Abstract
This report constitutes the first seasonal (October to December 2022) report outlining results from digital aerial surveys conducted in January 2023 within the Central North Sea under the POSEIDON project and commissioned by Natural England. Surveys were undertaken using APEM’s high-resolution camera system to capture digital still imagery of birds and marine megafauna within the Survey Area. The survey was successfully carried out across three days in January 2023 with no safety issues. Due to weather delays, it was not possible to carry out the survey by the end of December 2022. A total of 3,634 observations were recorded during the survey in January 2023, of which 3,835 were observations of birds and 81 observations of marine megafauna. APEM will continue to monitor the site for these species and others during the remaining seasonal surveys.