A review of the capacity of current avian monitoring schemes in Guernsey to assess the population status of breeding and wintering bird species.

The Strategy for Nature in Guernsey delivers a clear policy driver to establish baselines for key biodiversity groups to provide government, other policy makers and practitioners the biodiversity information required for good decision making and fulfilling obligations under international agreements (e.g. Ramsar, the Convention on Migratory Species’ African-Eurasian Waterbird Agreement etc.).

In this report, we summarise the different long-term avian monitoring schemes taking place in Guernsey and Herm and, where sufficient data exist, undertake an analysis to produce trends in species breeding or wintering populations. We assess whether the monitoring schemes are sufficient to fulfil local (Bailiwick), national (UK) and international reporting requirements, and make recommendations for improving schemes. We undertake a gap analysis and identify priority species that are not covered by an existing scheme and make recommendations for setting up a program of single species surveys  which fall outside current monitoring schemes.