Im Rahmen des RoniaH-Projektes haben wir uns in den vergangenen Monaten die Flugdistanzen brütender Rotmilane in Relation zur deren Horststandort angeschaut. Die Ergebnisse stellen wir in den Kontext der Planung zur Standortwahl von Windkraftanlagen. Derzeit weichen die Planungsverfahren und Abstandsempfehlungen der Bundesländer noch bezüglich der geltenden Prüfbereiche von Windkraftanlagen zu Horststandorten ab. In einem aktuellen Artikel (Kröger J, Becker, M. et al. 2025) zeigen wir die Ergebnisse in Relation zu den Werten im BNatschG bzw. der Bundesländer auf …
In der Fachzeitschrift „Die Vogelwelt, Vol 142(3)“ schreibt die Redaktion im Editorial: „Die Ergebnisse bestätigen beeindruckend die Anstandsempfehlung der Vogelschutzwarten für den Rotmilan im sog. Helgoländer Papier und liegen deutlich über den des Bundesgesetzgebers. Ob diese neuen Fakten bei zukünftigen politischen Entscheidungen berücksichtigt werden?“.
Das Rotmilan-Team
Abstract:
Risks of wind turbine collisions are increasing for many wild animal species with the ongoing
expansion of wind turbines in the course of the energy transition in Germany. Especially flying
animals like birds and bats are at direct high risk of collisions with the turbines’ rotor blades.
Soaring raptors are particularly at risk. Of these, the Red Kite is one of the most frequent victims
of collisions at wind turbines in Germany. An important measure to reduce the risk of collisions
in breeding populations is to maintain minimum distances between planned turbines and
known breeding sites. However, distance requirements vary between German federal states.
Telemetry studies enable distance recommendations based on actual movement patterns. They
give insights into habitat-specific space use patterns, which has become particularly necessary
with the planning of new wind turbines at forest sites and the simultaneous lack of precise
specifications for forests. They are also able to show the individual variability of space use. The
aim of our study was to use GPS movement data of 37 adult Red Kites breeding in different
regions of Hesse, Germany, to investigate the distribution of distances flown between known
nest locations and localisation points of flying Red Kites, both independently of the underlying
landscape and differentiated by land use type (forest and open land). Furthermore, we determined
which of the investigated distances could cover a big share of the localisations, when
averaged over the population. The data base of more than 0.6 million localisations from eight
calendar years covered 133 individual breeding seasons. It could be deduced that a distance of
1.5 km between nest and wind turbine should be maintained to protect a share of at least 60 %
of the Red Kites’ localisation points. The differentiation between used landscape types showed
that 60 % of localisations were covered at slightly shorter distances from the nest for flights
over forests than for flights over open land. When considering the individual variability, it
turned out that a proportion of 60 % of all localisation points should be regarded as a minimum
for the protection of the entire population studied. Our large telemetry dataset from Hesse
therefore supports the recommendations by the “Helgol.nder Papier” (LAG VSW 2015) and
provides valuable additions with regard to the landscape usage of Red Kites.
Key words: Red Kite, Milvus milvus, bird of prey, conservation, telemetry, renewable energy, collision risk, human-wildlife conflict
