Significant seabird census completed at St Kilda

Significant seabird census completed at St Kilda - National Trust for Scotland

To carry out the census, the team hiked to every nook and cranny of the main island. Image: Ellie Owen

The census took staff and volunteers around 1,400 hours to complete and it highlights the importance of taking action to protect seabirds.

As part of our vital work to help protect Scotland’s National Nature Reserves, we recently completed a census of cliff-nesting seabirds at St Kilda. The census – the first fully comparable survey since 1999 of all four islands that make up St Kilda – is part of the Love for Nature project, an ambitious programme of nature conservation work that aims to safeguard Scotland’s natural heritage. The census has been carried out by the Trust’s expert seabird staff and dedicated volunteers.

Almost 93 years after the St Kilda evacuation on 29 August 1930, when the last islanders left the archipelago, this census has identified a 61% decline across four species of cliff-nesting seabirds: fulmars, guillemots, razorbills and kittiwakes.

At one time, St Kilda was the only place in the UK that was home to fulmars. Our census team were dismayed while carrying out this latest count as it became clear there were far fewer fulmars than they had hoped to find. From their data, they realised that fulmars have declined by a huge 69% since the 1999 census. For every fulmar nest they were counting, there should have been three more.

The decline is even greater for the kittiwake, a small gull with a lemon-yellow beak. Our team has found that kittiwake numbers have declined by 84% since 1999. Guillemots and razorbills, which huddle together on the cliffs in large numbers during the summer and contribute the droning, gargling noises of the seabird colony cacophony, have also declined by over 35%, making the islands that bit quieter.