The status of the UK’s breeding seabirds

Five seabird species are added to the Birds of Conservation Concern Red List in this addendum to the 2021 update, bringing the total number of Red-listed seabird species to 10, up from six since seabirds were last assessed. The Amber List of seabirds moves from 19 to 14 species, and the Green List increases from one to two species.

View on journal website

Mismatches in scale between highly mobile marine megafauna and marine protected areas

Marine Protected Areas are designated to protect marine fauna, such as whales, sharks, turtles and seabirds, but are we getting them right? Tracking data provide valuable information on the movements and space use of species, so can these be used to help us plan and deliver better protected areas for marine magafauna and their habitats?

Predicting the impacts of wind farms on seabirds: An individual-based model

1. Individual-based models (IBMs) are a powerful tool in predicting the consequences of environmental change on animal populations and supporting evidence-based decision making for conservation planning.2. There are increasing proposals for wind farms in UK waters and seabirds are a vulnerable group, which may be at risk from these developments.3. We developed a spatially explicit IBM to investigate the potential impacts of the installation of wind farms in the English Channel and North Sea on body mass, productivity and mortality of a breeding population of Northern gannets for which we have tracking data.4. A baseline model with no wind farms accurately represented the status of a sample of tracked gannets at the end of the 90-day chick-rearing period, and the behaviourtime budget was similar to that of tracked gannets.5. Model simulations in the presence of wind farms indicated that installations should have little impact on the gannet population, when either avoidance behaviour or collision risk scenarios were simulated. Furthermore, wind farms would need to be ten times larger or in more highly used areas in order to have population-level impacts on Alderney’s gannets.6. Synthesis and applications. Our spatially explicit individual-based models (IBM) highlight that it is vital to know the colony-specific foraging grounds of seabirds that may be impacted, when identifying potential wind farm sites, in order to account for cumulative impacts from multiple sites. Avoiding areas highly used for foraging and commuting, and avoiding large-scale developments should be effective in limiting gannet mortality as a result of collision, competition and energy expenditure. Our IBM provides a robust approach which can be adapted for other seabird populations or to predict the impacts from other types of spatial change in the marine environment.

Predictive modelling to identify near-shore, fine-scale seabird distributions during the breeding season

The avoidance rates of collision between birds and offshore turbines

Report of work carried out by the British Trust for Ornithology in collaboration with the Environmental Research Institute on behalf of the Marine Scotland Science.Accurately estimating birds’ risk of collision with offshore wind turbines is a key part of the decision-making process for proposed renewable developments. However, the evidence base for quantifying the number of birds likely to avoid colliding with turbines is limited. Recent BTO-led work helping to fill this gap, improving the understanding of the impacts of offshore renewables on marine wildlife.

Download PDF

Seabird foraging ranges as a preliminary tool for identifying candidate Marine Protected Areas

The UK government is committed to establishing an ecologically coherent network of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) to manage and conserve marine ecosystems. Seabirds are vital to such ecosystems, but until now these species have received little protection at sea. This is partly because there is scant information available on the oceanic regions they use at the different stages of their lifecycle. A new study led by the BTO, in partnership with the RSPB and Birdlife International, has sought to address this by bringing together work on how far UK-breeding seabirds travel from their colonies (typically in search of food for themselves or their chicks) during the breeding season.

View this paper online

Survival of Gannets Morus bassanus in Britain and Ireland, 1959-2002

Use of gannets to monitor prey availability in the NE Atlantic Ocean: colony size, diet and foraging behaviour