Data from: Mortality limits used in wind energy impact assessment underestimate impacts of wind farms on bird populations

Abstract

In this archive we share the data and R code used for the construction of population models for seven bird species (Common Starling, Black-tailed Godwit, Marsh Harrier, Eurasian Spoonbill, White Stork, Common Tern and White-tailed Eagle) for our assessment of the effects of wind farms (Schippers et al. 2020). In most cases we parameterized our population models based on species-specific survival and reproduction rates from scientific articles and reports, but in the case of the Western Marsh Harrier we analyzed previously unpublished nest success and capture-mark-resighting data. Below we first describe per species which data we used for model parameterization, and then describe per data file what each variable represents. We selected populations of seven species based on the availability of data, considerable likelihood to collide with wind turbines and contrasting ages of first reproduction. For species for which long time series of demographic data were available with population trends clearly changing over time, we separately assessed periods with contrasting population trends, as detailed in the species descriptions below. Mean survival and reproduction rates, standard deviations and additional information like the age of first reproduction can be found in the accompanying paper by Schippers et al. (2020).

Dutch Raptor Group is also co-author of this dataset.