Aarhus University Seal

No. 203: Updated assessment of IBA designations in relation to eight specific marine areas

Petersen, I.K., Nielsen, R.D. & Clausen, P. 2019. Opdateret vurdering af IBA-udpegninger i relation til otte specifikke marine områder. Aarhus Universitet, DCE – Nationalt Center for Miljø og Energi, 80 s. - Teknisk rapport nr. 203. http://dce2.au.dk/pub/TR203.pdf

Summary

In May 2016 The Danish Agency for Water and Nature Management (SVANA) requested an evaluation of the geographical discrepancies between designations of marine IBA’s (Important Bird Areas) by BirdLife Denmark and Birds Directive areas designated by Danish authorities. The report was delivered in a draft version to the Agency in July 2016 (Petersen et al. in prep.)

 

The Environmental Protection Agency in June 2019 requested a report with updated ornithological information from eight specific IBA areas, covered by Petersen et al. (in press), namely the following:  IBA nr. 64 (Flensborg Fjord), IBA nr. 94 (Sejerøbugten og Nekselø), IBA 118 (Smålandsfarvandet), IBA nr. 119 (Nordvestlige Kattegat), IBA nr. 120 (Rønne Banke), IBA nr. 121 (Skagerrak og sydvestlige Norske Rende), IBA nr. 123 (Østlige Tyske Bugt) og IBA nr. 168 (Lille Middelgrund).

 

The Agency specifically asked for new ornithological background information, reevealed since the 2016 draft report. The Agency also requested additional maps of bird distributions that may support their considerations about potential additional Birds Directive areas in or around the eight areas mentioned above.

 

In this report AU/DCE updated the ornithological background data for the eight areas. The updated information primarily derive from the national monitoring program, NOVANA, with data from the winter of 2016 and the summer of 2018, but also from summer surveys in 2017 and winter surveys in 2019 in restricted areas of the inner Danish waters. Likewise, the updated data covers information from surveys in the southeastern parts of Kattegat (Petersen & Sterup 2019).

 

In this report we repeat the contents of the 2016 report for the eight IBA areas in question in their entirety, and additionally present a chapter on i/ updated available ornithological data and ii/ updated evaluation of the ornithological contents of the area.