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Credit: Théallie Dhelemmes
Some 147 kilometers of coastline between the Belgian border and the Bay Authie browse and carefully observe. The task is never easy but every year in February, it is raised by dozens of experts and passionate volunteers, as part of a broad campaign Census dead birds along the coasts.
The operation, which aims to recognize dead birds and identify the causes of mortality trends is European and declined locally by industry structures. Last weekend, Nathan Legroux, full of wildlife and bird naturalistic study group (GON) North – Pas-de-Calais, was one of the coordinators of the campaign on our shores. With it, 80 people of various structures (ANG, Eden 62, General Council of the North, Gdeam …), divided into small groups on the entire coastline. “We took advantage of the low tide to look and observe the corpses of dead birds on the water line.” They found in 97. “We still expect the numbers of the last sector, but it will be very close to a hundred.
If it seems important to the first reading, this figure is not alarming as Legroux Nathan, who speaks of numbers “encouraging, down for a few years.” The study holds responsible primarily the total lack of dead birds due to contact with oil. “We found one oil dumpling our two days of work but none of the corpses bore traces of oil.”
These are mostly gulls all species since the observers have recorded 59 of the total figure. Of these 59 birds, 24 are herring gulls. “That may change, because we were unable to determine the species 12 corpses, because of the advanced state of decomposition of the body,” says Nathan Legroux. Other major discoveries, the specialist evokes 9 gannets, cormorants 8, and 3 Torda penguins, “very present birds home but we do not see because they are at sea.”
Unlike last year, no trace of lead was found on a protected species. “Last year, a penguin was killed by shot.
This year, there was no poaching “. By cons, fishing nets and plastic bags are often found on the bodies. “The birds hunt fish present in the nets and are trapped by feeding. It is often said the observer. Fatigue is also a cause of death.
“It is generally satisfactory. It is far 700 birds found on average 40 years in similar work. ” The file will be sent to the Agency for Marine Protected Areas handle the North Sea.
Courtesy of nordlittoral.fr
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