Ocean Sentry
The UK”s seabird population could be all but wiped out unless new marine legislation is toughened up, according to the RSPB.
600,000 birds have died in the last decade and some breeds have vanished from our coasts, the charity said.
The plummeting numbers are the most dramatic evidence of climate change on wildlife in the UK.
The vast Fowlsheugh reserve in Scotland has lost 30% of its birds since 2000.
The Fowlsheugh puffin population, for example, has dropped by 58%, and almost half of the Kittiwakes have been lost.
A rise in the surface temperature of the North Sea has also killed off populations of sand eels, leaving the majority of seabirds struggling to find food, the RSPB said.
The charity warns that new marine bills for Scotland and the rest of the UK won’t go far enough to protect the birds.
It fears that social and economic demand for fishing and marine developments will take priority over wildlife.
Ecologist, Doug Gilbert, said: “We’ve got an international duty to protect these seabirds and at the moment we’re failing to do that.
The UK coastline is home to a third of the global population of many breeds including the great skua and the gannet.
The collapse of the marine food chain is also affecting fish stocks, particularly sea trout and salmon, along with seals and dolphins, environmentalists say.
(From news.sky.com, by Michelle May)
