Voortgangsrapport offshore waarnemingen nr.1, 1987

In 1987 ship based seabird observations were carried out following methods described by Tasker et al. 1984 by the Club van Zeetrekwaarnemers (CvZ), in connection with Dienst Getijdewateren (DGW, Rijkswaterstaat, Middelburg) and Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ Texel). A list is presented of trips carried out in 1987 with members of the CvZ as observers on board (table 1). Two standard trips, called WAMONO and WAMONO-plus, as carried out by MV Holland were regularly manned. Routine stops for these trips were water samples were taken are illustrated in figure 1 and 2 respectively. Computer processing of the data collected in 1987 has so far not been very successful, and only some preliminary results are given here (tables 2 and 3). Birds seen at the so called ’Frisian Front’, ca. 40 km north of Texel, in July and August are listed in table 4. Differences with results obtained during the extensive seawatching programme by the CvZ are briefly discussed. This is the first of a series of annual reports, meant to keep participants and interested people informed about our offshore work.