SEABIRD DATA NEEDED

within a larger site, there has been a very slight drop-off in coverage in recent years, from the peak of 31 in 1987 and 1991 to less than 20 sites at which Plot Colony Counts have been recorded since 2016. These data are currently stored separately from the SMP database, but there is some concern that counts may have been entered into SMP Online as Whole Colony Counts and work to not only rectify this, but also to build a Plot Colony Count recording system into SMP Online database is underway. The final graph shows site coverage by year for Breeding Success monitoring. This is particularly concerning, with a decrease in coverage from 304 sites in 2008 to 116 in 2018 and 162 in 2019.

It has been a challenging time for surveying in recent years, with COVID-19 taking a hold, followed by

HPAI (bird flu) more recently. There are also outstanding data for the most recent years of 2021 to 2022 to be loaded into the SMP database. This includes RSPB datasets and the SMP team at BTO are working closely with RSPB to align sites and input data from reserves across the UK, generously monitored by RSPB staff and volunteers. Therefore, we fully expect coverage to increase as we collate and load data for these more recent years into the SMP database.

Participants

There are 170 registered fieldworkers on the SMP Online system allocated to at least one site. Some participants are still to transfer from JNCC to BTO for GDPR compliance and we look forward to reactivating SMP Online accounts as participants request to move across to BTO’s system. Email smp@ bto.org if you are unable to login to SMP Online or if you are not allocated the sites you are expecting.

Thank you to all who record and submit both Abundance data via Colony Counts and/or Breeding Success information.