From time to time ACAP Latest News posts reviews of books that cover aspects of the biology of procellariiform seabirds, and of the conservation of their habitats (click here).  Such reviews have also covered books directed at children, noting that one of ACAP’s roles is to increase awareness of the threats facing albatrosses and petrels among the general public.

Ordinarily, ACAP’s Information Officer sends out for review new titles received (or reviews them himself).  But we are not living in ordinary times: one outcome of the COVID-19 pandemic has been disruptions to international mailing.  The Information Officer is domiciled in South Africa and currently there are problems with postage to that country from Australia.  So, failing to have the book to hand to review, Australia’s CSIRO Publishing’s blurb follows for a new(ish) children’s book, Windcatcher, that describes the trans-equatorial migration of the Short-tailed Shearwater Ardenna tenuirostris – considered to be Australia’s most abundant seabird.

“A short-tailed shearwater flies from the edge of the Southern Ocean to the rim of the Arctic Circle – and back – every year.  This remarkable 30,000 kilometre journey is driven by seabird law.  Instinct and community will guide her.  A wingspan the size of a child’s outstretched arms will support her.  But first, she must catch the wind … .  Based on birds that live on Griffiths Island, near Port Fairy, Victoria, Windcatcher is a tale of migration, conservation and survival that begins with one small bird called Hope.” An estimated 100 000 shearwater burrows exist on the island.

The book was written by award-winning children’s author Diane Jackson Hill and illustrated by Craig Smith, described as one of Australia’s most prolific and popular illustrators.  The Children's Book Council of Australia (CBCA) has named Windcatcher as a 2020 Notable Book, Picture Book of the Year.  Read the CBCA's review here.  Available as a hardback (AUD 24.99) or an eBook.

Read comments by the author and illustrator on their book.

The trans-equatorial migration route of the Short-tailed Shearwater, illustrated by Craig Smith

With thanks to Claire Mason for the alert.

Reference:

Jackson Hill, Diane & Smith, Craig 2019.  Windcatcher. Migration of the Short-tailed Shearwater.  CSIRO Publishing.  32 pp. ISBN 9781486309870.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 17 September 2020

A Northern Giant Petrel feeds on a Sooty Albatross chick on Marion Island, photograph by Marienne de Villiers

Ryan Reisinger (Marine Apex Predator Research Unit, Nelson Mandela University, Port Elizabeth, South Africa) and colleagues have published open access in the journal Royal Society Open Science on differences in the diets and at-sea distributions of sympatrically breeding Northern Macronectes halli and Southern M. giganteus at Marion Island.

The paper’s abstract follows:

“To mediate competition, similar sympatric species are assumed to use different resources, or the same but geographically separated resources.  The two giant petrels (Macronectes spp.) are intriguing in that they are morphologically similar seabirds with overlapping diets and distributions.  To better understand the mechanisms allowing their coexistence, we investigated intra- and interspecific niche segregation at Marion Island (Southern Indian Ocean), one of the few localities where they breed in sympatry.  We used GPS tracks from 94 individuals and remote-sensed environmental data to quantify habitat use, combined with blood carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios from 90 individuals to characterize their foraging habitat and trophic ecology.  Females of both species made distant at-sea foraging trips and fed at a similar trophic level.  However, they used distinct pelagic habitats.  By contrast, males of both species mainly foraged on or near land, resulting in significant sexual segregation, but high interspecific habitat and diet overlap.  However, some males showed flexible behavioural strategies, also making distant, pelagic foraging trips.  Using contemporaneous tracking, environmental and stable isotope data we provide a clear example of how sympatric sibling species can be segregated along different foraging behaviour dimensions.”

Reference:

Reisinger, R.R., Carpenter-Kling, T.,  Connan, M., Cherel, Y. & Pistorius, P.A. 2020  Foraging behaviour and habitat-use drives niche segregation in sibling seabird species. Royal Society Open Science  doi.org/10.1098/rsos.200649.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 16 September 2020

A downed Newell's Shearwater fledgling gets released, photograph by Elizabeth Ames

 André Raine (Kaua‘i Endangered Seabird Recovery Project, University of Hawai‘i & State of Hawai‘i Department of Land and Natural Resources, Hanapepe, Hawaii, USA) and colleagues have published in the open-access journal Endangered Species Research on how well Newell’s Shearwater Puffinus newelli fledglings do after being downed by artificial lights on the Hawaiian island of Kauai and subsequently released.

The paper’s abstract follows:

“Light attraction impacts nocturnally active fledgling seabirds worldwide and is a particularly acute problem on Kaua‘i (the northern-most island in the main Hawaiian Island archipelago) for the Critically Endangered Newell’s shearwater Puffinus newelli.  The Save Our Shearwaters (SOS) program was created in 1979 to address this issue and to date has recovered and released to sea more than 30500 fledglings.  Although the value of the program for animal welfare is clear, as birds cannot simply be left to die, no evaluation exists to inform post-release survival.  We used satellite transmitters to track 38 fledglings released by SOS and compared their survival rates (assessed by tag transmission duration) to those of 12 chicks that fledged naturally from the mountains of Kaua‘i.  Wild fledglings transmitted longer than SOS birds, and SOS birds with longer rehabilitation periods transmitted for a shorter duration than birds released immediately or rehabilitated for only 1 d.  Although transmitter durations from grounded fledglings were shorter (indicating impacts to survivorship), some SOS birds did survive and dispersed out to sea.  All surviving birds (wild and SOS) traveled more than 2000 km to the southwest of Kaua‘i, where they concentrated mostly in the North Pacific Equatorial Countercurrent Province, revealing a large-scale annual post-breeding aggregation zone for fledgling Newell’s shearwaters.  While there was reduced survival among birds undergoing rehabilitation, SOS remains an important contribution toward the conservation of Newell’s shearwater because a proportion of released birds do indeed survive.  However, light attraction, the root cause of fallout, remains a serious unresolved issue on Kaua’i.”

Reference:

Raine, A.F., Anderson, T., Vynne, M., Driskill, S., Raine, H. & Adams, J. 2020.  Post-release survival of fallout Newell’s shearwater fledglings from a rescue and rehabilitation program on Kaua‘i, Hawai‘i.  Endangered Species Research 43: 39-50.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 15 September 2020

Photograph from the 1980s by Betty Anne Schreiber. Read more of her and other ingested plastic artwork and displays here

 Marcela Uhart (Latin America Program, Karen C. Drayer Wildlife Health Center, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of California, Davis, USA), Luciana Gallo and Patricia Pereira Serafini have produced advice in the ACAP Guidelines series on assessing plastic ingestion by ACAP-listed species.

“During the Ninth Meeting of the ACAP Advisory Committee (AC9), the Population and Conservation Status Working Group (PaCSWG) noted the widespread intrusion of both macro- and microplastic in the diet and environment of seabirds and expressed concern about forecasts that this will increase. … The PaCSWG agreed that ACAP could contribute to this topic through various actions.  One such action is the production of guidelines to assess the incidence of plastic ingestion in ACAP species. Thus, during PaCSWG4 and PaCSWG5 we provided a draft set of guidelines for consideration of the working group.  Comments and recommendations have been incorporated in the current revised sampling guidelines to assess plastic ingestion (macro and microplastics as well as additives and adsorbed chemical compounds) with an array of sample type choices from live and dead birds and/or their immediate environment that should facilitate collection in diverse settings.  Although we focus on albatross and petrel species, these guidelines and recommendations are generalizable to other taxa.”

The guidelines’ summary follows:

“These guidelines provide a standardized approach for sampling ACAP species to assess plastic ingestion (macro and microplastics, as well as chemical compounds) with an array of sample type choices that should enable collection in diverse settings.  Samples can be collected from dead beached or by-caught specimens, live and dead animals in breeding sites or rehabilitation centres, as well as non-invasively by sampling fresh scats from nests, regurgitated boluses or unviable or hatched eggs.  Given the particular susceptibility of ACAP species to plastic ingestion and the increasing prevalence of this problem worldwide, collecting samples to assess plastic ingestion should be considered whenever an opportunity presents.  Using standardized protocols increases the consistency and representativeness of results and allows comparisons between species and detection of large-scale spatiotemporal patterns.  Target research and surveillance options include:

1. Macroplastics (>5mm): can be assessed from stomach contents in dead birds, regurgitates in live birds, and boluses.

2. Microplastics (<5mm): can be assessed from gastrointestinal contents in dead birds, live-bird regurgitates, faeces/guano and boluses.

3. Plastic-derived chemicals (additives): can be assessed in tissues/organs (e.g. liver, muscle, fat) in dead birds, and preen gland oil, stomach oil and plastic items recovered from live and/or dead birds. Additives can also be found in hatched and/or unviable eggs.

4. Plastic-adsorbed organic contaminants (e.g. PCBs -polychlorinated biphenyls- and POCs -organochlorine pesticides-): can be assessed in plastic items found in the gastrointestinal tract of dead birds or regurgitates in live birds.

More ACAP Guidelines documents may be found here.

Reference:

Uhart, M., Gallo, L. & Pereira Serafini, P. 2020.  Sampling guidelines to assess plastic ingestion in ACAP species. Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels.  21 pp.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 14 September 2020