Black-throated Diver annual records in North Scotland, 1834-2019

Quality Control

Good quality data, completely checked for typographic errors and geographic integrity.

Method steps

1. The recording methods for records in this dataset vary over time: • The Records from egg collection survey contains most of the historical egg collection data and some more recent egg collection records. Most of these records come from museum collections. • The most recent records from 01/01/2011 onwards consist of ad-hoc records collected by a range of recorders. These are then collated annually by RSPB staff. • Records from annual surveys prior to 31/12/2010 contain a combination of different surveys undertaken and casual birdwatching records. Information on this is explained here: - Occupancy Survey = Yes means that the territory was specifically surveyed for Black-throated Divers. No in this column means that the information came from casual observations whilst engaged in other survey work or from observers engaged in casual birdwatching. To qualify as Yes, either breeding was confirmed on an early visit, or the territory was surveyed on at least three separate days between 27 April and 15 June (the extreme dates for which we know eggs have been laid). -Productivity Survey = Yes in this column means that the territory was visited at least once after 15 June specifically to search for Black-throated Diver chicks. No in this column means that the information comes from casual observations, whilst engaged in other survey work or from casual birdwatching. -The raft codes were inserted for all entries for any site where a raft has ever been used, this explains why is there a raft code in the ""Raft Code"" column, and ""no"" in the ""raft available"" column in some cases. o Site Code = This gives a unique site code for each territory. A territory may consist of a whole loch, part of a loch or a group of lochs.

The dataset contains data from North Scotland Region. The majority of the records are at 1km resolution. Some of the records are available, at 100m, and some at 10m resolution. Please contact dataunit@rspb.org.uk if finer resolution grid refs are required.