In this context, offshore areas include any area of open sea,
from close inshore to the extent of the British Fishery
Limits. Although this type of SPA is commonly referred to as
‘offshore’, the analysis covers both offshore and inshore
waters.
JNCC is using the European Seabirds At Sea
(ESAS) database to identify seabird
concentrations within this extensive area. The ESAS
database hosts year-round data on the at-sea distributions of
all birds that occur in the waters of the north-west European
continental shelf. It contains around 2 million records
collected over a period of almost 30 years, and is the most
comprehensive set of data available on the distribution and
abundance of seabirds at sea in UK waters.
In 2007, JNCC commissioned a series of spatial
analyses of ESAS data, using a statistical method called
Poisson Kriging. The results from this are currently being analysed
by JNCC to identify seabird concentrations.
Further reading
Kober, K. et
al. (2012)
Kober, K. et
al. (2010)
A short summary of the offshore work
A summary of potential methods being considered, presented
by Kerstin Kober at the Waterbird Society Conference, Barcelona,
October 2007
Presented by Linda Wilson at the 1st World Seabird
Conference, Victoria, BC, Canada, September 2010
Wilson, L. J. et al.
(2008)
Marine SPAs: the UK
approach. PowerPoint
presentation.
Presented by Linda Wilson at the Pacific Seabird Group Annual
Meeting, Washington, February 2008