Work

Vehicles kill birds on sandy beaches: The global evidence

Year: 2025

Type: article

Study designs: Systematic Review, Meta-Analysis

Abstract: 1. Ocean beaches provide essential habitats for a diversity of birds to forage, breed, and roost. Beaches can also be prime sites for motorized recreation where off-road vehicles (ORVs) interact with avifauna - this creates a complex threat landscape in the human-wildlife domain, translating into a wicked conservation challenge. 2. Because effective vehicle management aimed at mitigating the adverse impacts of ORVs on animals is, ideally, evidence-based, here we synthesize the global data on vehicle-bird conflicts on sandy beaches. 3. Our meta-analysis demonstrates that deleterious impacts of ORVs on beach birds are geographically widespread, impacting a diversity of species in multiple ways, representing serious harm to individuals, populations, and assemblages. 4. Significant declines in the abundance and diversity of birds stressed by ORVs are common. Fitness is compromised at all stages of the breeding cycle: a) there are fewer breeding pairs, nests and successful breeding attempts on shores open to ORVs; b) compromised incubating behaviour exposes eggs and chicks to heat, cold and predators; c) nests and eggs are directly crushed by vehicles; d) fewer chicks hatch, and e) the number of young fledged diminishes. ORVs also flush birds (‘escape on the wing’), curtail critical foraging time, cause physiological stress, and displace individuals to less favourable habitats. 5. The strength of the evidence for serious ecological harm unambiguously attributed to off-road vehicles emphasizes the need to permanently reduce the spatial reach of ORVs, creating adequately-sized ‘safe zones’ for coastal avifauna in a variety of seascape and human use settings. • Recreational off-road vehicles (ORVs) conflict with birds on sandy beaches. • We provide a global meta-analysis of ORV impacts on birds on ocean beaches. • There is substantial evidence that ORVs cause serious harm to avifauna. • Declines in abundance, diversity, and fitness are common in birds stressed by ORVs. • The prime management tool is permanent and sizeable ‘safe zones’ free of vehicles.

Source: The Science of The Total Environment

DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2025.179258