Archives

Colin Harris and colleagues of Environmental Research & Assessment Ltd have published on-line this month a detailed report that lists and describes 101 Important Bird Areas (IBAs) in the Antarctic Peninsula region.

A number of these IBAs support breeding colonies of Southern Giant Petrels Macronectes giganteus, the only ACAP-listed species that breeds within the Antarctic Treaty Area, and thus falling outside national jurisdictions.

Each chosen site is described in the report with a map, a site description and information on its bird populations and conservation issues.

Here is an extract from one of these IBA accounts:

"Ant021: Cierva Point and offshore islands.  In the late 1980s, 135 breeding pairs of Southern Giant Petrel (Macronectes giganteus) were recorded in the area, nesting on both Moss and Sterneck islands".  Cierva Point and offshore islands on the Danco Coast are also an Antarctic Specially Protected Area (ASPA No. 134).

Click here for a listing of protected sites in Antarctica that support breeding Southern Giant Petrels.

The project was supported by BirdLife International and the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office and followed on from an original initiative of the then Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) Bird Biology Subcommittee. 

Reference:

Harris, C.M., Carr, R., Lorenz, K. & Jones, S. 2011.  Important Bird Areas in Antarctica: Antarctic Peninsula, South Shetland Islands, South Orkney Islands - Final Report.  Cambridge:  Environmental Research & Assessment Ltd.  225 pp.

With thanks to Colin Harris and Richard Phillips for information and Markus Ritz for the use of his photograph.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 17 June 2011, updated 21 June 2011