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Background: Connections between habitats are key to a full understanding of anthropic impacts on ecosystems. Freshwater habitats are especially biodiverse, yet depend on exchange with terrestrial habitats. White storks (Ciconia ciconia) are widespread opportunists that often forage in landfills and then visit wetlands, among other habitats. It is well known that white storks ingest contaminants at landfills (such as plastics and antibiotic resistant bacteria), which can be then deposited in other habitats through their faeces and regurgitated pellets. Methods: We characterized the role of white storks in habitat connectivity by analyzing GPS data from populations breeding in Germany and wintering from Spain to Morocco. We overlaid GPS tracks on a land-use surface to construct a spatially-explicit network in which nodes were sites, and links were direct flights. We then calculated centrality metrics, identified spatial modules, and quantified overall connections between habitat types. For regional networks in southern Spain and northern Morocco, we built Exponential Random Graph Models (ERGMs) to explain network topologies as a response to node habitat. Results: For Spain and Morocco combined, we built a directed spatial network with 114 nodes and 370 valued links. Landfills were the habitat type most connected to others, as measured by direct flights. The relevance of landfills was confirmed in both ERGMs, with significant positive effects of this habitat as a source of flights. In the ERGM for southern Spain, we found significant positive effects of rice fields and salines (solar saltworks) as sinks for flights. By contrast, in the ERGM for northern Morocco, we found a significant positive effect of marshes as a sink for flights. Conclusions: These results illustrate how white storks connect landfills with terrestrial and aquatic habitats, some of which are managed for food production. We identified specific interconnected habitat patches across Spain and Morocco that could be used for further studies on biovectoring of pollutants, pathogens and other propagules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Birds striking aircrafts cause substantial economic loss world‐wide and, more worryingly, human and wildlife fatalities. Designing effective measures to mitigate fatal bird strikes requires an in‐depth knowledge of the characteristics of this incident type and the flight behaviours of the bird species involved.The characteristics of bird strikes involving aircraft crashes or loss of human life in Spain were studied and compared to flight patterns of birds monitored by GPS. We tracked 210 individuals of the three species that cause the most crashes and human fatalities in Spain: griffon and cinereous vultures Gyps fulvus and Aegypius monachus and white storks Ciconia ciconia.All the crashes involved general aviation aircrafts, while none were recorded in commercial aviation. Most occurred outside airport boundaries, at midday, and in the warmest months, which all correspond with the maximum flight activity of the studied species.Bird flight altitudes overlapped the legal flight altitude limit set for general aviation.Policy implications. Mitigation of fatal bird strikes should especially address the conflict between general aviation and large soaring birds. Air transportation authorities should consider modifying the flight ceiling for general aviation flights above the studied species' maximum flight altitude. Moreover, policymakers should issue pilots with recommendations regarding the dates and times of peak activity of large soaring bird species to improve flight safety. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Features Louisa Ignacia Roldan, a woman sculptor in Spain in the 17th century. Range of artworks; Description of Roldan's artworks; Contributions to the field of women's studies in art.

Exploring how flocks of soaring migrants manage to achieve and maintain coordination while exploiting thermal updrafts is important for understanding how collective movements can enhance the sensing of the surrounding environment. Here we examined the structural organization of a group of circling white storks ( Ciconia ciconia ) throughout their migratory journey from Germany to Spain. We analysed individual high-resolution GPS trajectories of storks during circling events, and evaluated each bird's flight behaviour in relation to its flock members. Within the flock, we identified subgroups that synchronize their movements and coordinate switches in their circling direction within thermals. These switches in direction can be initiated by any individual of the subgroup, irrespective of how advanced its relative vertical position is, and occur at specific horizontal locations within the thermal allowing the storks to remain within the thermal. Using the motion of all flock members, we were able to examine the dynamic variation of airflow within the thermals and to determine the specific environmental conditions surrounding the flock. With an increasing amount of high-resolution GPS tracking, we may soon be able to use these animals as distributed sensors providing us with a new means to obtain a detailed knowledge of our environment.This article is part of the theme issue 'Collective movement ecology'., (© 2018 The Author(s).)