There are few points which should be taken into consideration when
reading this article.

1. In the late 1970s and 1980s there was a similar pattern of poor
breeding success in seabird colonies in the Orkney and Shetland
Islands. Some arctic tern and kittiwake colonies had poor success for
nearly 10 years in a row.

The "cause" was supposed to be the large industrial fishery for
sandeels - the main food source for a lot of seabirds in the area.
Eventually the fishery was severely restricted. The year following the
ban the seabird colonies had good breeding success.

Was this the root cause? Possibly, however it could also have been a
coincidence since there was no direct evidence of the fishery causing
harm. There was no direct evidence as most of the fishery was taking
place far offshore whereas most seabirds foraged relatively close to
their colonies. Also several colonies in the Orkney and Shetland
Islands and in nearby Caithness (on the Scottish mainland, where I am
from) were not showing the same level of decline. Some colonies were
stable if not increasing.

2. Seabirds are long-lived and such patterns of poor success may in
fact be "normal" - though they are alarming. Research has been carried
out in northern Scotland for the past 40-50 years with more extensive
datasets available since the late 1970's. What the natural cycle is
still unknown.

3. Guillemot numbers in particular and most seabird species in general
are at an all time high - as far as can be ascertained. Numbers of
guillemots in particular have exploded in recent years. This is mostly
likely due to the decimation of the top predator fish resulting in
booming numbers of species such as sand-eels. The decline in food
supply could be linked to general imbalances in the marine environment
caused by large-scale overfishing.

4. The numbers of bird affected as quoted in the article are small.
172,000 pairs of guillemots are a small, though not insignificant,
percentage of the population. There are several colonies in northern
Scotland with more than 50,000 pairs. Also 16,700 pairs of kittiwakes
is tiny. There are probably a couple of million breeding pairs of
seabirds in northern Scotland.



After the first "disaster" was averted the seabirds were not the only
ones saved, so were more than a few reputations of scientists who had
been fore-telling disaster with the first priority being of course,
more money for research. There is a history of accentuating the
negative when it comes to environmental problems of breeding seabirds
in the North Sea area. So as with politics, you should always be
careful to "follow the money".

The changes in the North Sea due to climate change will be bad.
Overfishing and pollution has made things worse. However the data is
not conclusive that global warming or overfishing is the direct cause.
We simply do not know.

The downside to all this is that hype and scare-mongering will result
in scientists get treated as Cassandras and nothing will get done.

Stuart
--
Stuart MacKay, Seattle, WA, USA