Northern Gannet Colony
Skrudur Iceland © Beth Clark

Swoop Into The

Seabird Tracking Database

A platform for seabird researchers to share their tracking data with the research and conservation communities.

Table of Contents

About Us

The BirdLife International Seabird Tracking Database is the largest collection of seabird tracking data in existence. It serves as a central store for seabird tracking data from around the world and aims to help further seabird conservation work and support the tracking community. Read more about the BirdLife Marine Programme.

Seabirds are one of the most threatened groups of birds. However, because of their highly dispersed and mobile ecology, their distributions and behaviour at-sea are not well understood. Remote tracking data, such as that held here, are therefore vital to help understand how they use the oceans and identify important sites for their conservation.

Originally called Tracking Ocean Wanderers, this database brings together data from a range of seabird species and families, has been made possible entirely though the unique collaboration of seabird scientists from around the world. The website has been developed to build links between data owners and their data, as well as provide tools to support data submission and standardising as well as to foster further seabird conservation work.

Our Funders

This website was supported by the Global Ocean Biodiversity Initiative with a grant from the International Climate Initiative (IKI). The German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, and Nuclear Safety (BMU) supports this initiative on the basis of a decision adopted by the German Bundestag.

Support for the database was also received from:
Further support has been gratefully received from:

Our Team

Tammy Davies

Marine Science Coordinator
Bio

Tammy Davies

Marine Science Coordinator

My work centres on using seabird tracking data to inform area-based management initiatives, and working with our Partners and other organisations on marine spatial planning and marine protected area proposals. This has included providing technical support for a candidate marine protected area on the High Seas (the North Atlantic Current and Evlanov Seamount MPA), and the description of Ecologically and Biologically Significant Areas (EBSAs). I also manage a project in the West Indian Ocean that promotes the inclusion of seabird data in decision making processes in the region, and support the work of our Partners with their marine efforts.

Ana Carneiro

Marine Science Manager
Bio

Ana Carneiro

Marine Science Manager

My main role is to undertake analyses of tracking data, in particular to identify priority sites for conservation at national, regional and global levels, and to help address seabird bycatch. I also manage within BirdLife a project that links habitat preference, activity patterns and detections from novel bird-borne radars to quantify interactions of tracked wandering albatrosses with legal and illegal fishing vessels in the South Atlantic.

Jonathan Handley

Marine IBA/KBA Officer
Bio

Jonathan Handley

Marine IBA/KBA Officer

My main role is the identification of priority conservation sites for seabirds and marine megafauna under the frameworks of marine Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas, and Key Biodiversity Areas. Priority conservation sites are identified by incorporating estimates of predator abundance into key at-sea areas identified from the analysis of distribution data, primarily those data derived from animal tracking. Furthermore, I facilitate the inclusion of these sites into marine spatial planning initiatives.

Bethany Clark

Seabird Science Officer
Bio

Bethany Clark

Seabird Science Officer

I am a seabird ecologist and data analyst, with a focus on biologging data. I manage the BirdLife International Seabird Tracking Database. I lead work on our CCI Collaborative Fund project: Plastic connectivity: disentangling the problem of plastic pollution for pelagic seabirds. We are collating seabird tracking data and plastic pollution models to assess the risk of marine plastics exposure for petrels. I also work on seabird foraging behaviour and interactions with fisheries, in both temperate and tropical regions

BirdLife International Marine Programme

Wider Team
Bio

BirdLife International Marine Programme

Wider Team

The BirdLife International Marine Programme (BIMP) works on a range of marine issues impacting seabirds, including bycatch (trialing mitigation measures, promoting evidenced-based solutions, and working with Regional Fisheries Management Organizations), and promoting evidence-based regulations and guidance through a variety of national, regional, and international policy mechanisms. Read more about our work here: https://birdlife-hatch.org/topics/31466/page/the-birdlife-marine-programme 

Our History

1997 – BirdLife establishes its Global Seabird Conservation Programme, particularly in response to albatross declines driven by bycatch in longline and trawl fisheries, which required coordinated research and action across the BirdLife Partnership.

1997

2003 – The Global Procellariiform Tracking Workshop is held in Gordon’s Bay, South Africa, bringing together holders of remote tracking data of albatrosses and petrels from around the world to map their distributions and inform conservation efforts.

2003

2004 – BirdLife's Tracking Ocean Wanderers publication presents the results from the workshop, and the data are held in the Global Procellariiform Tracking Database.

2004

2007 – The first regional marine IBA workshop is held for the Baltic region. Eight regional workshops will be held between 2007 and 2012 to bring together BirdLife Partner organisations to identify the most important sites for seabird conservation.

2007

2010 – The Global Procellariiform Tracking Database is brought online for the first time, enabling researchers to browse the database and submit data requests through the website.

2010

2012 – BirdLife launches its Marine IBA E-Atlas, the first ever global inventory of priority sites for marine conservation. Around 3,000 marine Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas (IBAs) were identified using tracking data, and presented in an interactive online map.

2012

2013 – A new penguin-focussed project is launched at the 8th International Penguin Conference in Bristol, UK. Over 1500 tracks from 9 species were contributed by collaborators around the world to further penguin conservation research.

2013

2014 – The database is completely redesigned, expanded to cover all seabird species, and re-launched as the Seabird Tracking Database.

2014

2017 – the database passes 10 million data points for seabird conservation.

2017

2022 – More than 220 researchers have contributed tracking data of 129 species – nearly one third of all seabird species in the world. At >25.5 million data points, the Seabird Tracking Database is the largest collection of seabird tracking data in existence.

2022