Katherine Booth Jones

Senior Research Ecologist

Katherine is the operational lead for the BTO in Northern Ireland. She is responsible for developing the scientific foundation of bird data used in Northern Ireland for conservation and sustainable land management policy development, planning and implementation.

Interests & Responsibilities

Katherine works closely with the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) and the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs in Northern Ireland (DAERA), other Government departments, NGOs and a range of stakeholders in environmental evidence to identify priority areas of need, advise on the collection of new data and guide the analysis of current data sets.

While her role requires a broad knowledge of Irish avifauna, Katherine’s specialism lies in seabird ecology, a field she has been working in since 2007.

In particular she is passionate about the insight that tracking technology can offer into seabird ecology, both in terms of proving data to inform conservation management and policy, but also as a tool to engage wider audiences with seabird research.

Due to this interest, Katherine is often closely linked with BTO’s Wetland and Marine Team, leading on a range of seabird projects in Northern Ireland, including a GPS tracking study of Belfast’s roof nesting gulls, seabird censusing, managing the Seabird Monitoring Programme in Northern Ireland as the only regional coordinator in the UK, and producing the annual Northern Ireland Seabird Report.

Other work themes to date have included: delivering policy-relevant analysis of bird trends using Atlas and WeBS data; surveying breeding waders in lowland grasslands, monitoring agri- environment schemes; and scoping new surveys to fill information gaps.

Other Information

General C-permit ringer
Newsletter Editor and Executive Committee member of The Seabird Group
Committee member of the Copeland Bird Observatory, The Copeland Islands, Belfast Lough, Northern Ireland
Meetings Committee member of the British Ornithological Union

Qualifications

PhD “Distribution and gene-flow in a hybridising population of Pterodroma petrels”, Institute of Zoology/University College London, 2012-2016

BSc Zoology (4-year placement), 1st Class Honours, Cardiff University 2007-2011

Recent BTO Publications

View all BTO publications for this author

Other Publications

Booth Jones, K. A., Allen, D., Archer, -item"> Booth Jones, K. 2023. Northern Ireland Seabird Report 2022. British Trust for Ornithology, Thetford, Norfolk ISBN: 978-1-912642-46-5 92pp

Booth Jones, K.A., O’Connell, P., Wolsey, S., Carrington-Cotton, A., Noble, D.G., McCulloch, N. & Calladine, J.R. 2022. Loss of breeding waders from key lowland grassland sites in Northern Ireland. Irish Birds 44 : 11-22

Booth Jones, K., Calbrade, N. & Austin, G. 2022. Analysis of waterbird population trends for Northern Ireland’s sea loughs: assessing the potential impacts of aquaculture and disturbance: Part 2 – Belfast Lough and Lough Foyle. Research Report no. 746. British Trust for Ornithology, Thetford, Norfolk ISBN: 978-1-912642-41-0

Booth Jones, K., Thaxter, C., Clewley, G., Wolsey, S., Calbrade, N., Atkinson, P., Calladine, J. & Burton, N. 2022. Belfast’s urban gulls: an assessment of breeding populations, breeding season movements and winter population. Research Report no. 734. British Trust for Ornithology, Thetford ISBN: 978-1-912642-26-7 52pp

Booth Jones, K. 2022. Northern Ireland Seabird Report 2021. British Trust for Ornithology, Thetford, Norfolk ISBN: 978-1-912642-36-6 88pp

Booth Jones, K. 2021. Northern Ireland Seabird Report 2020. British Trust for Ornithology, Thetford, Norfolk ISBN: 978-1-912642-23-6 88pp

E., Colhoun, K., Leonard, K., Mackie, K., Mawhinney, K., McFaul, L., Weir, D., Humphreys, E.M. & Burton, N. H. K. 2022. Cliff Nesting Seabird Surveys at Colonies in Northern Ireland. Final report for the Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute and Marine Scotland Science. Thetford. Retrieved from https://www.mpa-management.eu/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/MarPAMM-Lot-2-Seabird-Surveys-Report.pdf

Carreiro, A.R., Bried, J., Deakin, Z., Booth Jones, K.A., Thomas, R.J., Symondson, W.O.C., Ramos, J.A. & Medeiros, R. 2022. First Insights into the Diet Composition of Madeiran and Monteiro's Storm Petrels (Hydrobates castro and H. monteiroi) Breeding in the Azores. Waterbirds 44(3), 300-307. https://doi.org/10.1675/063.044.0304

Johnston, D. T., Masden, E. A., Booth Jones, K. A., & Humphreys, E. M. 2022. Black Guillemot (Cepphus grylle) tracking in Bangor and Lighthouse Island, Northern Ireland, 2021. Final report to the Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute and Marine Scotland Science. Thetford. Retrieved from https://www.mpa-management.eu/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/MarPAMM-Lot-4-Black-Guillemot-Tracking-Final-Report.pdf

Booth Jones, K.A., Nicoll, M.A., Raisin, C., Dawson, D.A., Hipperson, H., Horsburgh, G.J., Groombridge, J.J., Ismar, S.M., Sweet, P., Jones, C.G. & Tatayah, V. 2017. Widespread gene flow between oceans in a pelagic seabird species complex. Molecular Ecology.