Survey trends of North American shorebirds: Population declines or shifting distributions?

We analyzed data from two surveys of fall migrating shorebirds in central and eastern North America to estimate annual trends in means per survey and to determine whether trends indicate a change in population size or might have been caused by other factors. The analysis showed a broad decline in means per survey in Atlantic Canada and the northeastern United States (North Atlantic region). For example, 9 of 9 significant trends in this region were