Coordinated networking is one of the most important aspect of the project – one that will be greatly missed after its completion. Increased understanding of tern movements between colonies made us realize that birds which start breeding at one colony can finish their breeding season somewhere else, sometimes in a different region. This can occur when for example the colony is predated or flooded. We need to therefore work in a network of well-managed colonies and coordinate data collection and management practices. This can be challenging even within a single organisation, but the geographical scale of these metapopulations require working with many partners. Partnership working should furthermore have aims and regularly reviewed work programme. Simple exchange of knowledge and post-breeding updates are useful, but managers should go further and develop a truly working relationship and this require a coordination and therefore funding. 
 
Roseate Tern LIFE Project has been supporting these networks and relationships with the aim to bring management practices as close to best practice as possible. The most recent example was the Coquet team visiting Isle of May, which is managed by a great team from Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH). The place is legendary of course, but with the arrival of its current Site Manager - David Steel, new habitats have been created for Arctic and common terns. Sandwich terns arrived two years ago and this year a mixed pair of common and roseate tern bred on the island. David and his team were keen to learn how they can do even better for terns from the Coqueteers and we left with a really good idea of well-constructed tern terraces. With a planned expansion of the habitat, it looks like an ideal place for the roseate tern to settle. 
 
Networking should also be fun and after “exhausting” talks, discussions and the site visit, we continued the exchange around barbeque. Having met a lot of professional and enthusiastic members of the Isle of May team, it is hard to disagree with a recent post title on their blog “The future is bright…”. 
 
Check what is going on Isle of May here: https://isleofmaynnr.wordpress.com

While the exchange of knowledge and networking are surely stimulating endeavours, without a formal way of operating, clear set of actions and a follow up, these activities rarely produce a real difference for birds. It takes a lot of commitment from participating organisations and, above all, individuals who take part in such exchanges, to take the relationship to another level. In case of the networking exchanges between French, Irish and British roseate tern colony managers, we have managed to build a working relationship and bring a colossal change to the management and monitoring practices in France. 

So far, French colony managers have had a very much hands-off approach, providing only basic stone shelters and minimum monitoring effort to avoid disturbance. The emphasis has been on “naturalness” of the colonies. This, together with human disturbance and predation, has resulted in a very low year-on-year productivity.

Last year, we have visited all the current and former roseate tern colonies during a five-day trip to Brittany. It was obviously very useful to learn about local constraints, management practices, etc., which allowed us to come up with a set of recommendations for the two main colonies. Moreover, we have built strong relationships, which expand beyond purely professional sphere.

​Besides being a really friendly bunch of people (us including), dinners, stayovers, picnics with obligatory wine or cider made the whole experience bounding and lingering in our memories. However, what really made a difference was an idea to invite French colleagues to Coquet. It seems that only then the concept of creating artificial nesting habitats and intensifying monitoring efforts landed on fertile soil, which would otherwise be difficult to achieve with any number of presentations and elucidations. ​

Not surprisingly then, last week I found myself on the train to Brittany with the excellent company of Paul Morrison (Coquet) and Stephen Newton (Rockabill) to help Bretagne Vivante creating their first ever terraces and deploying nest boxes. Working clothes, French berets with the LIFE project logo and other gadgets – we were gearing up for hard work. 

After the Île aux Dames colony collapsed in 2011, the main two colonies are currently located in Île aux Moutons (43 pairs last year) in the south coast of Brittany and Île de La Colombière, located near St Malo in the north.

We have landed on Île aux Moutons with a bunch of Bretagne Vivante staff and volunteers in a beautiful weather; 100 boxes ready (made by local schoolkids), geotextile deployed to kill the vegetation over winter, shingle from the nearby beach ready. We are keen to work, but not before an obligatory cup of coffee – this is France after all.

Steve was orchestrating the location and direction of facing the nest boxes in relation to the planned monitoring hide. The rest of us removed stones, cleared vegetation, created patches of shingle and set the nest boxes. We have decided to go for a combination of patch conditions to check what the birds might prefer, ranging from boxes on shingle, bare ground and treated land. We also removed rock shelters, as they don’t provide adequate shelter, compared to nest boxes. The work was a success, everybody was in high spirit, enhanced by excellent picnic, wine and local cider as mentioned above – obligatoire.

The next day, we visited Île de La Colombière – a much smaller colony, which supported 6 pairs in 2017 – hence only 40 boxes. Here too, we were accompanied by the local staff and volunteers. The weather on the north side of Brittany was not as forgiving as the day before, our worries deepened when we saw a little grey plastic boat to take us to the island. We had enough skippers between us to decide that after all we can sail. The job was obviously quicker, but we found signs of rats, as the island is close to the shore and accessible by foot in the low tide. The local managers will be working on eradicating the rats before the coming season.
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Plus, if you need us, we are here to help – the “special” relationship does not end with Brexit.

It has been a busy summer at the three roseate tern colonies with the wardens monitoring and protecting them, but more the 2017 breeding highs and lows in a later blog post.

An important part of the Roseate Tern LIFE Recovery Project is information exchange and not only between our UK and Irish colonies and partners. As terns like many animals do not stop at a country's border; understanding movement between sites and protecting these areas is essential.

In north-west Europe, of the two other countries that support breeding roseate terns; the closest to the British Isles is France. Breeding roseate terns are located entirely in Brittany and historically their population followed a similar decline to the rest of the Europe. In the past, tern wardens have recorded British and Irish terns nesting in the French colonies; meaning there is obviously some interchange across the English Channel.
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As a result, in late July several members of the Roseate Tern LIFE staff, BirdWatch Ireland, RSPB and National Parks and Wildlife Services travelled to Brest to meet with Mr Yann Jacobs, Tern Project Manager/Regional Coordinator from Bretagne Vivante and visit the key tern sites. 

Both Bretagne Vivante's exchange visit to Northumberland and this the LIFE Project's trip to France have been fantastic opportunities; allowing us to get a deeper understanding of the intricacies of the different sites and the management approaches from various organisations. Through the collaboration of organisations which manage roseate tern colonies on an international scale; we can potentially offer new solutions and set a precedent for future activities.