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title: "How many White-chinned and Spectacled Petrels are out there?  \"30 000 holes on Marion Island\""
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# How many White-chinned and Spectacled Petrels are out there?  "30 000 holes on Marion Island"

Researchers at the University of Cape Town's Percy FitzPatrick Institute have reported on the populations of White-chinned Petrels *Procellaria aequinoctialis* at Marion Island in the southern Indian Ocean and of Spectacled Petrels *P. conspicillata* on Inaccessible Island in the South Atlantic in South Africa's popular ornithological magazine *[Africa Birds & Birding](http://www.africageographic.com/magazines/birds-and-birding/)*.

 Ben Dilly, Genevieve Jones and Peter Ryan counted 30 000 White-chin burrows on Marion Island in South Africa's Prince Edward Island Group in 2009 over a two-week period: the first survey of the numbers of any burrowing petrel at the island.

 ![](https://acap.aq/images/stories/acap/Birds/Petrels/W/White_chinned/white-chinned petrel_by_Ben Palan.jpg "White-chinned Petrel.  Photograph by Ben Palan")

 With previously published numbers of White-chinned Petrels for other southern islands in both the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, progress is being made to assess the global population - against which losses to longlines may be measured.

 ![](https://acap.aq/images/stories/acap/Birds/Petrels/S/Spectacled/spectacled_petrel_inaccessible_island_by_peter_ryan.jpg "Spectacled Petrel.  Photograph by Peter Ryan")

 Inaccessible's Spectacled Petrels, endemic to the island, appear to be doing better than the much more abundant and wide-spread White-chins.  A survey in 2009 by Peter Ryan and Ron Ronconi revealed a 40% increase since the previous one conducted in 2004, which itself showed a 7% annual increase since the original 1999 survey.

 **Reference:**

 Percy FitzPatrick Institute 2011.  30000 holes on Marion Island.  [*Africa Birds & Birding* 16(1): 22](http://www.fitzpatrick.uct.ac.za/africa_birds/fitzfm11.pdf). 

 *John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 15 February 2011*