Photo: Birdlife/Ben Metzger
A female Scopoli’s shearwater (ċiefa) originating from a colony off the San Dimitri cliffs in Gozo was fitted with a GPS data logger and tracked during the 2013 breeding season. Data shows she made several trips within and outside Malta’s 25 nautical mile fisheries zone in search of food for her young. The trips reached as far as the coasts of Sicily and Libya.
The information from the LIFE+ Malta Seabird Project has helped pinpoint what will become Malta’s first-ever Marine Special Protection Areas as part of the Natura 2000 network. Birdlife Malta will announce the results of the research tomorrow during an international workshop at Ta’ Cenc Hotel in Gozo.