Use of aerial surveys to detect bird displacement by offshore windfarms

COWRIE is pleased to announce the release of the above report prepared by The British Trust for Ornithology (BTO).

Aerial surveys potentially provide a cost-effective means of monitoring bird populations rapidly over large and inaccessible areas. However, the extent to which current survey methods allows changes in bird numbers to be detected during wind farm construction and operation is poorly understood.

This study makes use of previously collected aerial survey data, and uses a statistical technique called power analyses to assess whether current aerial survey methods allow changes in bird numbers to be detected, given that there are large background fluctuations in seabird numbers at any given site.

Five species, two of which were combined due to the difficulty of separation were selected for analysis: red-throated diver (Gavia stellata), common scoter (Melanitta nigra), sandwich tern (Sterna sandvicensis) and lesser and greater black-backed gulls (Larus fuscus and L. marinus).

The report can be downloaded here.


Source: COWRIE