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Environmental information systems
There are over 180 species of marine birds found throughout Europe's seas, and many of these undertake yearly migrations between feeding and breeding grounds. These include waders and waterbirds, such as ducks, geese, swans, divers and grebes; as well as birds that are usually referred to as seabirds: petrels, shearwaters, gannets, cormorants, skuas, gulls, terns and auks.
. This is attributable to both human pressures (e.g. bycatch and pollution) and also predation at colony sites by invasive species.
Which are the related MSFD Descriptors?
The quality and occurrence of habitats and the distribution and abundance of species are in line with prevailing physiographic, geographic and climatic conditions.
General outcomes of the regional assessments
In the Baltic Sea similar patterns have been observed with 31% of waterbirds in the breeding season showing declining, compared to 18% of over-wintering species. Status in the Mediterranean Sea is more unclear due to data availability. However, trends in the critically endangered Balearic Shearwater suggest marked declines.
Outcomes from the MSFD assessments
In 2018, Member States had to update the Good Environmental Status (GES) assessments performed under Marine Strategy Framework Directive Article 8. The present dashboard displays the overall status reported by countries for the features, where the results show which is the percentage of assessments where GES has been achieved, not achieved or not assessed (including unknown).
References
- ↵IUCN and BirdLife International, 2014, European Red List of Birds, BirdLife (https://www.birdlife.org/europe-and-central-asia/european-red-list-birds-0)
- ↵BirdLife International, 2015, European Red List of Birds, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg (http://datazone.birdlife.org/info/euroredlist)
- a bOSPAR Commission, 2017, OSPAR Intermediate Assessment 2017 Marine birds in trouble (https://oap.ospar.org/en/ospar-assessments/intermediate-assessment-2017/key-messages-and-highlights/marine-birds-trouble/)
- ↵HELCOM, 2018, HELCOM indicators — White-tailed sea eagle productivity, HELCOM core indicator report, Helsinki Commission, Helsinki, Finland (https://www.helcom.fi/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/White-tailedsea-eagle-productivity-HELCOM-core-indicator-2018.%20pdf)