES - National Stag beetle Survey 2002 - http://www.ptes.org/action/documents/PTES_Stag_Beetle_Report.pdf
Eva Sprecher-Uebersax, Studien zur Biologie und Phänologie des Hirschkäfers im Raum Basel, Basel, 2001, pg. 36-38.
Steve Tijou -
Gilbert Waldbauer, WHAT GOOD ARE BUGS?, Harvard University Press, 2003.
5 - Monitoring Flying by Transects in 2005 - John Hatto
John said ‘Transects’ were a commonly used sampling method for comparing the populations of many species over time. He summarised their theoretical basis, as looking for changes in activity in an area, by regularly passing through it & recording what was seen, then relating what was seen & the area covered with the rest of the site area. For simplicity each transect was usually a straight line walks across the area and to be representative of the area their routes had to be randomly generated. We were keen to find a simple system for monitoring populations and flight was one of the few times in the lifecycle when stag beetles could be observed. However, we saw few beetles even on warm nights in June/July. In addition using transects in practice for ‘stag beetle flight’, was not simple as, routes crossing the park at dusk must be safe for observers which is meant they could not be randomly selected. Necessitating a high survey density particularly as some proportion of the beetles appears in different locations in the Park each year. Yet the logistics and commitment necessary to be in the Park on a good proportion of suitable evenings, made it impossible to cover all areas on every evening and on some stormy nights it was just too risky to be out.
One further concern we had was that the Park is so vast we would need to be close to see a flying beetle, particularly to tell what sex it was. Previous experience suggested they made a somewhat mechanical sound in flight. He said he carried sound recording equipment, as the sex differences in shapes might show up in the waveform of sounds that flying beetles might make – however, none appeared to be making any sound – possibly beetle sounds might be dependent on size.
Other Results
- Enjoyable experience including sightings of many other beetles and wildlife
- Some detailed observations of flying & of predation.
- Appears to show routes in open areas give less results so tree density may explain fight sightings as well predations finds.
- Not likely to be a simple tool for measuring beetle population because each sighting on the 4 productive walks cost us a minimum of between 7 (1/.875*2*3) & 24 (1/.25*2*3) observer hours.
- Very costly - we had >2 people out for about 3 hours on 44 occasions = 264 hrs. To this add route preparation & training time of about 120hrs = 384hrs (at say notional £10/hr) and add Supervision & Transport the total Notional cost is approaching £4.5k
Actual results, in terms of totals (we look later at effects of Park air temperature mentioned in the pre-briefing) were Total Live beetles sightings whilst on walk routes 21, Seen off routes associated with walks 4 and live on the ground 4.
Future Studies
We will get a better understanding of how beetles use different parts of the Park by using our time to make detailed observations of beetle flight and predation behaviour at sites randomly chosen from a list of those identified as likely. Speakers this morning have helped us develop possible lines for such a study.
6 - Is Dead Wood Dead Boring? - Doug Napier, B.Sc. (Hons), MIEEM
Doug Napier (A Stag Beetle Expert – working in LB of Hounslow & a member of the NSBBAPG) made a slide presentation – this is his summary.
Dead wood comes in many shapes and sizes: from small twigs in the canopy of otherwise healthy, mature trees to the stark, skeletal remains of fondly remembered veterans.
In recent times urban parks managers have, on the whole, tended to malign dead wood and regard it as an ugly, hazard and an undesirable repository for disease to be disposed of at the earliest opportunity. This situation contrasts starkly with more natural woodland situations where dead wood is altogether more common place and seemingly better accepted.
In fact, dead wood serves three major functions in parks: ecological, structural/artistic and recreational and its value is becoming increasingly appreciated, most especially through the Biodiversity Action Plan process.
Stag Beetles are just one example of a plethora of invertebrates from a range of taxa whose life cycle is in part dependent upon dead wood. Fungi are another major group associated with decaying timber.
Dead wood and dead trees also form an important structural feature within the landscape of parks providing form, colour and texture that has a sculptural and artistic quality that is often more striking and attention-grabbing than mature living specimens.
Less well appreciated is that dead wood is a major focus point for visitors in parks: as a natural climbing frame, a secret hideaway, or as an improvised seat to relax upon. Make a note to study this on your next walk in Richmond Park. You’ll be amazed at just how “magnetic” dead wood and trees are to people!
7 – Reaching a wider audience with humour
Nick Baker (A Project Volunteer) presented 6 sketches of his ideas for helping people think about dead wood in more positive ways. It was generally agreed that these were a helpful contribution and several people promised to help develop ways these might be used.
8 - Review of 2005 Data – Mark Wagstaff
Mark Wagstaff (A founder member of the Project) made a presentation providing many detailed maps showing beetle remains and sightings as the year progressed. Obviously it is not appropriate to make that data publicly available as it could lead to the collection of beetles. Thus this report only provides a broad summary of Stag Beetle sightings and findings made in Richmond Park during the 2005. Sightings are of live beetles but most of the data comes from finding remains.
| Live Beetle Sightings | Predated Remains |
|---|---|
|
Male 16 |
Male 52 |
|
Female 10 |
Female 46 |
|
Unknown 10 |
Unknown 101 |
|
Total 36 |
Total 199 |
|
25 were seen flying – all associated with Transect Walks | |
Aerial Maps of the Park showing distribution of remains and live male and female beetles indicate that beetles prefer the edges of woods and semi-open areas to the centres of woods or wide open spaces.
Transects (see item 5
44 transects were walked between 24th May and 14th July.
25 sightings of flying beetles were recorded.
Following the Conference Mark prepared additional reports and maps comparing the common locations of findings or sightings between years from 2003 to 2005 – this data is summarised below. This was a complex and time consuming exercise for which we are very grateful.
Note: the increase in common sites in the columns A & B probably reflects the increase in the number of sites at which finds were made after the first year, e.g. we had got our act together by 2004 & 2005. However, the decline in the last two columns may indicate that a series of different cohorts of beetles are using different sites – we will need to look at this data more carefully.
|
A |
B |
C |
D | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Year |
2003 & 2004 |
2004 & 2005 |
2003 & 2005 |
2003 & 2004 & 2005 |
|
Common Sites |
20 |
48 |
12 |
11 |
Questions to Speakers & Discussion and Concluding Remarks
It was generally agreed that all speakers had provided plenty of food for thought.
Concern was expressed about the amount of effort expended on Transects – it was explained that what we are doing is the only large scale detailed study and being at the cutting edge can mean we have to step back and reconsider what we need to do next fairly frequently. Transects could have provided us with a means of measurement and by doing it properly would have given us results over several years. Unfortunately this did not happen. Predation which some people considered might be at very high and could be seriously affecting breeding, needs to be better understood. Currently we have no comparable figures available to be able to say how many beetles had successfully bred, or even how many were available to do so.
Those attending were thanks for their time and contributions and the project volunteers were complemented on the amount achieved and the quality of their work.
John Hatto then closed the Meeting with thanks to the Royal Parks for hosting the event.
Subsequently, in view of the planned expansion to cover all saproxylic invertebrates, Nigel has said he is hoping to set up a series of lecture/field study event using specialist speakers – ideally, this would start in the Spring, to help attract people prepared to join in stump and activity watching, but resources may delay this process!
Thanks to all those who contributed and offered, commented on earlier drafts to improve my rather sketchy notes. Please let me know of any significant comments or question asked during the Conference which you feel have been omitted.
