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Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of Importance Especially as Waterfowl Habitat

Name: Solent and Southampton Water Ramsar site

Unitary Authority/County: Hampshire County Council, New Forest District Council, Test Valley Borough Council, Southampton City Council Unitary Authority, Eastleigh Borough Council, Fareham District Council, Gosport Borough Council and Isle of Wight Council Unitary Authority.

Proposal

The Solent and Southampton Water Ramsar site comprises a series of estuaries and adjacent coastal habitats including intertidal mud and sandflats saline lagoons, vegetated shingle, saltmarsh, reedbeds, damp woodland, and grazing marsh. The following SSSIs; Lymington River Reedbeds, Sowley Pond, Hythe to Calshot Marshes, Eling and Bury Marshes, Lower Test Valley, Lincegrove and Hacketts Marshes, Titchfield Haven, and Gilkicker Lagoon and parts of Hurst Castle and Lymington River Estuary, North Solent, Lee-on-Solent to Itchen Estuary, Upper Hamble Estuary and Woods, Newtown Harbour, Thorness Bay, Medina Estuary, King's Quay Shore, Ryde Sands and Wootton Creek, Brading Marshes to St Helen's Ledges, Yar Estuary, Whitecliff Bay and Bembridge Ledges have been recommended as a Ramsar site.

Boundary of Ramsar site

Ramsar site boundary is coincident with Lymington River Reedbeds SSSI, Sowley Pond SSSI, Hythe to Calshot Marshes SSSI, Titchfield Haven SSSI, and Gilkicker Lagoon SSSI and includes parts of the other SSSIs listed above. Ask Natural England for maps which clarify the Ramsar site boundary.

Ramsar site interest

The Solent and Southampton Water Ramsar site is of international importance because:
a) The site regularly supports 20,000 waterfowl (waterfowl as defined by the Ramsar Convention) (Ramsar site selection criterion 3a):

* Unit of population size - individual birds wintering
Bird numbers from: WeBS database

b) The site regularly supports 1 % of the individuals in a population of waterfowl (Ramsar site selection criterion 3c):

Unit of population size: * - Individual birds wintering
Bird numbers from: WeBS Wildfowl & Waders database JNCC Seabird Colony Register

c) The site qualifies under Criterion 1a of the Ramsar Convention as it is one of very few major sheltered channels between a substantial island and mainland in European waters, exhibiting an unusual strong tidal flow and has long periods of slack water at high and low tide. The site contains many good and representative examples of wetland habitats characteristic of the biogeographical region including saline lagoons, saltmarshes, estuaries and reefs.

d) The site supports an appreciable assemblage of rare, vulnerable or endangered species or subspecies of plant or animal, or an appreciable number of individuals of any one or more of these species (Ramsar site selection criterion 2a). These are:

i) 39 British Red Data Book (RDB) invertebrates have been recorded including the following Endangered species: the micro-moth Elachista littoricola, the ground beetle Drypta dentata, the rove beetle Staphylinus caesareus, and the water beetles Gyrinus natator and Paracymus aeneus.

ii) The following eight British RDB plants have also been recorded within the site: dwarf spike-rush Eleocharis parvula, little robin Geranium purpureum forsteri, slender birdsfoot trefoil Lotus angustissimus, Hampshire purslane Ludwigiapalustris, yarrow broomrape Orobanchepurpurea, smooth cord-grass Spartina alterniflora and foxtail stonewort Lamprothamnium papulosum.

Additional non-qualifying interest

An outstanding assemblage of wintering and passage birds are dependent on wetland habitats within the site, including the following Annex I species not mentioned previously: red-throated diver Gavia stellata, black-throated diver G. arctica, great northern diver G. immer, Slavonian grebe Podiceps auritius, little egret Egretta garzetta, hen harrier Circus cyaneus, marsh harrier Circus aeruginosus, merlin Falco columbarius, peregrine Falco peregrinus and short-eared owl Asio flammeus.

Source: English Nature, September 1998

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