New, Sharper Declines Reported for Red Knots

Red Knot (Calidris canutus rufa) at Delaware Bay WHSRN Site. / © Diego Luna Quevedo

The Red Knot (Calidris canutus), one of the Western Hemisphere’s longest-distance migratory shorebirds, has been a candidate for listing under the U.S. Endangered Species Act since 2006. Candidate species are recognized as warranting protection, but are not considered as high a priority for listing as other declining species. Annual updates to the status of a candidate species are required until either it is listed or new information indicates that listing is no longer warranted.

The draft 2011 update to the status of the Red Knot was recently released by shorebird-expert authors from three nations. Except for a slight increase seen in 2009, the number of rufa knots (an imperiled subspecies) wintering in Tierra del Fuego has been in decline for the last decade. However, the 2011 update reports one of the sharpest declines yet, from 16,260 birds in 2010 to now 9,850 – a nearly 40% loss. The update further reports no evidence of recovery of horseshoe crabs, whose eggs provide critical nutrition for knots as they “refuel” on the U.S. mid-Atlantic Coast en route to Arctic breeding grounds.

A final, peer-reviewed update will be published in the coming months. However, given the signs of crisis, authors released their 14-page draft in the interest of timely information exchange among researchers, managers, and others able to help make a difference in Red Knot conservation. It is in that same spirit that we share it with you, the broader WHSRN community.

Read the draft 2011 Update to the Status of the Red Knot (182 KB, PDF)

For more information, please contact Amanda Dey (Amanda.Dey@dep.state.nj.us), New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Fish and Wildlife, Endangered and Nongame Species Program.