Abstract
This report presents the findings of the fifth year, (2001) of the Novar Windfarm Ornithological Monitoring Studies. The first report (Bioscan E0607R1 1997), principally monitored the breeding birds at Novar from May to July 1997 during the peak of the windfarm construction phase and subsequent reports have compared the operating windfarm with matched "control" 1km survey squares.
The survey methodology has remained essentially the same throughout, but additional features have become monitored as their potential importance became apparent. For the second year blue hare numbers, as a potentially important eagle prey item, have been followed. There is now a formal assessment of the association between "muirburn" and breeding birds.
The report continues to incorporate the findings of weekly searches for birdstrike casualties, which began in late 1997 once the turbines became fully operational. In 2000 and 2001, the success of birdstrike monitoring was also tested by placing carcasses at randomly chosen turbine positions.