2021-12-31-accounts

President’s statement

Annual Report & Accounts

birds | people | science

BOU.ORG.UK IBIS.AC.UK @IBIS_JOURNAL

IBISJOURNAL

IBIS_JOURNAL

英国 鸟类 学会会刊

2021

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 2

CONTENTS

President’s Statement	2
Structure, Governance &
Management	4
Objectives & Activities
Mission Statement	5
Council Activities	5
Activities in Scotland	6
Achievements & Performance
The BOU Office	6
Awards Nominations Committee
	11
Engagement Committee	12
IBIS Management	16
Meetings Committee	19
Grants Committee	26
Records Committee	32
Membership	34
Financial Review	34
Responsibilities of Trustees	36
Auditor’s Report	37
Annual accounts for 2021	41

Cover image: Researcher radio tracking waders © Rebecca Laidlaw

President’s statement

Prof Juliet Vickery

At the start of 2021, I certainly would have been pushed to name the 15th letter of the Greek Alphabet – now everyone knows Omicron, which has joined the growing list of Covid-related words and phrases such as ‘furlough’, ‘double vaxxed’

and ‘you’re on mute’. Things are supposed to get easier the longer you do a job or fulfil a role, right? I suspect many of you will not feel this is the case right now - I certainly don’t despite being three years into my Presidency of a 163-year-old society.

The BOU is having to adapt and be increasingly innovative in order to deliver its mission of promoting the science of ornithology. This annual report is testament of the ability of staff and members to do just this – to rise to the challenge and change with the times. Its pages are packed with facts and figures, activities and events and the names of a dynamic and committed team who have enabled it all to happen. I want to start by thanking all those whose names feature in this report. They have helped BOU ‘go virtual’ on many platforms, ‘go global’ and reach wider, more diverse audiences, and ‘go up’ in regaining the no. 1 slot with our journal, IBIS, and remain firmly no. 1 in ornithological science on social media.

We emerged from this year having built on our reputation as a prominent and respected player in the virtual ornithological world. Our high-profile presence through Twitter (@IBIS_JOURNAL) has grown again, by 11% on 2020, and we now have over 19,500 followers. @IBIS_JOURNAL remains by far the largest ornithology society/journal account on the platform helped by the highly engaged ornithological Twitter community. And for those willing and able to multitask in a virtual sense, we are also on Facebook, Instagram and China’s largest social media platform, Weibo.

Much of this social media activity directs people to our website. Compared with 2020, our overall website visitor numbers increased by 22%, with a 24% increase in the number of new visitors and evidence of our global reach in that almost 70% of visitors to the site are from outside the UK. The main arrival point is #theBOUblog - the most-read section of the BOU website – and this has been a bumper year. In 2021, a total of 111 blog posts were published, the highest annual total to date, including our 600th article since the launch in 2012. In January we rolled out our dynamic new member area on the website where, allowing, for the first time, members to manage their own membership details, access IBIS and register at reduced member rates for BOU events.

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JANET KEAR UNION MEDAL

Nigel Crocker was presented with the Janet Kear Union Medal at the annual conference in March.

The award recognises Nigel’s enormous contribution to the BOU, in particular his financial management, as both a former Honorary Treasurer and current Chair of our Investment Trustees, spanning four decades.

For the full citation see IBIS 163: 1129–1130 doi: 10.111/ibi.12946.

The Janet Kear Union Medal recognises an individual’s outstanding contribution to the BOU. Formerly the Union Medal, the award was renamed after former BOU President and IBIS edtior, Prof Janet Kear, when the medal was redesigned in 2019.

Following on from the BOUs first virtual conference in 2020, we successfully delivered three more in 2021. Our annual conference on ‘Restoring bird populations’ showcased new techniques and approaches in restoration science, research and policy. Through 30 talks with associated Twitter presentations, 15 poster presentations and 17 Twitter-only ‘talks’, we looked beyond slowing species’ declines and avoiding extinction, to actively restoring species, landscapes and indeed whole ecosystems. Added inspiration for this came from a wonderful Alfred Newton Lecture, delivered by Prof Carl Jones (Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust), who truly convinced us that ‘every species can be saved’. This was a message that went far and wide, given that we had 235 registrants from 40 countries and an in-theroom equivalent audience on Twitter of 1,580 over the three days.

A first in 2021 was to run not one, but two, autumn scientific meetings ‘Birds and people: from conflict to co-existence’ and ‘Developments in monitoring science’. The willingness of speakers to pre-record talks, and the fact that we have a behind the scenes volunteer team of technological whizzes, ensured split-second timing, allowing live Q&As and scope for more discussion on session-specific Slack channels.

IBIS, our flagship journal, continues to lead. Half of our editorial team is now outside the UK with two editors in the US and one in Australia and Zoom meetings enabling active participation even, for some, at slightly antisocial hours. The ‘going global’ theme is also evident in the introduction of dual language abstracts to improve accessibility of the science we publish. IBIS is a team effort, and the hard work of authors (of published papers as well as blog and social media content promoting the journal), reviewers, the IBIS Management Committee and its team of Editors and Associate Editors supported by Angela Langford and Wiley, succeeded in securing IBIS the top slot in ornithology – in June 2021, IBIS achieved an Impact Factor of 2.517 (from 2.076), ahead of all other 27 journals ranked in the ornithology category.

In our support of the ornithological community, we continue to actively help overcome barriers preventing equality for ornithologists . The work of the Engagement Committee champions many elements of our equality and diversity work. This year, the committee launched the #BOUdiversityBlog, following on from our successful Rainbow Blogs series, highlighting a wider range of diversity issues within the ornithological community and beyond. We continue to progress towards a 50:50 gender balance across BOU Council and committees, seeing a 53:47 (male:female) split (compared to 64:36 in 2019) and women now outnumbering men on Council (by one!) for the first time in our history. The Awards Nominations Committee, set up in 2020, produced more detailed criteria for our awards, with the key aim of increasing the diversity of nominations through clarifying the broad range of contributions for which they can be awarded. The science supported through research grants, career development bursaries and studentships also goes far and wide. For example, the eight small research grants awarded in 2021 were to incountry ornithologists working in Hawaii, South Africa, France, India, Turkey and USA. These activities complement other recent new practices and procedures, such as blind refereeing of IBIS papers and open recruitment for new editors that are designed to help ensure openness and inclusivity .

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ADMINISTRATION DETAILS

BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS’ UNION

Founded 1858 Registered as a Charity: England and Wales, no. 249877 Scotland, no. SC044850

Address

PO Box 417, Peterborough PE7 3FX, UK Tel: [phone] Email: [e-mail] Web: bou.org.uk / ibis.ac.uk

As at 31 December 2021

BOU Staff

Chief Operations Officer Mr Steve P. Dudley

It is sad but, perhaps, unsurprising that BOU membership dropped during 2021. Recruitment is often associated with conferences, and it is harder to persuade people to join when their experiences are only virtual. Sadly, several long-standing members died, and others found themselves under unexpected financial pressures. The report from the Treasurer, Graham Appleton highlights other important points – both positive and negative – and reminds us of the unpredictability of the revenue stream from IBIS. Investments did well in 2021, thanks to our wise and expert Investment Trustees (Nigel Crocker, Richard Price and Stephen Rumsey) and this income helps to provide funds that support ornithology and ornithologists, in line with our strategic aims.

So, what about the year ahead? Regardless of how far we do, or do not, progress along the Greek alphabet, I am confident the BOU will still be finding new ways to share the joy, inspiration and insights of the avian world. I also know we have one certain, big, change ahead, and that is to find a successor for the BOU’s Chief Operations Officer, Steve Dudley. Under his extraordinary 25-year-watch, and thanks to his drive and enthusiasm, the BOU has been transformed. His role has been pivotal in almost everything reported here in this report and the same has been true every year for a quarter of a century! In the year ahead we will reflect and celebrate Steve’s lasting legacy and he will, without doubt, be a hard act to follow. But 2021 shows us just what a remarkable, innovative and engaged community we are. I am confident that it is one from which, or to which, we will draw a talented new COO, to help steward the next phase of the BOU’s history.

Journal & Office Manager Mrs Angela F. Langford

Structure, Governance

Council Officers

President Prof Juliet Vickery Vice Presidents Prof Tony Fox Dr Richard Bradbury Honorary Secretary Dr Helen Baker Honorary Treasurer Mr Graham F. Appleton

Ordinary Members of Council

Dr Sonya Clegg (Chair, Grants Committee), Dr Emma Cunningham, Dr Francis Daunt (Chair, Meetings Committee), Dr Mark Eaton, Dr Tom Finch (Chair, Engagement Committee) Dr James Gilroy (Chair, Records Committee), Dr Rosemarie Kentie (Chair, IBIS Management Committee), Dr Julie Miller, Dr Rosemary Trevelyan and Dr Lucy Wright (Chair, Awards Nominations Committee).

& Management

The British Ornithologists’ Union is an unincorporated charity, no. 249877 (England & Wales) and SC044850 (Scotland).

The object of the BOU is the promotion of the science of ornithology. Its governing document is the Rules adopted at the Annual General Meeting in 2010, and last updated by Council in July 2020. Under the rules, the governing body, the Council of the Union, is responsible for the running of the Union’s business, supported by its staff. Council may delegate functions to standing or ad hoc committees that report to Council. The Union’s Council retains overall responsibility for matters so delegated.

The BOU has six standing committees: the Awards Nominations Committee, the Engagement Committee, the Grants Committee, the IBIS Management Committee, the Meetings Committee and the Records Committee.

Elected members of Council are Trustees of the charity. Members of Council are recruited from within the ornithological community. Where possible, Council

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ADMINISTRATION DETAILS

members will have served on one or more of the BOU’s standing committees prior to nomination for election to Council. Those standing for election to BOU Council as an incoming chair of a standing committee will have served for at least two years on the respective committee. On election, new Council members are provided with relevant Union documents to help familiarise them with current Union activities and to provide information on the duties and responsibilities of being a Trustee of the Union.

CONT/.

Trustees

The following individuals served as Trustees of the charity at the time of Council approving this annual report and accounts: Mr Graham F. Appleton, Dr Helen Baker, Dr Richard Bradbury, Dr Sonya Clegg, Dr Emma Cunningham, Dr Francis Daunt, Dr Mark Eaton, Prof Tony Fox, Dr James Gilroy, Dr Rosemarie Kentie, Dr Julie Miller, Prof Juliet Vickery, Dr Rosie Trevelyan and Dr Lucy Wright.

The following individuals also served as Trustees of the charity for part of the year covered by these annual report and accounts: Mr Neil J. Bucknell, Prof Will Cresswell, Dr Jennifer Smart and Dr Hugh Wright.

Editorial positions

At 31 December 2021 the following editorial positions were held:

IBIS Editor in Chief Dr Dominic McCafferty IBIS Editors Dr Rauri Bowie Dr Richard Fuller Prof Rebecca Kimball Dr Ruedi Nager Prof Jeremy Wilson Blog Editor Mr Connor Panter

Investment Trustees

The following individuals served as Investment Trustees for the Union during the period of this report and accounts: Mr Nigel J. Crocker, Mr Richard Price and Mr Stephen J. Rumsey.

Council continually reviews the risks to which the Union is exposed and is satisfied that, as far as is practicable, it has taken appropriate steps to mitigate any risk.

The Union employs full-time staff who work from their respective home offices. Staff salaries are reviewed annually, as part of our staff appraisal process, conducted by the President and Honorary Secretary. Pay is normally adjusted in line with inflation (CPIH) and there is an option to award an unconsolidated performancebased bonus, in exceptional circumstances.

Objectives & Activities

Mission statement

The British Ornithologists’ Union will promote understanding and conservation of the world’s birds, advance ornithology within the scientific community and promote scientific ornithology to the wider birdwatching public. The BOU mission will be achieved by the following means:

• Publishing IBIS as a leading international journal of ornithological science.

• Organising a programme of meetings and conferences.

• Awarding grants and bursaries for ornithological research.

• Encouraging liaison between those actively engaged in ornithological research.

• Providing a representative body of the scientific community, able to provide ornithological information and advice to government and other policy makers.

• Maintaining and publishing the official list of birds recorded in Britain– The British List.

Council activities

At our AGM in April, held for the second year running on Zoom, Dr Richard Bradbury was elected as Vice President to replace Neil Bucknell, Dr Mark Eaton was elected as an Ordinary member of Council to replace Prof Will Cresswell, Dr Tom Finch was elected as an Ordinary Member of Council, to replace Dr High Wright as Chair of the Engagement Committee and Dr Lucy Wright was elected as an Ordinary Member of Council to Chair of the Engagement Committee (previously a co-opted member).

Elected members of Council, as Trustees of the charity, confirm that they have referred to the guidance contained in the Charity Commission's general guidance on public benefit when reviewing objectives and activities.

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ADMINISTRATION DETAILS

CONT/.

Bankers

The Union holds accounts with the following banks:

CAF Bank Ltd 25 Kings Hill, West Malling, Kent ME19 4JQ

Natwest Bank plc PO Box 6037, Brompton Road, London SW13 1XJ

Scottish Widows 67 Morrison Street, Edinburgh EH3 8YJ

We were delighted that long-standing member, Nigel Crocker, accepted our award of the Janet Kear Union Medal for his outstanding contribution to BOU during his decades of service as both Treasurer and Chair of our Investment Trustees (page 3).

Activities in Scotland

The BOU is an unincorporated charity registered in Scotland (SC044850). As well as having members in Scotland, at the time of this report, four of our Trustees, Dr Helen Baker, Dr Emma Cunningham, Dr Francis Daunt and Dr Julie Miller, three of our journal editors, Dr Dominic McCafferty, Dr Rudolf Nager and Prof Jeremy Wilson, and our Chief Operations Officer, Steve Dudley, also resided there.

Achievements & Performance

Reports on our activities from the BOU Office and Standing Committees

The BOU Office

Solicitor

The Union’s solicitors are: Laytons Ranger House, Walnut Tree Close, Guildford, Surrey GU1 4UL

Accountant & Auditor

The Union’s accountant and auditor are: Azets Audit Services Ruthlyn House, 90 Lincoln Road, Peterborough PE1 2SP

Staff

During the year, the BOU employed two full-time, home-based staff members within the BOU Office: Steve Dudley (Chief Operations Officer) and Angela Langford (Journal & Office Manager).

Office duties

The BOU Office is responsible for the effective running of the BOU, managed by the Chief Operations Officer and overseen by Council and the Union’s standing committees.

The BOU Office’s key responsibilities are:

• undertake the day to day running of the BOU;

• to support BOU Council and its committees, implementing much of the work arising from them, specifically;

• working with the IBIS Management Committee, manage non-editorial, business and marketing of the Union’s journal, IBIS;

• working with the Meetings Committee, organise BOU conferences and meetings;

• working with the Engagement Committee, develop and deliver engagement initiatives including equality and diversity items;

• working with the Grants Committee, manage the Union’s Small Grants and Career Development Bursary schemes, the John & Pat Warham Studentships and the Brenda & Tony Gibbs awards;

• working with the Records Committee, manage the British List and associated areas;

• working with the Awards Nominations Committee to develop and deliver changes to our nominations processes and awards criteria;

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BOU.ORG.UK

• working with the Honorary Treasurer, maintain accounts and budgets and the preparation of annual accounts and prepare annual forecasts;

• working with the IBIS Editorial Team

• oversee and manage the manuscript process and flow for IBIS;

• oversee marketing of the journal;

• to oversee the business and contractual sides of IBIS;

• to service the BOU membership;

• to develop and manage the BOU’s web content;

• to develop and manage the BOU’s social media activity;

• to undertake routine administration;

The Union’s primary website promotes the BOU to a wide audience and is important for recruiting new members, disseminating information about the work of the BOU, taking online bookings for conferences and for selling BOU publications.

IBIS.AC.UK

The primary gateway to IBIS – the BOU’s international journal of avian science.

• to manage BOU sales, stock and storage facility;

• to handle general enquiries, press and publicity.

In addition to working with the Union’s various committees (see individual committee reports below) the BOU Office undertook the activities outlined below.

Website

BOU.ORG.UK

At the end of 2020 we delivered our new-look website and in January of this year we rolled out our new member area (using MemberPress) which allowed, for the first time, members to manage their own membership, access IBIS and register at reduced member rates for BOU events. The new dynamic site has been very well received and widely praised by members and visitors alike.

Recognising the importance of maintaining a modern, up-to-date, and dynamic website, Council sanctioned the latest incarnation of the site which represents the largest infrastructure investment we have made to date. With a dynamic social media presence delivering thousands of visitors to our website annually, the website remains a key component of our wider communication and promotion strategy, providing the static content for IBIS, membership, conferences and grants and awards that we link to from social media and other online promotion.

We continued to develop the site during the year with work being undertaken to improve the MemberPress side (for internal BOU use) and some work to improve the appearance of the historical blog content. We also published our 600th blog post since we launched #theBOUblog in 2012.

When compared with 2020, our overall website visitor numbers increased by 22%, with the number of new visitors up by 24%, and the total number of page views up by 16%. Looking at visits to the main website sections (reflecting our core activities) of the site, all sections bar the British List (-1%) saw an increase in page views including funding (67%), conferences (23%), blog (7%) and IBIS (5%). Whilst this is all very encouraging, the strength of such increases probably better reflects successful marketing driving people from other online sources to the site. Equally encouraging is that visitors to the site from outside the UK in 2021 represent 66% of all users, showing the global reach of the BOU.

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Conferences

OUR SOCIAL YEAR

BOU.ORG.UK/BOU-CONFERENCES/

See also Meetings Committee (page 19).

@IBIS_JOURNAL

Tweets	5,568	-9%
Engagements	139,968	-21%
Organic impressions	10.4m	-12%
Followers at 31 Dec 21	19,477	+11%

Twitter (@IBIS_JOURNAL) remains our primary platform and at the end of the year we had just short of 19,500 followers. @IBIS_JOURNAL remains by far the largest ornithology society/journal account on the platform and we continue to provide an active news service for ornithologists around the world, on which we promote newly published papers from a wide selection of ornithology and ecology journals, conferences, meetings, news items, job opportunities and more. The ornithological Twitter community is highly engaged and remains the envy of many other taxa-based groups within ecology, and helps us to spread BOU, IBIS and other ornithological news far wider than previously.

IBISJOURNAL

Posts	4,219	+2%
Engagements Impressions/reach	82,270 2.71m	-40% -19%
Fans at 31 Dec 21	10,414	+6%

Our follower-base on Facebook (FACEBOOK.COM/IBISJOURNAL) continues to grow, but despite a slight increase in content posted, we saw a decrease in engagements, mirroring that of Twitter, and we expect the same dynamics are in play.

Like other societies, for the second year running our conferences were massively impacted by the pandemic, with both our in-person events switched to online delivery. Meaning that we delivered three virtual conferences on Zoom with parallel Twitter events during the year.

One of the cancelled in-person events was, for the second year running, our annual conference due to be held at the University of Nottingham. We are again grateful for the University’s continued support and understanding enabling us to carry over our deposits already paid (originally for 2020) for our 2022 event with them.

The switch to online delivery means increased demands on the BOU Office. Thankfully, the success of our first virtual conference in 2020 meant we were in good shape to run three during 2021. With detailed documents already prepared for presenters (separate items for presenting on Zoom and Twitter), for those chairing the virtual sessions, and for attendees, each required only minor tweaking to incorporate lessons learned in 2020. In addition, we retained most of those individuals who helped us deliver our 2020 conferences which enabled seamless delivery of the three 2021 events.

Whilst the cost of attending a BOU virtual event is massively reduced from the cost of attending an in-person event, even these lower prices are beyond the reach of many researchers in developing countries. So, our commitment to run parallel Twitter events alongside all three of our 2021 conferences was not just widely lauded but also delivered free, representing online conferencing for thousands of researchers around the world.

Sponsorship

We are very grateful to Leica Camera (UK) who continued their support in providing prizes for the best paper in IBIS with an early career researcher as lead author and for our science communication awards.

Social media

BOU.ORG.UK/SOCIAL-MEDIA/

See also Engagement Committee (page 12).

Our overall online presence is critical to everything we do as a society. Social media remain our primary marketing tool, enabling us to inform the wider ornithological community about all our activities, including IBIS, conferences, funding and awards, and of course membership.

Key to this is the use of social media to direct people to the BOU and IBIS websites and, after search engine searches and direct-to-site visits, social media remains the most important source of visitors to both of these sites – and importantly, it is the

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OUR SOCIAL YEAR

IBIS_JOURNAL

Posts 171 +24% Engagements 5,801 +28% Followers at 31 Dec 21 1,469 +12%

Our growth on Instagram (IBIS_JOURNAL) saw a significant step up since last year. We saw this with both Twitter and Facebook in our early years, with it taking time to gain traction on any individual platform.

WEIBO

英国 鸟类 学会会刊

Posts 16 -20% Reads 1,222,000 -40% Followers at 31 Dec 2020 12,123 +13%

Our fourth year on Weibo, China’s largest social media platform, saw reduced output and engagement due to our two volunteers having increased work commitments and the continued impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic. This did not however slow down our growth in followers.

ALTMERICS

Despite reduced engagements across our two primary altmetric contributing social platforms, we continue to see significant growth in the number of online mentions of IBIS articles overall (Table 1).

source we have some control over. For 2021, 30% (3% up on 2020) of all referrals to our website originated from social media sources, accounting for 37% of all our referred viewing sessions (+10%). So, despite reduced engagement on our two primary platforms, Twitter and Facebook, the overall benefit to the BOU of engagement is clearly increasingly positive.

Our growth on Twitter continues to be notable, with our follower growth increasing by 11% (on 2020). Our own output was again down year-on-year and this no doubt contributed to fewer engagements. But this reduction may also be partly driven by an overall decrease in activity within our community during the pandemic, and the 2021 reduction mirrors that seen in 2020. For those with increased personal pressures, like increased care responsibilities and home schooling during the pandemic, stepping back from social platforms and other work-related activities was very evident over the last two years.

Twitter accounted for 15% of referred traffic to the BOU website (up 3% on 2020).

IBIS continues to attract more online attention than any other ornithology journal. More articles receive more mentions, and importantly more mentions for the major altmetric contributing sources of news media, blogs and social media, and we continue to see significant growth in all these areas (table 1).

The high online attention of IBIS articles means we also have some of the highest altmetric-scoring papers published in ornithology, six of the top 10 including the two highest-scoring papers ever published in our sector. Our highest scoring article is five times that of the highest scoring article in any other ornithological journal.

Table 1: Online mentions of the top 5 altmetric-scoring ornithology journals (in 2021)

					Mentions	Mentions
			_____________________
# Articles		Total AAS*	News	Blog	Twitter	Facebook	Wiki	Policy
IBIS	541	17,954	543	461	28,852	1,045	633	55
change 2020 v 2021	+1.5%	+25%	+54%	+9%	+26%	-8%	+71%	-49%
The Auk	477	6,239	312	184	3,192	132	934	8
change 2020 v 2021	+30%	+7.5%	-8.5%	+7.5%	+8%	-15.5%	+105%	-14%
J Avian Biology (21)	206	4,529	104	82	6,260	400	175	8
change 2020 v 2021	+1.5%	-10%	-48%	+32%	+5%	+5%	+212%	-20%
J Ornithology (21)	265	3,330	104	59	3,276	116	298	5
change 2020 v 2021	+7.5%	+5%	-7%	-3%	+1.5%	-27%	+213%	-62%
Bird Study (21)	188	3,144	27	51	4,765	103	66	15
change 2020 v 2021	+7.5%	+2%	-29%	-50%	+2%	-13%	+127%	-50%

• AAS = Altmetric Attention Score (here combined for # Articles)

Data from Altmetric Explorer (almertic.com/explorer) downloaded 6 January 2022.

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#THEBOUBLOG

Articles attain their respective Altmetric Attention Score (AAS) by different means (table 2) – Twitter remains key to most articles’ attention, but some, such as the foraging gulls article, was driven by attention from the main news media. News media take-up is very unpredictable and even thought we work with our publisher, Wiley, ahead of publication for what we deem to be news-worthy articles, providing news media with advance copy and access to a paper, everything we prepare can be lost on the day if something bigger happens and diverts media attention.

Social media attention occurs more levelly, with ourselves the primary originator of most social content shared for IBIS articles. However, an individual author can drive the attention of their own paper with an ongoing Twitter campaign, as has been the case with the article on dogs disturbing nesting plovers.

Table 2: Altmetric breakdown for the top altmetric-scoring articles in IBIS

Our most-read blog posts in 2021:

Chasing the ghost bird

Can citizen science data provide evidence that Common Potoos migrate?

Lucas DeGroote

Powdermill Avian Research Center, US

Nest building in a changing climate

Predicting the effects of climate change on the nesting behaviour of birds and other animals

Mark Mainwaring University of Lancaster, UK

			Mentions	Mentions
	________________
	AAS	News	Blog	Twitter	Facebk	Wiki
Dogs disturbing nesting plovers *doi: 10.1111/ibi.12879	2,713	18	4	6,708	4	2
Urban gulls foraging **doi: 10.1111/ibi.12892	1,089	125	8	222	7	0
Geophagy in Amazonian parrotsdoi: 10.1111/ibi.12515	389	45	1	44	1	2
Decline of Common Cuckoodoi: 10.1111/ibi.12612	354	1	5	612	6	1
Hill Myna extinction-in-progress ***doi: 10.1111/ibi.12839	348	70	1	77	0	2

• Highest altmetric-scoring paper in ornithology ** Second highest altmetric-scoring paper in ornithology

*** Voted best paper by an early-career researcher in IBIS in 2020

AAS = Altmetric Attention Score

Got an old smartphone? Turn it into a bird-monitoring app

The use of a smartphone app for motion detection to monitor birds remotely

Ronny Steen

Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Norway

E-NEWSLETTERS

Our regular e-newsletters are sent to over 8,000 researchers, and others interested in ornithology, all around the world.

Data from Altmetric Explorer (almertic.com/explorer) downloaded 22 January 2021.

#theBOUblog

BOU.ORG.UK/BLOG/

Our blog remains the main arrival point for visitors and the most-read section of the BOU website, accounting for around a third of overall page views. During the year we published 111 blog posts (79 in 2020) - our highest annual total to date – of which 50 were on IBIS papers (41 in 2020) (see Engagement Committee on page 12 for more detail).

Blogs are increasingly popular in our sector, with more and more journals and societies setting up their own, and as a result they continue to contribute more year on year to our sector’s altmetrics. In 2021, 953 blog posts relating to articles published in ornithology journals were recorded by Altmetric – cf. to the 853 in 2020, 756 in 2019 and from a starting point of 61 in 2013) (source: Altmetric Explorer accessed 6 January 2022).

2020 saw a welcome increase in the number of articles from third-party journals being covered on #theBOUblog (21) and we were pleased that we reached this

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number again in 2021. We’d like to grow this further so please consider promoting your paper, wherever published, on #theBOUblog.

E-newsletters

BOU.ORG.UK/E-NEWSLETTERS /

We published a total of 29 e-newsletters during the year, with a focus on IBIS (monthly new articles and quarterly new issues), conferences (three held during the year) and BOU news.

Press and media

We saw a further increase in the coverage of IBIS articles in the wider media and press, as reflected in the number of altmetric mentions (see table 2 on page 10), which is testament to the work that our journal partner, Wiley, and ourselves put in to try and get our articles covered as widely as possible.

We continue to receive coverage of BOU Records Committee announcements in the UK birding press and online birding services, as well as in regional bird reports and e-groups.

General administrative items

General correspondence (largely emails and contact forms received via the website) continues to increase and take up significant Office time. We continue to maintain a storage facility in Peterborough.

AWARDS NOMINATIONS COMMITTEE

Chair

Dr Lucy Wright (RSPB)

Awards Nominations Committee

The Awards Nominations Committee was set up during 2020 to oversee the criteria and nominations process for each of the BOU’s awards, currently the Godman-Salvin Prize, Janet Kear Union Medal and the Alfred Newton Lecture. Two meetings were held during 2021 with further business conducted by email.

Members

Dr Niall Burton (BTO)

Ms Aurora Gonzalo-Tarodo (University of

West England)

Prof Rhys Green (retired, formerly RSPB & University of Cambridge)

Prof Keith Hamer (University of Leeds)

Dr Grant Humphries (HiDef Aerial Surveying) Dr Rebecca Laidlaw (Natural Resources

Wales)

Dr Elizabeth Masden (University of Highlands & Islands)

Mr David Stroud (retired, formerly JNCC) Dr Alice Trevail (University of Exeter)

The Committee’s first task was to produce more detailed criteria for the three existing awards, with the key aim of increasing the diversity of nominations, and these were agreed by Council at their November meeting. These new criteria do not change the scope of the awards but simply add detail to clarify the broad range of contributions for which they can be awarded and the nominations and selection process.

During the year a subgroup of early- and mid-career members of the Committee, led by Dr Rebecca Laidlaw, began developing a new award for early to mid-career researchers. Their proposals were considered by the full Committee at the end of the year and the finalised proposal will now go to Council at their first meeting in 2022.

Nominations were sought for the 2023 Alfred Newton Lecture on the theme of evolutionary responses. There were five nominations (four women and one man).

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 12

ENGAGEMENT COMMITTEE

Chair

Dr Tom Finch (RSPB)

A panel comprising members of the 2023 Annual Conference Scientific Programme Committee and members of the Awards Nominations Committee independently ranked the five nominees. The top three ranked nominees (two women and one man) were put forward to Council, who approved the selection. The top-ranked nominee, Prof Jane Reid, has accepted Council’s invitation to deliver the Alfred Newton Lecture in 2023.

Members

Dr Ailidh Barnes (BTO)

Dr Lynda Donaldson (Wildfowl & Wetlands

Trust)

Mr Steve Dudley, BOU COO

Dr Aonghais Cook (BTO)

Dr Jenny Dunn (University of Lincoln)

Engagement Committee

The Committee oversees engagement between all parts of the Union, its members and the wider ornithological community, in order to increase awareness of the BOU's activities, champion equality and diversity in the BOU's work, and strive towards a stable membership base. It also aims to advance ornithology, by facilitating communication and collaboration within the community.

Dr Daniel Hayhow (Earthwatch Europe)

Dr Veronica Mendez (The University Centre of

the Westfjords, Iceland)

Dr Julie Miller (University of Glasgow)

Mr Connor Panter, Blog Editor (University of Nottingham)

Dr Ashley Sendell-Price (Uppsala University, Sweden)

Dr Saskia Wischnewski (RSPB)

Ms Natalia Zielonka, Social Media Support Officer (University of East Anglia)

EQUALITY & DIVERSITY WORKING GROUP (EDWG)

Chair

The Committee delivers these aims by developing and improving opportunities to engage with more people, primarily through our conferences and social media activities. The Committee also reviews the benefits that the Union provides to its members.

The Committee met twice during 2021, with both meetings held online due to Covid19 restrictions. Dr Tom Finch joined the Committee as Chair at the BOU’s AGM in March. He takes over from Dr Hugh Wright, who played a huge role in growing the Committee and driving its work on Equality and Diversity. Thank you, Hugh. Reflecting its increasing workload, the Committee welcomed five new members in 2021, a net gain of four. Our new members are: Dr Veronica Mendez (The University Centre of the Westfjords); Dr Aonghais Cook (BTO); Dr Julie Miller (Marine Scotland Science), who joins us from Council; our new Social Media Support Officer Natalia Zielonka (University of East Anglia) and our new Blog Editor Connor Panter (University of Nottingham). Dr Nina O’Hanlon (Social Media Support Officer) retired from the Committee.

Prof Juliet Vickery, BOU President (BTO)

Members

Dr Ailidh Barnes (BTO) *

Dr Emma Cunningham (University of Edinburgh)

Mr Steve Dudley, BOU COO

Dr Jenny Dunn (University of Lincoln) Dr Tom Finch (RSPB)

Dr Daniel Hayhow (Earthwatch Europe) Dr Rosie Trevelyan (Cambridge University)

Dr Ashley Sendell-Price (Uppsala University,

Sweden) *

• EDWG Secretariat

Equality and diversity

BOU.ORG.UK/ABOUT-THE-BOU/EQUALITY-DIVERSITY/

Equality and diversity remain a major part of the Committee’s remit, and through the Equality and Diversity Working Group (EDWG), the BOU continues to explore ways in which to improve inclusivity and reduce barriers across its activities. Perhaps the most visible component of this work is the #BOUdiversityBlog, which has built upon the hugely successful Rainbow Blogs series. The aim of the #BOUdiversityBlog series is to highlight and promote a wider range of diversity issues within the ornithological community and beyond. Since the series was launched by BOU President Juliet Vickery in April 2021 (BOU.ORG.UK/BLOG-DIVERSITYVICKERY-INTRODUCING-THE-BOU-DIVERSITY-BLOG/), we have published nine eyeopening, thought-provoking and often moving articles. The series includes some perspectives from other organisations with which the BOU often liaises including the British Ecological Society and the Seabird Group. The #BOUdiversityBlog has raised awareness amongst ornithologists who may not have direct experience of these

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 13

The BOU is committed to diversity in ornithology. We aim to help overcome barriers preventing equality for ornithologists. All our activities are open to anyone interested in ornithology, regardless of, but not limited to, nationality, gender, ethnicity, disability, sexuality and socio-economic status.

Gender ratio of different BOU groups and social media accounts (2021)

	male	female	not
			known
Council & committees	53%	47%
BOU membership	63%	26%	11%
Twitter	63%	37%
Instagram	54%	37%	9%
Facebook	61%	37%	2%

issues, and provides an important signal to members and non-members alike that the BOU is progressive, open and supportive.

As part of our drive to make our journal, IBIS, more accessible and inclusive, we introduced additional language abstracts at the end of 2021. On submission, authors will be able to include a second abstract in either their native language or a language relevant to the country in which the research took place.

Ensuring that BOU activities are open and supportive to everyone, regardless of their gender identity, remains a priority. In 2021, we continued recent progress towards the BOU’s target of a 50:50 gender balance across BOU Council and committees, seeing a 53:47 (male:female) split (compared to 59:41 in 2020 and 64:36 in 2019). Among members of Council there is a roughly even gender balance, with women outnumbering men by one for the first time in our history.

Whilst we aim for 50:50 gender balance across our core activities, such as Council and committees, it is encouraging that our membership reflects our wider ornithological community, as can be seen when comparing it to our followers on our social platforms (see left). We can only see this improving further in coming years as, when we look at the make-up of early-career members (c.30% of our membership), women currently make up 47% of that cohort.

We have also updated our approach to award nominations to improve representation. – see Awards and Nominations Committee (page 11) for more information. Finally, 2021 saw a refresh to the Unconscious Bias Training which is compulsory for BOU Council members, committee members, staff, IBIS editors, support officers and conference organisers, to ensure that we all remain aware of the impacts of implicit bias and subconscious stereotyping on our decision-making.

Honorary positions

The Committee’s Support Officers assist the BOU office with journal publicity, social media activities and the BOU blog. In 2021 we welcomed two enthusiastic new Support Officers to cover #theBOUblog and social media.

Blog (#theBOUblog) – edited by Dr Leila Walker and Connor Panter

Dr Christina Ieronymidou went on maternity leave at the start of the year and understandably decided not to return to the position of Blog Editor in order to prioritise family time. Christina has been with us since 2014 and we thank her warmly for developing #theBOUblog into the force it is today. Leila provided cover for Christina up to July, when Connor Panter was appointed as editor on a Support Officer Honorarium. We thank Leila for keeping the show on the road and enabling a smooth handover with Connor. In addition, our Journal Publicity Support Officer, Dr Jente Ottenburghs, continued to write fortnightly articles on IBIS papers.

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 14

During the year, Leila and Connor oversaw the following:

SCIENCE COMMUNICATION AWARDS

• 111 new posts were published on the #theBOUblog in 2021 (our highest annual total) and continued to deliver a high diversity of content and highlight the popularity of our blog.

• The 26 articles authored by the Journal Publicity Support Officer were complemented by a further 34 written by the authors of IBIS papers.

• 11 posts gave personal perspectives on equality, diversity, inclusion and accessibility issues in ornithology.

• Blogs with a BOU focus included one post written by BOU Warham student Émile Brisson-Curadeau on the Ratmanoff King Penguin colony, and a further seven articles from a BOU research grant recipients.

• The BOU also endorsed Birds of Conservation Concern for the first time, which was supported by a blog post from our Chief Operations Officer.

• The BOU blog continues to reach a global audience and remains the most visited section of the BOU website, accounting for 28% of all page views for the site.

Mery Nomsa was voted the best social media scicommer of 2020.

Journal publicity – supported by Dr Jente Ottenburghs

Roselby Juárez (top) and Luis Sandoval’s blog post was voted the best article on #theBOUblog in 2020.

Jente continued in his role supporting the promotion of IBIS articles, in particular writing blog posts on recently published papers.

• 26 articles were written for the BOU blog, summarising a broad variety of IBIS papers published in 2020.

• These posts have contributed 11% of overall post ‘reads’ of #theBOUblog (across all posts 2012–21).

• Promoted all IBIS paper blog posts across our social media platforms.

• Referenced IBIS papers on Wikipedia; these references contribute to each paper’s Altmetric Attention Score, as well as helping to improve the overall coverage of ornithology on Wikipedia.

• Promoted IBIS papers on other websites internationally.

Social media – supported by Natalia Zielonka

In July, Natalia took over from Dr Nina O’Hanlon who has helped grow the BOU’s social media presence enormously during her four years in the role.

• Following the success of #BOUsci20, 2021 saw the rise of the dual-platform online conference, with Zoom and Twitter events run simultaneously for our spring conference (#BOU2022) and two autumn meetings (#BOUasm21, #BOUsci21).

• The BOU's Twitter account (@IBIS_journal) had over 19,477 followers at the year-end (up 11% on 31 Dec 2020).

• The BOU's Facebook account (@Ibisjournal) had over 10,414 followers at the year-end (up 6% on 31 Dec 2020).

• The BOU Instagram account (@IBIS_journal) continues to grow, with over 1,450 followers (up 12% on 31 Dec 2020), posting content focused on IBIS papers, BOU blogs, BOU events and the British List.

Cont/.

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 15

Recognising excellence in science communication

SCIENCE COMMUNICATION

AWARDS

CONT/.

Amy Hall was voted the best sound and vision scicommer in 2020.

We are grateful to Leica Camera (UK) Ltd for supporting our Science Communication Awards.

SUPPORTING MEMBERS

During the year we continued to trial a member mentoring scheme.

The BOU remains at the front of promoting science communication within ornithology. We champion the use of social media for promoting and discussing research; #theBOUblog is one of the most-read avian science blogs; and parallel Twitter conferences are now a mainstay of our online and in-person events.

Supported by Leica Camera (UK), in March we announced the winners of the second #BOUscicommAwards. The 2020 awards saw the introduction of a new category, for best sound and vision scicommer. The 2020 winners were:

• Best social media scicommer : Mery Nomsa (South Africa)

• Best of #theBOUblog : Roselvy Juárez and Luis Sandoval (Costa Rica)

• Best sound and vision scicommer : Amy Hall (UK)

You can read more about the awards and enjoy a Q&A with the winners in this blog post: BOU.ORG.UK/BOUSCICOMMAWARDS-2020-THE-WINNERS/.

We thank our awards panel of Jody Allair, Dr Tatsuya Amano, Steve Dudley, Gill Holmes, Tykee James, Dr Virat Jolli, Sorrel Lyall, Dr Nina O’Hanlon, Emily Williams and Nicole Wood who drew up a short-list of nominees from the wider pool nominated by the public. The short-list was then put to a public vote to derive the winners of each of the three categories. We also thank all those who voted.

Member mentoring scheme

Access to a community of like-minded individuals is really effective in helping people manage and navigate a way through their careers. Covid-19 restrictions have made it much harder for conventional, face-to-face interactions, leaving many feeling isolated. To extend the BOU’s support to its members, the Committee launched a pilot mentoring scheme in spring 2021, to provide peer-to-peer support for BOU members at all career stages.

Mentees were recruited through an online form, and then divided into five small groups with a shared common focus (e.g. career progression, work/life balance, women in ornithology). Groups were facilitated by BOU committee members (Dr Ailidh Barnes, Dr Grant Humphries, Dr Cat Morrison, Dr Saskia Wischnewski and Dr Tom Finch). The aim was for groups to meet virtually on a monthly basis, with a different mentor invited each month to discuss topics of the mentees’ choice.

Feedback has been generally positive, with mentees, facilitators and mentors all enjoying and benefiting from the scheme. However, fieldwork and other competing commitments meant that some groups have struggled to meet every month, so the trial will be extended until all groups have met six times.

We thank mentees, facilitators and mentors involved in the pilot so far; schemes such as this wouldn’t happen without such enthusiasm, good will and volunteered time.

Conferences

See BOU Office (page 6) and Meetings Committee (page 19).

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 16

Looking ahead

IBIS MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE

Covid-19 continues to impact many aspects of our lives, and it’s difficult to predict when, if ever, our ways of working will ever return to our previous normal. In the continued absence of in-person events, providing quality engagement with our membership is a challenge. Nonetheless, online meetings bring opportunities to engage with a much wider audience, including ornithologists who might not ordinarily attend in-person events (including parents and carers). Our parallel Twitter events, which in future will accompany all conferences (whether online or in-person), reach an even greater (and potentially more diverse) audience at a fraction of the environmental and financial cost.

The Engagement Committee will play a key role in ensuring that the Union continues to engage with and deliver benefits to its membership and the wider community through whatever combination of online and in-person events take place in 2022 and beyond. Striving for greater accessibility for under–represented groups will remain high on our agenda, as will consideration of our environmental footprint.

Chair

Dr Rosemarie Kentie (NIOZ Netherlands Institute for Sea Research)

IBIS Management Committee

IBIS.AC.UK

Members

Mr Graham Appleton, BOU Honorary Treasurer

Dr Beatriz Arroyo Lopez (Instituto de

Investigacion en Recursos Cinegeticos (IREC) (CSIC-UCLM-JCCM), Spain)

Dr Richard Broughton (UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology)

Dr Rauri Bowie, Editor (University of California – Berkeley)

Dr Dan Chamberlain, Editor (University of

Turin) – to 30 September 2021

Mr Steve Dudley, BOU COO

Dr Richard Fuller (University of Queensland) – from 1 October 2021

Dr Rebecca Kimball, Editor (University of

Florida)

Committee membership and business

The IBIS Management Committee provides strategic direction, support and advice to editors and staff on the management of the journal including with our publisher, Wiley. The IBIS Management Committee consists of the Editor in Chief, all editors, the Chief Operations Officer, the Honorary Treasurer, the Journal Manager and three regular members operating at associate editor level for IBIS or similar journals.

At the AGM, existing Committee member Dr Rosemarie Kentie, was elected to follow Dr Jennifer Smart as Chair of the Committee. We are grateful for Jen’s diligent care of the Committee in recent years and would like to thank her once again. Dr Beatriz Arroyo Lopez joined our IBIS Management Committee team during the year.

IBIS is published on behalf of the BOU by Wiley Publishing from whom we continue to receive excellent service, support and advice. The efforts of Wiley staff during 2021 are greatly appreciated, especially from Andreas Petersen, our Journal Publishing Manager. We have an excellent relationship with Wiley and maintain constant communication throughout the year, with both parties striving to improve IBIS, to ensure the journal remains at the forefront of ornithology.

Mrs Angela Langford, Journal Manager

Dr Dominic McCafferty, Editor in Chief

(University of Glasgow)

Dr Ruedi Nager, Editor (University of Glasgow) Dr Staffan Roos (Swedish University of

Agricultural Sciences)

Our annual meeting with Wiley was held on Zoom in February, with Dr Jen Smart as Chair for the last time. At the meeting, annual reports covering editorial, production, marketing and finance were presented and discussed. Our close working relationship comes to the fore during these meetings with both sides able to talk openly about our joint management of the journal.

Prof Jeremy Wilson, Editor (RSPB)

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 17

Editorial team

After 15 years, and handling over 875 manuscripts, Dr Dan Chamberlain decided it was time to step down as an editor of IBIS. We were very sad to see Dan leave us and thank him warmly for the outstanding service he has provide to IBIS and the BOU during his time as editor.

TOP CITED PAPERS

From most recent Impact Factor period (2020)

Urban exploiters have broader dietary niches than urban avoiders / Facundo Xavier Palacio / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12732

Implications of bacterial, viral and mycotic microorganisms in vultures for wildlife conservation, ecosystem services and public health / Pablo I. Plaza, Guillermo Blanco, Sergio A. Lambertucci / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12865

Individual condition but not fledging phenology carries over to affect post-fledging survival in a Neotropical migratory songbird Dean R. Evans, Keith A. Hobson, Jackson W. Kusack, Michael D. Cadman, C. Myles Falconer, Greg W. Mitchell. / DOI:10.1111/ibi.12727

MOST DOWNLOADED IBIS PAPERS

Papers downloaded in 2021

Killing of raptors on grouse moors: evidence and effects / Ian Newton / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12886

Towards redressing inaccurate, offensive and inappropriate common bird names / Robert J. Driver, Alexander L. Bond / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12984

Urban gulls adapt foraging schedule to human ‐ activity patterns / Anouk Spelt, Oliver Soutar, Cara Williamson, Jane Memmott, Judy Shamoun ‐ Baranes, Peter Rock, Shane Windsor / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12892

Dan’s replacement is Prof Richard Fuller who was selected following an open advertisement and thorough interview and selection process, to which a good number of high-quality applicants applied. Richard’s scientific work includes conservation planning, conservation psychology, migration ecology, urban ecology, and the interaction of humans and wildlife, with a special focus on the East-Asian Australasian flyway. We believe Richard will bring great experience to the IBIS team and will extend our coverage of the Asia-Pacific region, thereby further expanding our international reach.

We held an editorial meeting, again on Zoom, in November. With our editorial team now spanning the globe, with two editors in the US and one in Australia, having our meetings on Zoom means everyone was able to participate, although it was quite early or late for some. Editorial meetings are important at many levels, as they allow us to discuss topics such as the impact of Covid-19 on IBIS, and to review our manuscript criteria and submission guidelines, ensuring that the journal remains in tune with our author and reviewer community.

Our Associate Editor Board plays a vital role in the management of the journal and we thank each and every one of them for their time and dedication to the journal. In 2021, we welcomed David Canal to the Board. Luc Lens and Jesus Martínez-Padilla retired from the Board this year and we thank them for their support and commitment during their time as Associate Editors.

IBIS – #1 in ornithology

In Clarivate’s latest journal impact factors (June 2021), IBIS moved back to the top spot in ornithology, with a new Impact Factor of 2.517 (from 2.076) and leading the now 28 journals ranked in the category. This is excellent news for authors, whose papers are being more widely read and cited, for IBIS and for the BOU.

As the IBIS Management Committee, chaired by Jen Smart (2017-2021), we have been working hard to continue to improve BOU’s high-quality scientific journal. One way of measuring the success of these actions is to look at the Impact Factor, which measures the yearly average number of citations of articles published in the last two years. We have been delighted to receive a strong flow of good submissions, especially review articles, and to take a record number through to publication. This is a real team success, involving our authors, reviewers, and the editorial team of Dominic McCafferty (Editor in Chief), Rauri Bowie, Dan Chamberlain, Rebecca Kimball, Ruedi Nager and Jeremy Wilson, supported by Angela Langford and our Associate Editors from around the world. And not forgetting all the many people who reviewed articles as part of our selection process.

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 18

Getting the paper to publication is only part of the story. The number one spot is also a reflection of the excellent partnership with the production team at Wiley and the strong emphasis that the BOU itself places on promoting the work of our authors, through blogs, in e-newsletters and via social media. Thanks go to Christina Ieronymidou, Jente Ottenburghs, Nina O'Hanlon, Leila Walker and Steve Dudley, as well as all those authors who write articles about their own papers for #theBOUblog.

TOP ALTMETRIC PAPERS

Papers published in 2021

Towards redressing inaccurate, offensive and inappropriate common bird names / Robert J. Driver, Alexander L. Bond / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12984

Geolocators reveal variation and sex-specific differences in the migratory strategies of a long-distance migrant / Fraser Bell, Stuart Bearhop, Martins Briedis, Myriam El Harouchi, Sophie C. Bell, Joan Castello, Malcolm Burgess / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.123017

Sex and age differences in the diet of the Eurasian Sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus) using web-sourced photographs: exploring the feasibility of a new citizen science approach / Connor T. Panter, Arjun Amar / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12918

Nomadic breeders Snowy Owls (Bubo scandiacus) do not use stopovers to sample the summer environment / Andrea Brown, Rebecca A. McCabe, Jean-François Therrien, Karen L. Wiebe, Scott Weidensaul, David Brinker, Gilles Gauthier, Kyle H. Elliott / DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12950

Dominic Ng ’s paper was voted the best ECR paper published in IBIS in 2020.

Genomic and morphological data help uncover extinction ‐ in ‐ progress of an unsustainably traded Hill Myna radiation Dean R. Evans, Keith A. Hobson, Jackson W. Dominic Y. J. Ng, Tereza Švejcarová, Keren R. Sadanandan, Teuku Reza Ferasyi, Jessica G.H. Lee, Dewi M. Prawiradilaga, Tomáš Ouhel, Elize Y.X. Ng, Frank E. Rheindt / DOI:10.1111/ibi.12839

Our marketing and promotion of our own papers also make IBIS the highest scoring ornithology journal measured by Altmetric and we have the two papers with the highest Altmetric Attention Scores in ornithology (see table 2 on page 10).

Dual language abstracts

Towards the end of the year, we introduced dual language abstracts. In addition to the usual English abstract, we now encourage authors to write a second abstract in their own language or in a language appropriate to their study location. We hope that this will make articles more accessible and widely read. We were very pleased with the warm response this was met with from the ornithological community.

The future

2022 is going to be busier than usual, with some significant changes. Sadly, after five years at the helm, our Editor-in-Chief, Dr Dominic McCafferty, will leave us in August, upon completion of volume 164. A hard act to follow, taking us to the highest ranked ornithology spot for only the second time in 25 years, we will advertise for Dom’s replacement in early 2022.

The year will also see the retirement (in July) of Steve Dudley, the BOU’s Chief Operations Officer for the past 25 years. This is not only a significant change for the BOU but also for IBIS, since the COO plays an integral role in managing the business and marketing aspects of the journal. It is planned that the incoming COO will have a two-month overlap with Steve, who himself will remain in a consultancy capacity with us into 2023, and we are confident that we have sound systems in place to facilitate this major change (expected in June) and that the new COO will find IBIS in excellent health.

2022 also sees us enter our third year of our four-year contract with Wiley. During the year we will work on a new contract to run from January 2024 which must be in place by the end of 2022 if we are to remain with Wiley. With his experience of negotiating our last three journal publishing contracts, outgoing COO, Steve Dudley, will be responsible for overseeing this important task, which will also enable the incoming COO to focus on the more routine side of managing the journal.

Best ECR paper

Our now annual award of the best early-career researcher paper (from the preceding volume) saw five papers nominated from the IBIS Associate Editor board, from which Dominic Ng et al’s paper on the ‘extinction-in-progress’ of the Hill Myna came top in the public vote held in early 2021 (see left and BOU.ORG.UK/IBIS/BESTECR-PAPER-OF-2020/).

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 19

MEETINGS COMMITTEE

Meetings Committee

BOU.ORG.UK/CONFERENCES-AND-MEETINGS/

Chair

Dr Francis Daunt (UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology)

Members

Dr José Alves (University of Aveiro, Portugal and University of Iceland)

Dr Maria Bogdanova (UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology)

Dr Katherine Booth Jones (BTO Northern

Ireland)

Mr Steve Dudley, BOU COO

Dr Christine Howard (Durham University) Dr Joelene Hughes (RSPB)

Mrs Angela Langford, Journal & Office

Manager

Dr Cat Morrison (University of East Anglia) Dr Ana Payo-Payo (University of Aberdeen) Dr Rob Robinson (BTO)

Dr Amanda Trask (Institute of Zoology) Dr Kevin Wood (Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust)

The Meetings Committee is responsible for maintaining the ongoing programme of BOU conferences and meetings and providing advice and support to the BOU Office and others responsible for organising and running BOU events.

The Committee met remotely via Zoom three times during the year and also conducted business by email and telephone. Dr Rob Robinson completed his term in 2021 and we are grateful to him for his strong contributions to the Committee and commitment to BOU events over many years. The Committee welcomed three new members as part of an expansion in the size of the Committee in order to accommodate the increasing workload: Dr Katherine Booth Jones (BTO Northern Ireland), Dr Christine Howard (University of Durham) and Dr Kevin Wood (Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust).

2021 events and the global pandemic

Conferences remain a major focal point for many small societies, a key way to engage with members and their wider research communities.

With the pandemic and associated restrictions on face-to-face events continuing throughout 2021, all three BOU conferences were conducted online using the platform Zoom, with a Twitter conference running in parallel with each event. The BOU built on the success of the Zoom conference ‘Climate change and birds: solutions to the crisis’ in November 2020, detailed in the last year’s Annual Report. All three 2021 conferences were extremely successful, with excellent scientific programmes delivered as recorded talks arranged in advance of each conference and with few technical problems on event days.

Virtual events deliver a considerably larger attendance with a much wider international reach than equivalent in-person events of the past (please see the individual accounts that follow for details). This positive outcome of online events, coupled with a continued appreciation of the advantages of in-person events, has led the BOU to adopt the policy of delivering both online and in-person conferences in our future annual programme, subject to Covid restrictions.

The Committee would particularly like to thank our expanding conference delivery team of Ryan Burrell, Triin Kassiku, Camilo Carneiro, Monika Reiss, Sarah Binnie, Nina O’Hanlon, Natalia Zielonka, Angela Langford and Steve Dudley for all their hard work, with an ever-increasing workload across multiple platforms.

2021 annual conference

Restoring bird populations (#BOU2021)

Our 2021 annual conference took place in late March/early April. The Scientific Programme Committee comprised Dr David Douglas (RSPB: Chair), Dr Geoff Hilton (Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust), Dr Nancy Ockendon (Endangered Landscapes Programme) and Dr Amanda Trask (Institute of Zoology).

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 20

TWITTER CONFERENCES

We are committed to deliver our conferences across dual platforms, with paid-for in-person and virtual conferences each having a free to access parallel Twitter event. There is a misconception that ‘cheap’ virtual events are accessible to everyone, but even low-cost (by Western standards) can still be prohibitively expensive for those in developing countries. And whilst we recognise that the cost of accessing free platforms, such as Twitter, is not entirely equitable as the cost of Internet access is disproportionately high for many in developing countries, by providing conference content on a free-to-access platform our events are more accessible and we do reach far more researchers around the world than we would otherwise do.

As can be seen from the reports within the Meetings Committee section (pages 19–26) the ‘in-the-room’ audience of a Twitter event greatly outnumbers that of even a low-cost virtual conference on Zoom, e.g., BOUsci21 was 1,924 on Twitter vs 217 on Zoom.

It is also estimated that the emissions associated with travelling to an in-person conference are several million times greater than those resulting from tweeting about the same research (Caravaggi et al 2021).

FURTHER READING

Twitter conferences as a low-carbon, far-reaching and inclusive way of communicating research in ornithology and ecology .

Anthony Caravaggi, Agnes B. Olin, Kirsty A. Franklin, Steve P. Dudley. 2021. IBIS. 163: 1481– 1491. doi: 10.1111/ibi.12959

The focus was on new techniques in restoration science and research/policy, relating to the 2020 biodiversity targets. The natural world is under huge pressure from human activity, placing bird populations and their habitats at risk. At the same time, there is growing recognition that avian conservation should look beyond slowing species’ declines and avoiding extinction, to actively restoring avian abundance and diversity in landscapes and working to restore whole ecosystems. Despite the challenges facing nature, our understanding of how to restore species and ecosystems has never been greater, and the momentum for ecological restoration is building globally. Restoring bird populations requires working at a range of scales, from individual animals to whole ecosystems, and from local sites to whole flyways. Birds can be indicators of recovery trajectories for entire ecosystems and can be integral to the success of habitat restoration, for example through their functional roles as predators, scavengers and dispersal agents. The conference brought together the latest science underpinning the restoration of bird species and their ecosystems, focusing on successes, challenges and future directions.

The conference was originally scheduled for March 2020 but was postponed because of the Covid-19 pandemic (see 2020 Annual Report for full details). The original aspiration was for the conference to take place in person at the University of Nottingham, and we are extremely grateful to the university for supporting this move by ensuring the deposits paid towards BOU2020 would be transferred in full to 2021. However, a number of restrictions remained in place during the planning period in late 2020 and early 2021 so the conference was moved to an online format, and the deposit with the University of Nottingham transferred once more to 2022. The conference organisers kindly agreed to continue in their roles following the postponement and the vast majority of presenters indicated that they would be willing to move their talks back 12 months and deliver them online. The Committee is thankful that organisers and presenters were able to deliver such an excellent programme in the circumstances. In order to attract a wider audience, including attendants from the Americas, and to minimise screen fatigue, the conference ran over three days from early afternoon to early evening UK time. It included a range of activities for Early Career Researchers on the previous afternoon and during the main conference. The BOU Annual General Meeting was held on the Wednesday evening.

The Alfred Newton Lecture was delivered by Prof Carl Jones (Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust) and other keynote speakers included Mary Colwell (Freelance producer and writer), Nicola Crockford (RSPB), Dr John Ewen (Institute of Zoology), Dr Joe Tobias (Imperial College) and Dr Karen Varnham (RSPB) – all with associated Twitter presentations. There were a further 24 talks with associated Twitter presentations, 15 poster presentations (with each speaker giving a 30-second speed introduction in a dedicated Zoom session) and 17 Twitter-only talks.

The conference attracted 235 registrants from 40 countries, 35% of whom were from outside the UK. Twitter saw an in-the-room equivalent audience of 1,580 over the three days with 450 active participants (presenters, those asking and replying to comments to tweets, etc) and a real-time reach of 600,000.

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 21

As with the November 2020 Zoom conference, we again utilised Slack for wider conference engagement, with each session having its own ‘channel’ allowing for attendees to post additional questions of speakers, and with each poster presenter having their own dedicated channel. The platform also serves as a helpdesk for attendees to raise conference issues with the organisers. Feedback was again very positive, and we will continue to tweak this platform’s use in order to maximise engagement.

2021 autumn scientific meetings

In 2019, we decided to increase the number of autumn meetings from one to two from 2021, so this was the first year in which two took place.

Birds and people: from conflicts to resolution (#BOUasm21)

In response to the marked increase in research and wider interests of birds and conflicts, BOU held a conference on this theme on 9 November, entitled ‘Birds and people: from conflict to co-existence’ (#BOUasm21 on Twitter). The Scientific Programme Committee was led by Dr Barry MacMahon (University College Dublin, Ireland) and supported by Dr Juliette Young (National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment, France), Dr Isla Hodgson (University of Stirling), Dr Bea Arroyo (Instituto de Investigación en Recursos Cinegéticos/Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain) and Dr Francis Daunt (UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology).

Interactions between humans and animals are becoming increasingly frequent, as wild habitats shrink and human presence expands throughout the world. Conflicts are one of the outcomes of this increased interaction, with severe consequences for both wildlife and people. Globally, conflicts can arise across a diversity of ecosystems, species and circumstances. Further, they are more complex than a first glance might suggest, involving not just ecological arguments, but also economic, cultural, social and political disputes. Avian species are often at the centre of such conflicts. Examples include conflicts over birds and agricultural interests, forestry, and public health. Such situations severely threaten not just the conservation of birdlife, but also human lives, livelihoods, and well-being. The first step to overcoming these problems is to recognise and understand the full diversity of drivers that cause conflicts to emerge, persist and escalate. Only then may we move towards fostering mutually beneficial relationships between birds and people. This conference facilitated a platform to explore the potential of a) science to provide data-driven solutions to this complex topic and b) the collaboration between multiple disciplines (e.g. natural scientists, social scientists and ecologists) and other stakeholders to develop fresh, interesting and effective approaches to conflicts between birds and people.

The original intention was that this would be an in-person event in Peterborough in order to make use of the deposit with the venue that had been moved forward by 12 months from November 2020, and because it was felt that this topic leant itself well to an in-person format. In the end, continuing restrictions led to the decision to move

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FUTURE CONFERENCING

The last two years have seen most

conferences switch to a virtual format. We’ve now delivered four such events on Zoom with parallel Twitter conferences for increased accessibility and reach.

We’ve attempted to move back to in-person events but on each occasion have been foiled by increases in Covid transmissions at critical points (e.g. during registration periods) and to safeguard participants, including our own volunteers and staff. Whilst virtual events have worked very well during pandemic conditions, we will however return to inperson conferences when we feel it is safe for all concerned to do so.

the conference online. Keynote talks (with associated Twitter presentations) were delivered by Prof Nils Bunnefeld (University of Stirling), Dr Martina Carrete (Universidad Pablo de Olavide), Dr Isla Hodgson (University of Stirling) and Dr Richard Sherley (University of Exeter). There were a further 17 Zoom talks with associated Twitter presentations, 15 Twitter-only talks and a conference summary (Zoom only) given by independent rural commentator, Rob Yorke.

Of the 150 people who were registered for the event, 94 attended live at some point during the day. Twitter reached a real (in the room equivalent) audience of 1,420 people of which 355 actively engaged (retweeting content, commenting and asking questions).

Developments in monitoring science (#BOUsci21)

The second planned autumn meeting was on the theme of new monitoring technologies, chosen to showcase the many new data collection and analysis methods that have been developed in recent years. It was entitled ‘Developments in monitoring science’ (#BOUsci21 on Twitter) and took place on Zoom over two full days (24–25 November). Dr Mark Eaton (Rare Breeding Birds Panel & RSPB) led the Scientific Programme Committee, supported by Dr José Alves (University of Aveiro, Portugal and University of Iceland and BOU Meetings Committee), Dr Fiona Burns (RSPB) and Ms Dawn Balmer (BTO).

The monitoring of bird populations provides the bedrock for informing conservation priorities and the research and conservation action that arises from these priorities. Whilst traditional field methods underpin the standardised monitoring programmes that have operated in the UK and many other countries, sometimes for decades, rapid recent developments in technology, online communication and statistics are offering many new possibilities that may enable us to improve existing monitoring programmes, and also to extend monitoring efforts to new species, regions and habitats. The conference brought together ornithologists and ecologists from academic and conservation organisations, to share findings and explore the opportunities provided by recent advances and breakthroughs, covering a wide range of themes including technological developments such as drones, bioacoustics, radar and eDNA; new analyses of monitoring and recording data; online and mobile data collection; demography and monitoring; engagement of volunteers and the role of citizen science; and using monitoring data in conservation and policy.

Keynote talks (with associated Twitter presentations) were delivered by Prof Caren Cooper (North Carolina State University), Dr Gabriel Gargallo (Catalan Ornithological Institute), Dr Simon Gillings (BTO), Dr Cat Horswill (Zoological Society of London/University College London), Dr Kate Jennings (RSPB) and Dr Kate Jones (University College London). There were a further 24 talks with associated Twitter presentations and seven Twitter-only talks.

The conference was attended by 217 registrants from 28 countries, 47% of whom were outside the UK – our largest overseas audience of any event, showing the

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2022 ANNUAL CONFERENCE

AVIAN REPRODUCTION

wider interest in the topic. Of the 217 registrants, 163 (77%) attended live at some point across the two days. This is high, with our three previous Zoom conferences coming out around 63%. The rest will have registered for the recordings. On Twitter, across the two days we had a real audience of 1,924. Of these 813 either tweeted (2,019 times) or commented on the tweets posted (the remaining 1,111 shared or liked content).

Slack was used for both events for wider conference engagement with each session having its own ‘channel’, allowing attendees to post additional questions of speakers.

Third party conferences

Due to increased workloads across other activities we didn't take part or support any other conferences during 2021.

12 – 14 Apr 2022 | on Zoom & Twitter

Future events

With increased Covid-19 transmissions during the critical pre-conference registration period, which resulted in virtually no-one committing to the event, we have reluctantly moved our annual conference over to Zoom (and Twitter) and it will now run over three half-days, Tue, 12 April through to Thu, 14 April.

Within bird life histories, breeding events represent an opportunity to measure some of the fundamental drivers of population and evolutionary processes. It is a crucially important life stage that has heavy energetic demands on parents and offspring, and its consequences can be felt throughout the lifetime of the individuals involved. For offspring, the maternal and environmental effects of their rearing conditions influence their phenotype which determines their competitive and reproductive success later in life. For adults, the investment in offspring brings great rewards but also incurs costs that might carry-over for years.

SCIENTIFIC PROGRAMME COMMITTEE:

Dr Ian Hartley: Chair (University of Lancaster, UK)

Dr José Alves (University of Aveiro, Portugal & BOU Meetings Committee)

Dr Sarah Burthe (UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology)

Dr Rebecca Laidlaw (Natural Resources Wales, UK)

Dr Rob Robinson (BTO & BOU Meetings Committee, UK)

Image: Common Moorhen feeding chick Francis C. Franklin CC BY SA 4.0 Wikimedia Commons

2022 Annual conference – ‘Avian reproduction’ (#BOU2022)

The 2022 annual conference, originally planned for 2021 but postponed because of the pandemic, will be on the topic of avian reproduction (#BOU2022 on Twitter). Within bird life histories, breeding events represent an opportunity to measure some of the fundamental drivers of population and evolutionary processes. It is a crucially important life stage that has heavy energetic demands on parents and offspring, and its consequences can be felt throughout the lifetime of the individuals involved. For offspring, the maternal and environmental effects of their rearing conditions influence their phenotype which determines their competitive and reproductive success later in life. For adults, the investment in offspring brings great rewards but also incurs costs that might carry-over for years. An understanding of the key components of reproductive success can provide important insights into the mechanisms of change and any potential associated limitations. Whether we are interested in practical conservation or the more theoretical concepts within behaviour and evolution, the breeding stages of bird life histories provide an important focus for many studies. Ranging from nest architecture to egg colouration, clutch sizes to nestling growth patterns, and parental care to chick survival, our understanding of drivers of reproductive success have developed exponentially over the past few decades. The conference will aim to cover a range of topics relating to the nesting period in the life history of birds, including interactions between breeders, offspring and siblings; individual breeding decisions; evolution and function of egg morphology and nest structure; development and ecophysiology of eggs and young; costs of reproduction; links between individual nest outcomes and population dynamics; and conservation implications.

The conference is being organised by Dr Ian Hartley (University of Lancaster, Chair), supported by Dr José Alves (University of Aveiro, Portugal & BOU Meetings Committee), Dr Sarah Burthe (UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology), Dr Becky Laidlaw (University of East Anglia) and Dr Rob Robinson (BTO & formerly BOU

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2022 AUTUMN CONFERENCES

CITIZEN SCIENCE & BIRDS 10–11 October 2022 | on Zoom & Twitter #BOUasm22

The first of two autumn meetings in 2022 will look how people drive many aspects of our understanding of birds.

The Scientific Programme Committee is Chaired by Dr Ellie Owen (RSPB).

Further details in due course at BOU.ORG.UK.

BIRDS AS INDIVIDUALS 23 November 2022 | in-person & Twitter #BOUsci22

The second autumn 2022 meeting will be a one-day, in-person meeting in Peterborough and will look how individual birds respond to changes at different levels, e.g. morphologically, physiologically, behaviour or life-history strategies.

The Scientific Programme Committee is Chaired by Dr Thomas Bodey (Aberdeen University).

Further details in due course at BOU.ORG.UK.

Images:

top – birders, U.S. National Archives and Records Administration / (NAID) 7722789 Wikimedia Commons; bottom – Sparrowhawk, Imran Shah CC BY SA 2.0 Wikimedia Commons

Meetings Committee). The Alfred Newton Lecture will be delivered by Prof Nick Davies (University of Cambridge) and other keynote speakers include Dr Martin Bulla (Max Planck Institute for Ornithology), Dr Emma Cunningham (University of Edinburgh), Dr Lynda Donaldson (Wildlife & Wetlands Trust), Dr Nicola Hemmings (University of Sheffield), Prof Pat Monaghan (University of Glasgow) and Dr Ally Phillimore (University of Edinburgh).

As this report was being produced, the decision to switch this event to a virtual one was taken, based on their being very few people committed to the in-person event so. This early decision to switch to online delivery elicited an overwhelmingly positive response.

2022 autumn scientific meetings

The first autumn conference in 2022 will take place on 10-11 October 2022, on the topic of ‘Citizen science and birds: people powering ornithology’ (#BOUasm22 on Twitter). Ornithology has a long history of participation by volunteers, who undertake bird surveys and other research, and much of our knowledge of birds would not exist without ‘citizen scientists’. This approach has enabled studies to take place across wider areas and over longer time scales than would otherwise be possible. Linking citizen science with technological and analytical advances may further increase our capacity to study birds at scale and to meet more of the challenges posed by modern ornithology. Innovative citizen science programmes have unlocked new ornithological data, for example in population ecology, phenology, tracking environmental change and migration. At the same time new and diverse audiences are engaging in research and conservation. This has led to novel research on who citizen scientists are, how to motivate and support involvement and how to measure the impact of participation. Meanwhile, robust data collection and validation within citizen science programmes remain key areas for learning, particularly as new technologies start to automate much of what citizen scientists record. This two-day meeting aims to communicate what succeeds and fails in citizen science programmes, what technological advances are available to ornithology, the prominence of rigour and evaluation, and the social science of community participation in ornithology. Citizen science will likely continue to be a key method for ornithology, long into the future, and this meeting will be of interest to a wide range of ornithologists.

The conference is being organised by Dr Ellie Owen (RSPB), supported by Dr Arjun Amar (Fitzpatrick Institute, University of Cape Town), Dr Tom Hart (University of Oxford) and Dr Joelene Hughes (RSPB).

The second autumn conference in 2022 will take place on 23 November 2022, on the topic of ‘Birds as individuals’ (#BOUsci22 on Twitter). Birds have a wide range of predictable and unpredictable challenges, including climatic changes, food availability, habitat quality, social interactions and more. How individuals respond to these changes, through variation in morphology, physiology, behaviour or lifehistory strategies between (and within) individuals, can impact on the ecological and evolutionary success of populations and species, regardless of the source (i.e. genetic or phenotypic plasticity) of this variation. For example, among-individual

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CODE OF CONDUCT

We welcome everyone to BOU events, be these in person at our conferences, meetings and workshops, or online events such as Twitter conferences.

We work hard to engender and promote a welcoming environment that is collaborative, supportive and engaging for everyone involved. Our events provide opportunities to share, develop and broaden viewpoints in a safe and inclusive environment.

We celebrate diversity in all its forms and expect that all our participants are respectful and considerate of each other, that they provide supportive critique, and embrace the multitude of opinions that are on offer.

variation in avian ‘personalities’ can be related to differences in physiological and behavioural responses, survival and reproductive success. The increased resolution provided by examining questions at the individual-level provides a mechanistic understanding of how and why responses to external and internal challenges vary. It also enables exploration of the extent to which individuals are able to adjust their phenotype (or not), and the consequences of such plasticity. This scales up to explain patterns at population and community levels. For instance, variation in individual traits within populations may generate individuals that consistently consume a small subset of the whole population’s resource base (individual diet specialisation). This strategy can allow for fitness-enhancing changes in individual foraging efforts that respond to variation in resource availability, which is a key stabilizing mechanism of complex food webs. Enhancing our knowledge of the consequences of individual-level variation touches on almost all aspects of avian ecology. It increases our ability to understand the dynamics of natural populations, and ultimately to develop more informed management for protection and restoration objectives. This conference will cover a range of topics including physiology, movement ecology, behaviour, foraging ecology, conservation biology and population modelling.

The conference is being organised by Dr Thomas Bodey (University of Aberdeen, Chair), supported by Dr José Alves (University of Aveiro, Portugal and BOU Meetings Committee), Dr Karin Maldonado (Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Spain) and Dr Ana Payo Payo (University of Aberdeen).

Improving BOU conferences

If you have any concerns, feel that any participant of an event has breached this code, or have suggestions for how we can make our events more inclusive and productive, please contact any member of the BOU staff, BOU’s Meetings Committee or event organisers (named contacts are listed in all event programmes). During an event, please report any incident as soon as you feel able, to allow us to act upon your concerns.

Our focus during 2021 was to further improve our delivery of online conferences following the success of our first Zoom conference in November 2020. We have been very pleased with the success of our four dual platform (Zoom and Twitter) conferences to date, so much so that we now have a policy in place to organise Zoom/Twitter conferences where we wish to maximise international reach and are willing to forego the advantages of in-person events. This also allows for greater inclusion by potential speakers, especially on truly globally ornithological topics, allowing for an even broader range of speakers and research areas to be delivered to a larger, wider audience.

Further, at the 2021 annual conference, we trialed a new idea that was originally planned for the postponed in-person 2020 conference: following feedback that conferences could be a good opportunity to facilitate postdocs in building a peer community, the Committee agreed to trial a workshop for postdocs to run in parallel to the ECR workshops. The postdocs themselves drove and delivered the event, and although attendance was modest the feedback was good and the proposal is for this to be maintained at future annual conferences.

The use of blind review of submissions continues to work well for BOU conferences. We have published a conference Code of Conduct (see BOU.ORG.UK/BOUCONFERENCES/CODE-OF-CONDUCT/) and continue to implement equality, diversity and inclusiveness initiatives (BOU.ORG.UK/ABOUT-THE-BOU/EQUALITY-AND-DIVERSITY/) into

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GRANTS COMMITTEE

Chair

all of our activities, working with the Engagement Committee’s Equality and Diversity Working Group. Online events offer significant opportunities for enhancing diversity at our conferences, and we are encouraging all scientific committees to make maximum use of this.

Dr Sonya Clegg (University of Oxford)

Members

Dr Tom Bradfer-Lawrence (RSPB) Mr Steve Dudley, BOU COO Dr Ilya Maclean (University of Exeter) Dr Sam Patrick (University of Liverpool) Dr Martin Sullivan (Manchester Metropolitan

University)

Grants Committee

BOU.ORG.UK/FUNDING/

This Committee advises Council on the selection of research grant and bursary applications that the BOU should support.

The Committee considers applications for:

• small research grants.

• career development bursaries;

• open to BOU members and from non-members in developing countries.

• John & Pat Warham Studentships;

FUNDING ORNITHOLOGY

Two of the species being researched by projects funded by the BOU in 2021.

From the top:

Narcondam Hornbill Rhyticeros narcondami Rohitjahnavi CC BY SA 4.0 Wikimedia Commons

Palmchat Dulus dominicus Jorge checo CC BY SA 3.0 Wikimedia Commons

• funded by a bequest left to the BOU by the late John and Pat Warham for the study of Sphenisciform (penguins) and Procellariiform (tubenoses) seabirds.

• Brenda and Tony Gibbs Awards;

• funded by a bequest left to the BOU by the late Brenda and Tony Gibbs for research on tracking and migration studies including the use of new technologies.

The Committee met twice via Zoom in 2021. The meeting to consider research grant and career development bursary applications was held in February, and the meeting to consider applications for our first Brenda and Tony Gibbs Award was held in August. Due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on our investments, the John and Pat Warham Studentship was not offered this year. The remainder of the Committee’s business was conducted by email.

The membership of the Committee grew by one, with Dr Martin Sullivan joining as an ordinary member.

Small Ornithological Research Grant scheme

The Committee received 54 grant applications (51 in 2020, 55 in 2019). Six applications were rejected due to breaches in submission criteria, or the amount requested was for a very small proportion of overall project funding, leaving 48 to be assessed (50 in 2020, 46 in 2019). Fourteen applications were removed during an initial sift by the Committee Chair, on the basis of scientific quality. Committee members were able to view all of these rejected applications and request any individual application be considered in full. A total of 34 applications were initially scored by the Committee ahead of their annual meeting held on 2 February 2021. Three qualified for funding under the Brenda and Tony Gibb bequest. The combined scores and comments from Committee members were used for the basis of the onthe-day discussions to determine which projects to support.

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Council approved eight awards, totaling £12,000, to be made in 2021:

2020 PROJECTS UPDATE

Due to the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on projects we have funded in recent years, we provide here an update to those awards made in 2020.

Olivia Hicks (UK) | £1,527 (amount requested)

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Centre d’Etudes Biologiques de Chize, France The energetic trade-off between immunity and foraging complexity.

Hannah Moon (US) | £1,450 (requested £1,524)

PhD student, University of Hawaii at Manoa, USA

The following projects were carried out during 2020 and will be reported on in due course:

Molecular drivers of spectral perception in endangered Hawaiian seabirds.

Benjamin Murphy (Germany) | £1,111 (amount requested)

Josh Arbon (UK) | £1,750

PhD candidate, University of Exeter, UK Does pair-bond strength affect parental care strategies?

Amanda Bourne (South Africa) | £1,020 PhD candidate, Fitzpatrick Institute of African Ornithology, University of Cape Town, South Africa Do seasonal changes in food resources predict breeding phenology and reproductive success in Southern Pied Babblers Turdoides bicolor ?

Initially awarded £1,440, a slightly revised, lower cost (£1,020) project successfully ran as scheduled. A report can be seen on the BOUfunded project page on the BOU website at BOU.ORG.UK/CATEGORY/BOU-FUNDED/.

Crinan Jarrett (UK) | £1,600 PhD candidate, University of Glasgow, UK Putting a price on the menu: Quantifying bird ecosystem services in African cocoa plantations.

PhD student, Fitzpatrick Institute of African Ornithology, South Africa Taking the heat: are Drongo’s Dicrurus adsimilis efforts to cool nestlings in hot weather constrained by the necessity of maintaining safe body temperatures?

Not yet paid out with project now to be undertaken in 2022, due to impacts of Covid-19 pandemic in 2021.

Rohit Naniwadekar (India) | £1,499 (amount requested)

Researcher, Nature Conservation Foundation, India

Population genetics of the island endemic Narcondam Hornbill Rhyticeros narcondami.

Cagla Onsal (Turkey) | £1,488 (amount requested) Masters Student, Koc University, Turkey

Multi-modal signalling in noise in the European Robin Erithacus rubecula.

Riva Riley (US) | £1,425 (requested £1,500)

President’s Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Maryland, USA

Patterns of cooperation in a communally nesting bird, the Palmchat Dulus dominicus.

Not yet paid out with the project now to be undertaken in 2022 due to impacts of Covid-19 pandemic in 2021.

Petra Sumasgutner (Austria) | £1,500 (amount requested)

Jenna McCullough (US) | £1,600

PhD student, University of New Mexico, US Island kingfishers as an emerging model system to study the genomics of speciation.

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Konrad Lorenz Research Centre, Austria Honest signals and circulating carotenoids in an urban top predator (Common Kestrel).

Brenda and Tony Gibbs small research award

Separate to the main Gibbs Award (awards up to £20,000 – see page 32) we will use the remainder of the bequest left to us by Brenda and Tony Gibbs to fund smaller awards for applications within the parameters of the Gibbs bequest coming in through our small grant scheme.

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 28

One award was made in 2021:

2020 PROJECTS UPDATE

CONT/.

The following projects were carried over to 2021 and will be reported on in due course:

Fraser Bell (UK) | £1,989

PhD candidate, University of Exeter, UK Patterns and consequences of parasite infection in a declining long-distance migratory passerine.

Darren O’Connell (Ireland) | £1,650 Postdoctoral Research Associate, University, UK Birds as monitors of ecosystem restoration: using avian soundscapes for assessing biodiversity and functioning of restored mangrove forests.

The original project was unable to run due to fieldwork and travel restrictions during the Covid-19 pandemic in both 2020 and 2021. With the award paid out and equipment purchased, a revised proposal for this project to be moved from studying Indonesian mangrove communities to study Scottish upland communities on similar lines was accepted by the Committee, and the project will run in 2022.

WARHAM STUDENT

Our 2018 Warham Student, Kirsty Franklin , University of East Anglia, UK.

Jethro George Gauld (UK) | £2,000 (amount requested) PhD student, University of East Anglia, UK Real world trial of new LORA GPS tracking technology, to understand vulture movement behaviour at wind farms, in three dimensions .

The project successfully ran as scheduled. A report can be seen on the BOUfunded project page on the BOU website at BOU.ORG.UK/CATEGORY/BOU-FUNDED/.

Career Development Bursary scheme

No new awards were offered in 2021.

Due to the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic, the two bursaries awarded in 2020 were not taken up, with the funding held over until 2021. Unfortunately, neither project was able to go ahead in 2021 and the awards have now been withdrawn.

John and Pat Warham Studentships

Of the four fully funded studentships available, three have been appointed in previous years. Updates on these projects are provided below.

Kirsty Franklin, University of East Anglia, UK (commenced 2018) The ‘Round Island petrel’ conundrum

Principal supervisor: Prof Jennifer Gill

Kirsty told us the following in her end of year communication:

Somehow, I am in the final year of my PhD and I have no idea where the time has gone! I am therefore in full data analysis and thesis-writing mode with the aim of finishing my PhD this spring.

So far, I’m happy to have two of my PhD data chapters completed; they’ve both been submitted for publication and are undergoing their second round of revisions. One of these uses geolocator tracking data from the 62 Round Island petrels Pterodroma sp for which we have multiple complete migrations, to investigate how repeatable the petrels are in their migratory strategies. The second paper is a meta-analysis of the repeatability of avian migration phenology (timings of arrival to and departure from breeding grounds). This paper evolved from a literature review into a meta-analysis, following reviewer comments and after I contacted metaanalysis expert, Shinichi Nakagawa, from the University of New South Wales (Sydney). He guided me through the meta-analysis process and so, in addition to learning a new skill, I’m pleased to have made a new collaboration. Thanks, Shinichi! Once these papers are published, I am sure I will offer to write a BOU blog post about each of them, so please keep an eye out.

I’m also pleased to say that the camera traps and stands, which I deployed during my fieldwork on Round Island in 2019, to monitor petrel breeding attempts, are still standing. These cameras have generated over 160,000 images so I think I have

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 29

enough images for my analysis now! Of these images, ~32,000 have been classified through the citizen science project, Seabird Watch, in which around 1,600 volunteers have taken part and (virtually) visited Round Island.

I’m also currently supervising an undergraduate student based in the School of Computing Sciences here at University of East Anglia (UEA) who is testing several machine learning and computer vision algorithms aimed at automating the detection and counting of petrels in the images. If you’re interested in hearing more about our camera work and what they have revealed, then make sure to catch my presentation at the BOU 2022 conference on avian reproduction.

Despite the global pandemic and lots of conferences being cancelled, postponed, or moved online, I’ve managed to present some of my PhD work virtually. From the start of my PhD, I knew that my confidence in public speaking was something I wanted to work on, and I think four conference/seminar presentations, an interview with David Lindo (aka the Urban Birder), and an appearance on a Facebook Live show within a year has been pretty good going. I’ve also gained some teaching and supervisory experience, by supervising an MSc student based at Imperial College London, who was looking at Herald Petrel Pterodroma heraldica tracking data from Raine Island (as part of an Institute of Zoology and Queensland government (Australia) collaboration), assisted with some of the R statistics teaching for PhD students at UEA and (fingers crossed) I will be going to eSwatini in March/April to demonstrate on an undergraduate field course!

But for now, I’ve got a busy few months ahead as I wrap up my remaining PhD chapters. I’m excited to see the results of the remaining analyses, and how it all comes together. Overall, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my PhD, I’ve learnt A LOT, and have worked and met some fantastic people. Most importantly, I couldn’t have asked for a better supervisory team and support from the BOU.

WARHAM STUDENT

Our 2019 Warham Student, Paige Green , University of Tasmania, Australia.

Paige Greene, University of Tasmania, Australia (commenced 2019)

Quantifying the ecological factors under-pinning population trends in crested penguins

Principal supervisor: Prof Mark Hindell

In her end of year communication with us, Paige wrote:

According to my progress bar on my student account I am 920 days into my PhD project – which sounds so much longer than 2.5 years! I’ve had my second-year review which went swimmingly. I have had my first thesis chapter accepted for publication which should be published in the first half of 2022. My first lead author paper! Woop woop!

The past year has had its ups and downs, due to Covid-related setbacks, but all in all I am really happy with what we have achieved. Last year two scientists from New Zealand’s Department of Conservation (amidst changing plans numerous times and funding and permit issues) managed to take a voyage to the Antipodes Islands, south of New Zealand, and very excitingly deployed geolocation trackers on Eastern

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 30

Rockhopper Eudyptes chrysocome filholi and Erect-crested Penguins Eudyptes sclateri. These trackers have been collecting data on where these penguins forage in the ocean over the last year. The Department of Conservation have again gone to retrieve these devices back from the penguins allowing us for the first time to find out where these birds search for food in the marine environment. We are very excited about the results so far. This new tracking data will form part of a study focusing on the population of tracked crested penguins Eudyptes sp in the New Zealand area. This is important as many of these populations are in decline, and by finding out where they go to find food we can try to understand what’s happening in these environments and why the penguins may not be finding enough food to sustain stable or increasing population numbers.

I am currently refining my next data chapter which is a large meta-analysis of all known winter migration tracks from four species of crested penguins and the effects that climate change could have on these animals. This has been a challenging and large chapter to assimilate but I am very happy with how it is coming together. Particularly, it has been exciting to lead this large-scale effort that will include most of the current crested penguin researchers across the world (around 20 authors!). This study is the product of a collaboration of international scientists and an example of the multispecies and broad scale studies needed in a world where environments are changing rapidly. While we have modelled the climate redistributions of four widespread and charismatic penguin species, this study serves as an example of the risks faced by millions of marine predators that breed in the Southern Ocean.

During my project I have had the opportunity to help supervise a third-year student on GLS tracking work in the non-breeding season of albatrosses (Diomedeidae). I have also been fortunate in collaborating with GLS tracking work in the nonbreeding season of Grey Petrels Procellaria cinerea from Macquarie University (Australia) as well as GLS tracking work in the non-breeding season of Snow Petrels Pagodroma nivea from Antarctica.

I presented my work at the World Seabird Twitter Conference, World Seabird Conference and the Biologging Conference. I gave a lecture for an Honours’ module on ‘Seabirds as Southern Ocean Sentinels’; and have also done a bit of science communication in the form of a radio interview on Sub-Antarctic life and my first data chapter, and co-wrote an article for the Ecological Society of Australia’s newsletter on the challenges of Sub-Antarctic field work.

Completely outside of my PhD (but because of it!) I was incredibly lucky to be asked to visit France’s Antarctic Base Durmont D’Urville. It has been my life dream to see Antarctica and this last year it actually happened! It was awe-inspiring and gave me a profound sense of why we are do research and why we need to preserve this fragile ecosystem.

It’s been an incredible year filled with amazing opportunities. I literally get to live my dreams because of my Warham Studentship

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WARHAM STUDENT

Our 2020 Warham Student, Émile BrissonCuradeau , McGill University, Canada.

Émile Brisson-Curadeau, McGill University, Canada (commenced 2020) Foraging behaviour of King Penguins under extreme climatic events Principal supervisor: Dr Kyle Elliott

In Émile’s end of year communication, sent from Kerguelen Islands, he wrote:

Back in the field again! After thirty hours in the air, and almost two weeks of sailing, I have reached the Kerguelen Islands, one of the most remote island groups on the planet. Once more, I have spent Christmas and New Year’s Eve with the King Penguins Aptenodytes patagonicus here: not a bad way to spend the holidays!

For this second field season we will equip the deep-diving penguins with GPS, GLS, accelerometers and temperature-depth recorders to understand their foraging behavior year-round, and how it is affected by climate and oceanography.

But what have I been up to this last year? We published our first paper in Marine Biology! In this paper we looked at how we could use accelerometers to remotely determine the number of prey captures in a penguin dive, hence having an estimate of their foraging success. This method will in fact be used this year with those penguins equipped with accelerometers.

Other than that, we advanced work on other papers, mainly one looking at how large-scale climatic trends affect the survival of penguin chicks. So far, it seems that the constant warming of the air temperature at Kerguelen has helped the penguin chicks survive in the winter, mostly reducing their thermoregulation costs. However, the warming of the sea might also have a (negative?) influence on the foraging success of the parents, and therefore on chick provisioning. More results on that project will come out soon, and hopefully we will publish our results by next year.

I’m really looking forward to 2022. Conferences are starting to get organised, and I have registered for the BOU annual meeting, as well as the International Ornithological Conference occurring in Durban. It will be exciting to share my results with the scientific community! Hopefully Covid will not change these plans… In any case, I will register for virtual presentations if it does!

Since all conferences were cancelled this year, our entire budget went into covering fieldwork costs. We are lucky enough that we can still conduct fieldwork out here, so we might as well take the opportunity to collect as much data as we can! Most of the budget was spent on the purchase of loggers that we are currently deploying.

Luckily my work on the Kerguelen Islands hasn’t really been impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic. The NGO responsible for the logistics of all scientific projects on Kerguelen is very active and they are taking extreme measures to ensure scientific projects can continue on the island without contamination. I had to quarantine before taking the boat here and I was tested twice. Thankfully, Covid-19 still hasn’t reached the island, so those measures are working so far! The only real change for me has been outside the field season, when I work at home (in Canada)

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Flesh-footed Shearwater Ardenna carneipes is the subject of the first of our Brenda and Tony Gibbs Awards aimed at investigating the migration and movements of birds. Image | patrickkavanagh CC BY 2.0 Wikimedia Commons

on my data rather than in the lab. I also might have wanted to go to a conference or two, but like everyone else, I’ll have to wait a little longer for those kinds of events to come back. Other than that, Covid-19 hasn’t really slowed down my project!

Fourth Warham studentship

Due to the continuing Covid-19 pandemic, we delayed awarding the final studentship but expect to advertise for the fourth and final award during 2022.

Brenda and Tony Gibbs bequest

We had an excellent response to call for applications for this new award and the Committee assessed 37 applications. The combined scores and comments from Committee members were used for the basis of the on-the-day discussions at a meeting on 17 August 2021.

Council approved a single award of £20,000:

Jennifer Lavers (University of Tasmania)

Lecturer in Marine Science, Institute for Marine & Antarctic Studies (IMAS), University of Tasmania, Australia

Investigating carry-over effects of plastic pollution on post-fledging movement and survival of a pelagic seabird.

Records Committee

BOU.ORG.UK/BRITISH-LIST/

RECORDS COMMITTEE

Chair

Dr James Gilroy (University of East Anglia)

Secretary

Dr Chris McInerny (University of Glasgow)

Members

Mr Chris Batty (Lancashire) Mr Steve Dudley, BOU COO Mr Paul French (BBRC Chairman) Mr Mark Golley (Norfolk, UK)

Dr Alex Lees (Manchester Metro University) Dr Pierre-Andre Crochet (French National

Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS)) Mr Andrew Stoddart (Norfolk, UK)

The Records Committee is responsible for maintaining the British List, the official list of birds recorded in Britain.

The Committee met once (remotely) during the year with other business conducted by email.

Dawn Balmer retired as a member of the Committee in July 2021. Dawn has been a diligent and enormously valued member during her time with us, and we extend our gratitude to Dawn for all her hard work over the course of her term. We welcomed Mark Golley as a new member – Mark is a very active Norfolk-based birder and naturalist, and we look forward to his contributions to the Committee’s work.

Changes to the British List

The Committee’s 53rd Report, covering the period from October 2020 to September 2021, was published in December (IBIS 164: 363-368), announcing the following changes to Category A of the British List:

• South Polar Skua Stercorarius maccormicki – species added to the List.

• White-chinned Petrel Procellaria aequinoctialis – species added to the List.

• Brown Booby Sula leucogaster – species added to the List.

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 33

• Yellow-bellied Flycatcher Empidonax flaviventris – species added to the List.

White-chinned Petrel (Orkney, May 2020) was a remarkable sighting for a birdwatcher out on his lockdown walk in spring 2020. One of seven species admitted to the British List in 2021. Image © Robert Foubister

• Ruby-crowned Kinglet Corthylio calendula – species added to the List.

• Eastern Yellow Wagtail Motacilla tschutschensis – nominate subspecies tschutschensis added to the List.

The 53rd Report also included the addition of the species pair Southern Giant Petrel/Northern Giant Petrel Macronectes giganteus/Macronectes halli to Appendix 3 (species groups not included in the systematic list) on the basis of an individual seen in Co. Durham and Northumberland in 2019 that could not be identified to species level.

Subsequent to the publication of the 53rd Report the Committee announced the addition of one further species to Category A of the British List (which will be included in the 54th Report):

• Ross’s Goose Anser rossii.

In total, these changes to the British List, together with taxonomic changes in line with IOC taxonomy (detailed in IBIS 164: 363-368) bring the total to 628 species as at 31 December 2021.

Links with other groups

The Committee maintains close links with the British Birds Rarities Committee (BBRC). The BOURC Secretary continues to work closely with BBRC’s Secretariat and other European committees, and informal links are maintained with Association of European Records Committees (AERC).

BOURC online intranet

The Committee operates an online intranet site that is used for the storage of images and documents to assist with its work.

Membership

At the end of the year our total membership stood at 946 (1,041 at 31 Dec 2020) comprising 666 full members (751 at 31 Dec 2020) and 280 reduced rate subscribers (290 at 31 Dec 2020) made up of 262 early career researchers (ECRs) and 18 from developing countries.

55 resignations were received during the year (27 in 2020), and Council noted, with sadness, the following deaths: Dr William Bourne, Dr Stephen Davies, Mr Keith Herber, Mr Robin Prytherch, Dr M Ridpath, Mr Julian Taylor and Dr Jean Marc Thiollay

Subscription rates increased in late 2020 from £40.00 to £45.00 for Ordinary membership and from £15.00 to £20.00 for ECR membership.

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 34

Acknowledgements

The Union would like to extend its thanks and gratitude to the following who have assisted with the many BOU activities throughout the year: all those members of Council and our committees as listed throughout the report who give up their time willingly to develop, oversee and deliver our wide range of activities; Raurie Bowie, Dan Chamberlain, Richard Fuller, Rebecca Kimball, Dominic McCafferty, Ruedi Nager, Jeremy Wilson, Patrick Smith, all Associate Editors (listed in each issue of IBIS) and the hundreds of reviewers (listed annually in IBIS) for their invaluable work for IBIS; Richard Sale (on behalf of the Alexander Library, Oxford University) for his editing of the IBIS book reviews; Prof Christopher Perrins and Neil Bucknell for arranging the obituaries published in IBIS; Farhath Jabeen, Andreas Petersen, Janany Sudarshan, Joanna Borysiak, Graham Allen and colleagues at Wiley, for their help in delivering our high quality journal; Leica (UK) for their support of our IBIS early career researcher and science communication awards; Nigel Crocker, Richard Price and Stephen Rumsey for their excellent management of the Union’s investment portfolio; Dr David Douglas (RSPB; Chair), Dr Nancy Ockendon (Endangered Landscapes Programme), Dr Geoff Hilton (Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust) and Dr Amanda Trask (Institute of Zoology) for their work preparing the programme for the virtual annual conference (Restoring bird populations); Dr Barry MacMahon (University College Dublin, Ireland), Dr Juliette Young (National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment, France), Dr Isla Hodgson (University of Stirling), Dr Bea Arroyo (Instituto de Investigación en Recursos Cinegéticos/Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain) and Dr Francis Daunt (UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology) for the planning and delivery of our ‘Birds and People’ virtual conference; Dr Mark Eaton (Rare Breeding Birds Panel & RSPB), Dr José Alves (University of Aveiro, Portugal & University of Iceland and BOU Meetings Committee), Dr Fiona Burns (RSPB) and Ms Dawn Balmer (BTO) for the planning and delivery of our ‘Development in monitoring science’ virtual conference; Ryan Burrell, Triin Kassiku, Camilo Carneiro, Monika Reiss, Sarah Binnie, Nina O’Hanlon and Natalia Zielonka for their excellent delivery of our three virtual events across Zoom and Twitter; Yachang Cheng and Zhu Lei for running our Weibo account in China; our science communication awards panel of Jody Allair, Dr Tatsuya Amano, Gill Holmes, Tykee James, Dr Virat Jolli, Sorrel Lyall, Dr Nina O’Hanlon, Emily Williams and Nicole Wood;

Whilst it was encouraging to see our membership hold up in 2020 during the first year of the pandemic, we feel the combination of the continuation of the pandemic with an increase in membership fees contributed to the drop in membership in 2021.

We remain very grateful for the continued support of our members and hope we can count on your continued commitment to the BOU and ornithology during what will almost certainly be a very challenging 2022.

Financial review

Graham Appleton, Honorary Treasurer

The continuation of the Covid-19 pandemic created a difficult backdrop to 2021 and it was sad not to meet anyone at conferences or committee meetings. Despite these issues, the BOU has been able to meet its strategic goals, without too big an impact on operations. A recovery in the value of

investment funds restored the Union’s balance sheet, and that makes it appear as if there was a small surplus in the year (£24,774), after the large apparent losses in 2020 (£139,936). Averaging out the two figures, suggests that the Union is reducing assets by about £58,000 per year, including expenditure from recent legacies, which is in line with the strategy agreed by Council. Looking at the accounts in detail reveals a mixture of encouraging news and two issues that are a cause for concern – membership numbers and IBIS revenue.

I should like to express my gratitude to everyone involved in three very successful online conferences – BOU staff, Support Officers and volunteers who helped deliver online components, the Meetings Committee, the three Scientific Programme Committees and the many conference presenters. Income not only met expenses; it also helped to fund the charitable work of the Union, especially through grants and bursaries. The negative side of not meeting face-to-face is that we saw a fall in membership numbers, although this was more than defrayed by the increase in subscriptions. In the medium term, Council will want to try to address recruitment and retention issues.

IBIS income is of huge importance to the BOU and we are delighted with the support that we receive from Wiley, who continue to develop new marketing opportunities. Thanks to our combined efforts, we saw only a 0.2% decline in income, when compared to 2020. This is pleasing, given the way that the publications landscape is changing and the wider downturn associated with Covid-19. The latter has created difficulties for universities and academic institutes, making it harder for publishers to sell new publication packages. There is also the underlying issue of ‘Open Access’ which has been affecting the income of specialist journals for some years and which will create challenges in the medium and longer terms.

Cont/.

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Acknowledgements

CONT/.

Sophie Detchon, Robert Bogdan, Stoycho Stoychov, Brian Edwards and Charlie Douglass at Douglass Digital for maintenance and development of the BOU website; Maria Rogers and the conference staff at the University of Nottingham Conferences for working with us on the ongoing postponement of our in-person annual conference; Chas Holt (BBRC Secretary), Patric Lorgé (AERC Chairman), Bob McGowan (National Museums Scotland), Keith Naylor, British Birds Rarities Committee (BBRC), and bird records committees across Europe under the auspices of the Association of European Records Committees (AERC) who have assisted BOURC during the year; and Caroline Gillis, Tracey Richardson and colleagues at Azets (accountants and auditors).

We apologise to anyone we have inadvertently omitted.

During 2021, we received a legacy of £500 from the Estate of Robin Woods. We are always grateful for such gifts, which give us that little bit more flexibility to support ornithology in the UK and around the world. It is not possible to say ‘thank you’ when such gifts are received but I hope that members who have made these sorts of provisions realise how much their generosity will be appreciated.

On the expenditure side of the accounts, we significantly reduced the costs of Council and committee meetings, by not meeting in person, and reduced the amount of promotional work, as this is usually linked to our own conferences and to others at which the BOU is represented. These cost-trimming measures were sensible in the short-term but we will need to invest in these areas if we are to grow membership.

Investments

Twelve months ago, I reported a significant drop in the value of BOU investments. In 2021, we benefited from a recovery in the global economy, to such an extent that endowment funds were higher than they had been at the end of 2019. Income from these funds is used to help with grants and bursaries.

During 2021, the first payments were made from the Brenda and Tony Gibbs Fund, money from which we shall hope to spend over the next five or six years. Towards the end of 2021, we sold the investments held in the John and Pat Warham Scholarship Fund, thereby realising gains made. There is enough money in the Fund to fulfill our commitments to the first three Warham students and we shall be advertising a fourth (and final) opportunity in 2022. I am grateful for the sage advice we receive from our Investment Trustees: Nigel Crocker, Richard Price and Stephen Rumsey.

Council policies

The Union will continue to reduce the amount of cash savings we hold, in line with the expectations of the Charity Commissioners. Council has agreed that we should reduce Unrestricted Funds to £350,000, in the medium term, representing one year of operations (£250,000) and a buffer of £100,000. The size of this reserve takes account of uncertainty over medium-term income from journal publishing, which is currently a significant part of the Union’s turnover.

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Responsibilities of the Trustees

The Members of Council are responsible for preparing the Trustees' Report and the financial statements in accordance with applicable law and United Kingdom Accounting Standards (United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice).

The law applicable to charities in England and Wales and in Scotland requires the Members of Council to prepare financial statements for each financial year which give a true and fair view of the state of affairs of the charity and of the incoming resources and application of resources of the charity for that year.

In preparing these financial statements, the Members of Council are required to:

• select suitable accounting policies and then apply them consistently;

• observe the methods and principles in the Charities SORP;

• make judgements and estimates that are reasonable and prudent;

• state whether applicable accounting standards have been followed, subject to any material departures disclosed and explained in the financial statements; and

• prepare the financial statements on the going concern basis unless it is inappropriate to presume that the charity will continue in operation.

The Members of Council are responsible for keeping sufficient accounting records that disclose with reasonable accuracy at any time the financial position of the charity and enable them to ensure that the financial statements comply with the Charities Act 2011, the Charity (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008, the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005, the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended) and the provisions of the trust deed. They are also responsible for safeguarding the assets of the charity and hence for taking reasonable steps for the prevention and detection of fraud and other irregularities.

Staff remuneration is reviewed annually in January by the principal officers (President, Honorary Treasurer and Honorary Secretary). The decision on whether to make a pay award is contingent on affordability and the 12-month average CPIH for the previous calendar year. Benchmarking of pay and pension against comparators within the same sector, including the main avian research charities, is undertaken periodically according to availability and affordability of information.

Approved by the Council on 9 March 2022 and signed on their behalf by:

Prof Juliet Vickery President

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Independent auditor’s report

to the members of the British Ornithologists’ Union for the year ended 31 December 2021

Opinion

We have audited the financial statements of British Ornithologists' Union (the ‘ charity ’ ) for the year ended 31 December 2021 which comprise the statement of financial activities, the balance sheet and the notes to the financial statements, including a summary of significant accounting policies. The financial reporting framework that has been applied in their preparation is applicable law and United Kingdom Accounting Standards, including Financial Reporting Standard 102 The Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice).

In our opinion, the financial statements:

• give a true and fair view of the state of the charity ’ s affairs as at 31 December 2020 and of its incoming resources and application of resources, for the year then ended;

• have been properly prepared in accordance with United Kingdom Generally Accepted Accounting Practice; and

• have been prepared in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011, the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005 and regulation 8 of the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended).

Basis for opinion

We conducted our audit in accordance with International Standards on Auditing (UK) (ISAs (UK)) and applicable law. Our responsibilities under those standards are further described in the Auditor's responsibilities for the audit of the financial statements section of our report. We are independent of the charity in accordance with the ethical requirements that are relevant to our audit of the financial statements in the UK, including the FRC ’ s Ethical Standard, and we have fulfilled our other ethical responsibilities in accordance with these requirements. We believe that the audit evidence we have obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for our opinion.

Conclusions relating to going concern

In auditing the financial statements, we have concluded that the Trustees ’ use of the going concern basis of accounting in the preparation of the financial statements is appropriate.

Based on the work we have performed, we have not identified any material uncertainties relating to events or conditions that, individually or collectively, may cast significant doubt on the charity ’ s ability to continue as a going concern for a period of at least twelve months from when the financial statements are authorised for issue.

Our responsibilities and the responsibilities of the Members of Council with respect to going concern are described in the relevant sections of this report.

Other information

The other information comprises the information included in the annual report other than the financial statements and our auditor ’ s report thereon. The Members of Council are responsible for the other information contained within the annual report. Our opinion on the financial statements does not cover the other information and we do not express any form of assurance conclusion thereon. Our responsibility is to read the other information and, in doing so, consider whether the other information is materially inconsistent with the financial statements or our knowledge obtained in the course of the audit, or otherwise appears to be materially misstated. If we identify such material inconsistencies or

BOU Annual Report & Accounts | 2021 | 38

apparent material misstatements, we are required to determine whether this gives rise to a material misstatement in the financial statements themselves. If, based on the work we have performed, we conclude that there is a material misstatement of this other information, we are required to report that fact.

We have nothing to report in this regard.

Matters on which we are required to report by exception

We have nothing to report in respect of the following matters in relation to which the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 and the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended) require us to report to you if, in our opinion:

• the information given in the financial statements is inconsistent in any material respect with the Trustees ’ report; or

• sufficient and proper accounting records have not been kept; or

• the financial statements are not in agreement with the accounting records; or

• we have not received all the information and explanations we require for our audit.

Responsibilities of Members of Council

As explained more fully in the statement of Trustees ’ responsibilities, the Members of Council are responsible for the preparation of the financial statements and for being satisfied that they give a true and fair view, and for such internal control as the Members of Council determine is necessary to enable the preparation of financial statements that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error. In preparing the financial statements, the Members of Council are responsible for assessing the charity ’ s ability to continue as a going concern, disclosing, as applicable, matters related to going concern and using the going concern basis of accounting unless the Members of Council either intend to cease operations, or have no realistic alternative but to do so.

Auditor's responsibilities for the audit of the financial statements

We have been appointed as auditor under section 144 of the Charities Act 2011 and section 44(1)(c) of the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005 and report in accordance with the Acts and relevant regulations made or having effect thereunder.

Our objectives are to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements as a whole are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error, and to issue an auditor's report that includes our opinion. Reasonable assurance is a high level of assurance, but is not a guarantee that an audit conducted in accordance with ISAs (UK) will always detect a material misstatement when it exists. Misstatements can arise from fraud or error and are considered material if, individually or in the aggregate, they could reasonably be expected to influence the economic decisions of users taken on the basis of these financial statements.

A further description of our responsibilities for the audit of the financial statements is located on the Financial Reporting Council ’ s website at: http://www.frc.org.uk/auditorsresponsibilities. This description forms part of our auditor ’ s report.

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Extent to which the audit was considered capable of detecting irregularities, including fraud Irregularities, including fraud, are instances of non-compliance with laws and regulations. We design procedures in line with our responsibilities, outlined above and on the Financial Reporting Council ’ s website, to detect material misstatements in respect of irregularities, including fraud.

We obtain and update our understanding of the entity, its activities, its control environment, and likely future developments, including in relation to the legal and regulatory framework applicable and how the entity is complying with that framework. Based on this understanding, we identify and assess the risks of material misstatement of the financial statements, whether due to fraud or error, design and perform audit procedures responsive to those risks, and obtain audit evidence that is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for our opinion. This includes consideration of the risk of acts by the entity that were contrary to applicable laws and regulations, including fraud.

In response to the risk of irregularities and non-compliance with laws and regulations, including fraud, we designed procedures which included:

• Enquiry of management and those charged with governance around actual and potential litigation and claims as well as actual, suspected and alleged fraud;

• Reviewing minutes of meetings of those charged with governance;

• Assessing the extent of compliance with the laws and regulations considered to have a direct material effect on the financial statements or the operations of the entity through enquiry and inspection;

• Reviewing financial statement disclosures and testing to supporting documentation to assess compliance with applicable laws and regulations;

• Performing audit work over the risk of management bias and override of controls, including testing of journal entries and other adjustments for appropriateness, evaluating the business rationale of significant transactions outside the normal course of business and reviewing accounting estimates for indicators of potential bias.

Because of the inherent limitations of an audit, there is a risk that we will not detect all irregularities, including those leading to a material misstatement in the financial statements or non-compliance with regulation. This risk increases the more that compliance with a law or regulation is removed from the events and transactions reflected in the financial statements, as we will be less likely to become aware of instances of non-compliance. The risk of not detecting a material misstatement resulting from fraud is higher than for one resulting from error, as fraud may involve collusion, forgery, intentional omissions, misrepresentations, or the override of internal control.

Other matters

Your attention is drawn to the fact that the charity has prepared financial statements in accordance with "Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice applicable to charities preparing their accounts in accordance with the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102)" (as amended) in preference to the Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice issued on 1 April 2005 which is referred to in the extant regulations but has now been withdrawn.

This has been done in order for the financial statements to provide a true and fair view in accordance with current Generally Accepted Accounting Practice.

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Use of this report

This report is made solely to the charity ’ s trustees, as a body, in accordance with part 4 of the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 and regulation 10 of the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006. Our audit work has been undertaken so that we might state to the charity's trustees those matters we are required to state to them in an auditors ’ report and for no other purpose. To the fullest extent permitted by law, we do not accept or assume responsibility to anyone other than the charity and the charity ’ s trustees as a body, for our audit work, for this report, or for the opinions we have formed.

Tracey Richardson BSc (Hons) FCA (Senior Statutory Auditor)

11 March 2022

For and on behalf of Azets Audit Services

Chartered Accountants

Statutory Auditor

Ruthlyn House 90 Lincoln Road Peterborough Cambridgeshire PE1 2SP

Azets Audit Services is eligible for appointment as auditor of the charity by virtue of its eligibility for appointment as auditor of a company under of section 1212 of the Companies Act 2006.

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES

FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

Current financial year Notes Income from: Donations and legacies 3 Charitable activities 4 Investments 5 Total income and endowments Expenditure on: Raising funds 6 Charitable activities 7 Total expenditure Net gains/(losses) on investments 12 Net (outgoing)/incoming resources before transfers Gross transfers between funds Net movement in funds Fund balances at 1 January 2021 Fund balances at 31 December 2021	Unrestricted funds £ 33,596 117,312 26,339 177,247 55,126 96,164 151,290 50,599 76,556 7,749 84,305 566,431 650,736	Restricted funds £ – – 3,854 3,854 – 77,487 77,487 – (73,633) (7,749) (81,382) 443,480 362,098	Endowment funds £ – – 1,426 1,426 – – – 20,425 21,851 – 21,851 140,592 162,443	Total 2021 £ 33,596 117,312 31,619 182,527 55,126 173,651 228,777 71,024 24,774 – 24,774 1,150,503 1,175,277	Total 2020 £ 35,523 103,308 28,358
					167,189
					59,105
					185,130
					244,235
					(62,890)
					(139,936) –
					(139,936) 1,290,439
					1,150,503

The statement of financial activities includes all gains and losses recognised in the year.

All income and expenditure is derived from continuing activities.

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES (CONTINUED)

FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

Prior financial year (2020) Notes Income from: Donations and legacies 3 Charitable activities 4 Investments 5 Total income and endowments Expenditure on: Raising funds 6 Charitable activities 7 Total expenditure Net gains/(losses) on investments 12 Net (outgoing)/incoming resources before transfers Gross transfers between funds Net movement in funds Fund balances at 1 January 2020 Fund balances at 31 December 2020	Unrestricted funds £ 35,523 103,308 23,721 162,552 59,105 109,968 169,073 (45,561) (52,082) 7,516 (44,566) 610,997 566,431	Restricted funds £ – – 3,489 3,489 – 75,162 75,162 – (71,673) (7,516) (79,189) 522,669 443,480	Endowment funds £ – – 1,148 1, 148 – – – (17,329) (16,181) – (16,181) 156,773 140,592	Total 2020 £ 35,523 103,308 28,358
				167,189
				59,105
				185,130
				244,235
				(62,890)
				(139,936) –
				(139,936) 1,290,439
				1,150,503

The statement of financial activities includes all gains and losses recognised in the year.

All income and expenditure is derived from continuing activities.

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

BALANCE SHEET

AS AT 31 DECEMBER 2021 2021 Fixed assets Notes £ £ Investments 13 565,806 Current assets Debtors 15 52,408 Cash at bank and in hand 617,383 669,791 Creditors: amounts falling due within one year 16 (60,320) Net current assets 609,471 Total assets less current liabilities 1,175,277 Capital funds Endowment funds-general General endowment funds 20 162,443 Income funds Restricted funds 19 362,098 Unrestricted funds 650,736 1,175,277	2020 £ 48,294 427,680 475,974 (42,163)	£ 716,692 433,811
		1,150,503
		140,592 443,480 566,431
		1,150,503

The accounts were approved by the Members of Council on 9 March 2022.

Prof Juliet Vickery President

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

1 Accounting policies

Charity information

The British Ornithologists' Union is a registered charity in England and Wales (249877) and Scotland (SC044850) and is unincorporated.

The charity is a public benefit company.

The charity's place of business is:

PO Box 417, Peterborough, PE7 3FX, United Kingdom.

1.1 Accounting convention

The accounts have been prepared in accordance with the charity's trust deed, the Charities Act 2011, the Charities and Trustee Investment (Scotland) Act 2005, the Charities Accounts (Scotland) Regulations 2006 (as amended) and “Accounting and Reporting by Charities: Statement of Recommended Practice applicable to charities preparing their accounts in accordance with the Financial Reporting Standard applicable in the UK and Republic of Ireland (FRS 102)” (as amended for accounting periods commencing from 1 January 2016). The charity is a Public Benefit Entity as defined by FRS 102.

The charity has taken advantage of the provisions in the SORP for charities applying FRS 102 Update Bulletin 1 not to prepare a Statement of Cash Flows.

The financial statements have departed from the Charities (Accounts and Reports) Regulations 2008 only to the extent required to provide a true and fair view. This departure has involved following the Statement of Recommended Practice for charities applying FRS 102 rather than the version of the Statement of Recommended Practice which is referred to in the Regulations but which has since been withdrawn.

The financial statements are prepared in sterling, which is the functional currency of the charity. Monetary amounts in these financial statements are rounded to the nearest £.

The financial statements have been prepared under the historical cost convention, modified to include the revaluation of freehold properties and to include investment properties and certain financial instruments at fair value. The principal accounting policies adopted are set out below.

1.2 Going concern

At the time of approving the financial statements, the Members of Council have a reasonable expectation that the charity has adequate resources to continue in operational existence for the foreseeable future. Thus the Members of Council continue to adopt the going concern basis of accounting in preparing the financial statements.

1.3 Charitable funds

Unrestricted funds are available for use at the discretion of the Members of Council in furtherance of their charitable objectives unless the funds have been designated for other purposes.

Designated funds are unrestricted funds earmarked by the trustees for particular future project or commitment.

Restricted funds are subjected to restrictions on their expenditure declared by the donor or through the terms of an appeal, and fall into one of two sub-classes: restricted income funds or endowment funds.

Endowment funds are subject to specific conditions by donors that the capital must be maintained by the charity.

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

1 Accounting policies (continued)

1.4 Income

• All incoming resources are included in the statement of financial activities when entitlement has passed to the charity; it is probable that the economic benefits associated with the transaction will flow to the charity and the amount can be reliably measured. The following specific policies are applied to particular categories of income:

• income from donations or grants is recognised when there is evidence of entitlement to the gift, receipt is probable and its amount can be measured reliably.

• legacy income is recognised when receipt is probable and entitlement is established.

• income from donated goods is measured at the fair value of the goods unless this is impractical to measure reliably, in which case the value is derived from the cost to the donor or the estimated resale value. Donated facilities and services are recognised in the accounts when received if the value can be reliably measured. No amounts are included for the contribution of general volunteers.

• income from contracts for the supply of services is recognised with the delivery of the contracted service. This is classified as unrestricted funds unless there is a contractual requirement for it to be spent on a particular purpose and returned if unspent, in which case it may be regarded as restricted.

1.5 Expenditure

• Expenditure is recognised on an accruals basis as a liability is incurred. Expenditure includes any VAT which cannot be fully recovered, and is classified under headings of the statement of financial activities to which it relates:

• expenditure on raising funds includes the costs of all fundraising activities, events, non-charitable trading activities, and the sale of donated goods.

• expenditure on charitable activities includes all costs incurred by a charity in undertaking activities that further its charitable aims for the benefit of its beneficiaries, including those support costs and costs relating to the governance of the charity apportioned to charitable activities.

• other expenditure includes all expenditure that is neither related to raising funds for the charity nor part of its expenditure on charitable activities.

All costs are allocated to expenditure categories reflecting the use of the resource. Direct costs attributable to a single activity are allocated directly to that activity. Shared costs are apportioned between the activities they contribute to on a reasonable, justifiable and consistent basis.

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NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED) FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

1 Accounting policies (continued)

Overheads

Overhead costs are allocated to the relevant cost centres in the following proportions:

		A F Langford	S P Dudley
	Office costs	remuneration	remuneration
Conference costs	15%	7.5%	22.5%
Management and administration	45%	47.5%	60%
IBIS publishing costs	37.5%	45%	15%
Research costs	2.5%	–	2.5%
	100%	100%	100%

These proportions were decided upon by the trustees, who believe that they represent a fair reflection of the resources expended by the charity on each activity.

1.6 Fixed asset investments

Unlisted equity investments are initially recorded at cost, and subsequently measured at fair value. If fair value cannot be reliably measured, assets are measured at cost less impairment.

Listed investments are measured at fair value with changes in fair value being recognised in income or expenditure.

1.7 Cash and cash equivalents

Cash and cash equivalents include cash in hand, deposits held at call with banks, other short-term liquid investments with original maturities of three months or less, and bank overdrafts. Bank overdrafts are shown within borrowings in current liabilities.

1.8 Financial instruments

The charity has elected to apply the provisions of Section 11 ‘Basic Financial Instruments’ and Section 12 ‘Other Financial Instruments Issues’ of FRS 102 to all of its financial instruments.

Financial instruments are recognised in the charity's balance sheet when the charity becomes party to the contractual provisions of the instrument.

Financial assets and liabilities are offset, with the net amounts presented in the financial statements, when there is a legally enforceable right to set off the recognised amounts and there is an intention to settle on a net basis or to realise the asset and settle the liability simultaneously.

Basic financial assets

Basic financial assets, which include debtors and cash and bank balances, are initially measured at transaction price including transaction costs and are subsequently carried at amortised cost using the effective interest method unless the arrangement constitutes a financing transaction, where the transaction is measured at the present value of the future receipts discounted at a market rate of interest. Financial assets classified as receivable within one year are not amortised.

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED) FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

1 Accounting policies (continued)

Basic financial liabilities

Basic financial liabilities, including creditors and bank loans are initially recognised at transaction price unless the arrangement constitutes a financing transaction, where the debt instrument is measured at the present value of the future payments discounted at a market rate of interest. Financial liabilities classified as payable within one year are not amortised.

Debt instruments are subsequently carried at amortised cost, using the effective interest rate method.

Trade creditors are obligations to pay for goods or services that have been acquired in the ordinary course of operations from suppliers. Amounts payable are classified as current liabilities if payment is due within one year or less. If not, they are presented as non-current liabilities. Trade creditors are recognised initially at transaction price and subsequently measured at amortised cost using the effective interest method.

Derecognition of financial liabilities

Financial liabilities are derecognised when the charity’s contractual obligations expire or are discharged or cancelled.

1.9 Employee benefits

The cost of any unused holiday entitlement is recognised in the period in which the employee’s services are received.

Termination benefits are recognised immediately as an expense when the charity is demonstrably committed to terminate the employment of an employee or to provide termination benefits.

2 Critical accounting estimates and judgements

In the application of the charity’s accounting policies, the Members of Council are required to make judgements, estimates and assumptions about the carrying amount of assets and liabilities that are not readily apparent from other sources. The estimates and associated assumptions are based on historical experience and other factors that are considered to be relevant. Actual results may differ from these estimates.

The estimates and underlying assumptions are reviewed on an ongoing basis. Revisions to accounting estimates are recognised in the period in which the estimate is revised where the revision affects only that period, or in the period of the revision and future periods where the revision affects both current and future periods.

3 Donations and legacies Donations and gifts Subscriptions Sponsorship	2021 £ 1,197 32,399 – 33,596	2020 £ 820 33,478 1,225 103,308

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED)

FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

4 5 6 7	Charitable activities Publication income – IBIS Other publication income Conference income BOU2020 conference income BOU2020 conference income refunded Investments Unrestricted funds £ Income from listed investments 26,315 Interest receivable 24 26,339 For the year ended 31 December 2020 23,721 Raising funds Fundraising and publicity Management costs – purchases Management costs – wages and salaries Management costs – employer's NIC Management costs – pension costs Fundraising and publicity Charitable activities Research – administration costs Publication costs – IBIS Conference costs Grant and bursary funding of activities (see note 8) Share of governance costs (see note 9)	Restricted Endowment funds funds general £ £ 3,854 1,426 – – 3,584 1,426 3,489 1,148	2021 £ 96,793 10 20,509 – – 117,312 Total 2021 £ 31,595 24 31,619 2021 £ 6,718 41,973 2,227 4,208 55,126 2021 £ 1,774 57,498 19,216 78,488 82,607 12,556 173,651	2020 £ 97,003 79 6,226 32,965 (32,965)
				103,308
				Total 2020 £ 27,577 781
				28,358
				28,358
				2020 £ 11,276 41,494 2,197 4,138
				59,105
				2020 £ 1,955 60,493 18,401
				80,849 89,651 14,630
				185,130

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED)

FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

8 Grants and bursaries payable

9

Grants and bursaries payable
Awards payable (eight in 2021): Jethro George Gauld (PhD student, University of East Anglia, UK) Olivia Hicks (Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Centre d’Etudes Biolgiques de Chize, France) Hannah Moon (PhD student, University of Hawai’i at Manoa, USA) Benjamin Murphy (PhD student, Fitzpatrick Institute of African Ornithology, South Africa) Rohit Naniwadekar (Researcher, Nature Conservation Foundation, India) Çağla Önsal (Masters Student, Koç University, Turkey) Petra Sumasgutner (Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Konrad Lorenz Research Centre, Austria) Riva Riley (President’s Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Maryland, USA)) Josh Arbon (PhD candidate, University of Exeter, UK) Fraser Bell (PhD candidate, University of Exeter, UK) Amanda Bourne (PhD Candidate, University of Cape Town, South Africa) Crinan Jarrett (PhD candidate, University of Glasgow, UK) Jenna McCullough (PhD student, University of New Mexico, US) Darren O'Connell (Postdoctoral Research Associate, University, UK) Amparo Herrera Dueñas (Freelance scientific researcher, University of Glasgow, UK) Kate Rogerson (Formerly PhD candidate, University of East Anglia, UK) Reversal of grants accrued for payment in prior year as projects cancelled: Amparo Herrera Dueñas (Freelance scientific researcher, University of Glasgow, UK) Kate Rogerson (Formerly PhD candidate, University of East Anglia, UK) Grants to institutions (four in 2021): University of East Anglia, UK (John & Pat Warham Studentship – Kirsty Franklin) University of Tasmania, Australia (John & Pat Warham Studentship – Paige Green) McGill University, Canada (John & Pat Warham Studentship – Émile Brisson-Curadeau) University of Tasmania, Australia (Brenda & Tony Gibbs Award – Jennifer Lavers) Support and governance costs Support costs Governance costs £ £ Audit fees – 5,150 Accountancy – 2,614 Costs of trustees' and committee meetings – 4,792 Other governance costs – – – 12,556 Analysed between Charitable activities – 12,556		2021 £ 2,000 1,527 1,450 1,111 1,499 1,488 1,500 1,425 - - - - - - - - (2,400) (2,480) 10,550 23,086 21,851 20,000 82,607 2021 £ 5,150 2,614 4,792 – 12,556 12,556		2020 £ - - - - - - - - 1,750 1,989 1,020 1,600 1,600 1,650 2,400 2,480 - - 22,986 24,007 28,169 -
				89,651
				2020 £ 5,050 2,564 4,900 2,116
				14,630
				14,630

Governance costs includes payments to the auditors of £5,150 (2020 – £5,050) for audit fees and £2,614 (2020 – £2,564) for other services.

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED) FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

10 Members of Council

None of the Members of Council (or any persons connected with them) received any remuneration or benefits from the charity during the year.

During the year a total of one Member of Council was reimbursed expenses totaling £4 (2020 – four members reimbursed £158). These expenses represent travelling costs incurred by the Members of Council in the performance of their duties.

11 Employees

Number of employees The average monthly number employees during the year was: Employment costs Wages and salaries Social security costs Other pension costs	2021 2 2021 £ 75,824 3,993 7,601 87,418	2020 2
		2020 £ 74,980 3,940 7,478
		86,398

No employee received employee benefits of more than £60,000 during the year (2020 – nil).

12 Net gains/(losses) on investments Revaluation of investments Gain/(loss) on sale of investments	2021 2020 Unrestricted funds Endowment funds Total Unrestricted funds Endowment funds general £ £ £ £ £ 45,005 20,425 65,430 (45,561) (17,329) 5,594 – 5,594 – – 50,599 20,425 71,024 (45,561) (17,329)	Total £ (62,890) –
		(62,890)

13	Fixed asset investments	Listed investments
	Cost or valuation	£
	At 1 January 2021	716,692
	Additions	3,684
	Valuation changes	65,430
	Disposals	(220,000)
	At 31 December 2021	565,806
	Carrying amount
	At 31 December 2021	565,806
	At 31 December 2020	716,692

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED)

FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

13 Fixed asset investments (continued)

Investments in the John and Pat Warham Scholarship Fund were sold and the income was transferred to a bank account. This money will cover commitments to the three ongoing studentships and to pay for a fourth that will be advertised during 2022.

14 Financial instruments Carrying amount of financial assets Trade debtors Other debtors Bank and cash Measured at cost Listed investments Measured at market value Carrying amount of financial liabilities Other taxation and social security Accruals Measured at cost 15 Debtors Amounts falling due within one year: Trade debtors Other debtors Prepayments and accrued income 16 Creditors: amounts falling due within one year Notes Other taxation and social security Deferred income 17 Accruals	2021 £ 31,553 8,057 617,383 656,993 565,806 565,806 2,152 34,154 36,306 2021 £ 31,553 8,057 12,798 52,408 2021 £ 2,152 24,014 34,154 60,320	2020 £ 31,168 4,160 427,680
		463,008
		716,692
		716,692
		- 27,158
		27,158
		2020 £ 31,168 4,160 12,966 48,294 2020 £ - 15,005 27,158 42,163

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED)

FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

17 Deferred income

Deferred income	2021	2020
	£	£
Other deferred income	24,014	15,005

Deferred income relates to subscriptions received in advance of £20,189 (2020 – £15,005), income received in advance for conferences in future years of £3,825 (2020 – £ nil).

18 Pensions and other post-retirement benefits

Defined contribution pension plans

Contributions to defined contribution plans are recognised as an expense in the period in which the related service is provided.

The charge to profit or loss in respect of defined contribution plans was £7,601 (2020 – £7,478).

19 Restricted funds

The income funds of the charity include restricted funds comprising the following unexpended balances of donations and grants held on trust for specific purposes:

Balance at 1 Jan 2020 £ Research Fund 72,290 John & Pat Warham Scholarship Fund 316,135 Brenda & Tony Gibbs Bequest 134,244 522,669 Balance at 1 Jan 2021 £ Research Fund 75,779 John & Pat Warham Scholarship Fund 233,457 Brenda & Tony Gibbs Bequest 134,244 443,480	Movement in funds (2020) Income Expenditure £ £ 3,489 – – (75,162) – – 3,489 (75,162) Movement in funds (2021) Income Expenditure £ £ 3,854 – – (55,487) – (22,000) 3,854 (77,487)	Transfers Balance at 31 Dec 2020 £ £ – 75,779 (7,516) 233,457 – 134,244 (7,516) 443,480 Transfers Balance at 31 Dec 2021 £ £ – 79,633 (5,549) 172,421 (2,200) 110,044 (7,749) 362,098	Transfers Balance at 31 Dec 2020 £ £ – 75,779 (7,516) 233,457 – 134,244 (7,516) 443,480 Transfers Balance at 31 Dec 2021 £ £ – 79,633 (5,549) 172,421 (2,200) 110,044 (7,749) 362,098
			362,098

Restricted funds include the Research Fund. This includes the income arising from investments held in the Endowment Fund.

The John & Pat Warham Scholarship Fund is to be used for research on Sphenisciform and Procellariiform seabirds and the income arising from investments.

The Brenda and Tony Gibbs Bequest is to be used for research on tracking and migration studies including the use of new technologies.

The transfer to the unrestricted fund represents an administration fee of 10% of the grants awarded from the John and Pat Warham Scholarship Fund and the Brenda and Tony Gibbs Bequest.

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NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED)

FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

20 Endowment funds

Endowment funds represent assets which must be held permanently by the charity. Income arising on the endowment funds can be used in accordance with the objects of the charity and is included as restricted income. Any capital gains or losses arising on the assets form part of the fund.

L & MT Fund Research Fund Hutt Legacy L & MT Fund Research Fund Hutt Legacy	Balance at 1 Jan 2020 £ 120,653 11,990 24,130 156,773 Balance at 1 Jan 2021 £ 110,739 9,910 19,943 140,592	Movement in funds (2020) Income Expenditure Transfers Revaluations gains and losses Balance at 31 Dec 2020 £ £ £ £ £ 1,148 – – (11,062) 110,739 – – – (2,080) 9,910 – – – (4,187) 19,943 1,148 – – (17,329) 140,592 Movement in funds (2021) Income Expenditure Transfers Revaluations gains and losses Balance at 31 Dec 2021 £ £ £ £ £ 1,426 – – 16,431 128,596 – – – 1,326 11,236 – – – 2,668 22,611 1,426 – – 20,425 162,443	Movement in funds (2020) Income Expenditure Transfers Revaluations gains and losses Balance at 31 Dec 2020 £ £ £ £ £ 1,148 – – (11,062) 110,739 – – – (2,080) 9,910 – – – (4,187) 19,943 1,148 – – (17,329) 140,592 Movement in funds (2021) Income Expenditure Transfers Revaluations gains and losses Balance at 31 Dec 2021 £ £ £ £ £ 1,426 – – 16,431 128,596 – – – 1,326 11,236 – – – 2,668 22,611 1,426 – – 20,425 162,443
			162,443

The Landsborough and Mary Thomson Research Fund and the Hutt Legacy represent funds set up by individual donors. The purpose of the L&MT Research Fund was to fund research. Income arising from the capital held in investments within Endowment Funds is credited to the restricted Research Fund. The Research Fund represents permanent capital, the income from which is transferred to the fund of the same name in Restricted Funds to be spent solely on research activities (e.g. grants and bursaries). The Hutt Legacy is intended for the general purposes of the Union and interest arising from this item is credited to General Funds which itself represents investments and net assets which are held for the daily running and maintenance of the charity.

21 Analysis of net assets between funds

Unrestricted funds Fund balances at 31 December 2021 are represented by: £ Investments 266,995 Current assets/(liabilities) 383,741 650,736	2021 Restricted funds Endowment funds £ £ 136,368 162,443 225,730 – 362,098 162,443	Total 2021 £ 565,806 609,471
		1,175,277

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BRITISH ORNITHOLOGISTS' UNION

NOTES TO THE FINANCIAL STATEMENTS (CONTINUED) FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 DECEMBER 2021

21 Analysis of net assets between funds (continued)

Analysis of net assets between funds(continued)
Unrestricted funds Fund balances at 31 December 2020 are represented by: £ Investments 230,321 Current assets/(liabilities) 336,110 566,431	2020 Restricted funds Endowment funds £ £ 345,779 140,592 97,701 – 443,480 140,592	Total 2020 £ 716,692 433,811
		1,150,503

22 Related party transactions

There were no disclosable related party transactions during the year (2020 – none).

Remuneration of key management personnel

The remuneration of key management personnel including employer pension contributions is as follows:

	2921	2020
	£	£
Aggregate compensation	52,148	51,734