Arctic raptor occupancy and reproductive success near a remote open-cut mine: North Baffin Island, Nunavut

Abstract

Natural resource development in the Canadian Arctic—a mostly remote and ‘untouched’ landscape—is expanding. Raptorial species are key indicators of ecosystem diversity and environmental change; disturbance-mediated changes to Arctic-breeding raptor populations can be assessed to determine impacts from development. From 2012 through 2020, we monitored peregrine falcon (Falco peregrinus) and rough-legged hawk (Buteo lagopus) breeding territories near an iron ore mine on North Baffin Island, Nunavut, Canada. The mine was constructed from 2010 through 2014 and became operational in 2015. Our objective was to evaluate whether proximity to mining disturbance affected occupancy and reproductive success of both species. We quantified occupancy using multi-season occupancy models and reproductive success using stochastic partial differential equations capable of accounting for unexplained spatiotemporal variation. Occupancy of both species was best explained by year effects. Occupancy remained relatively stable across time for peregrine falcons (\(\lambda\) = 0.99 ± 0.04) but fluctuated drastically for rough-legged hawks (\(\lambda\) = 3.41 ± 2.17). For both species, most of the spatiotemporal variation in reproductive success was unexplained (presumably from underlying abiotic and biotic factors), which led to the differential presence and count of nestlings across the study area and time. Neither distance to disturbance nor primary production explained variation in occupancy and reproductive success.