Two conservation groups represented by the nonprofit law firm Earthjustice have filed a lawsuit against the Hawaii Department of Transportation for failing to address the injuries and death to globally Endangered Newell’s Shearwaters Puffinus newelli and globally Vulnerable Hawaiian Petrels Pterodroma sandwichensis caused by bright lighting at state-operated airports and harbours on the Hawaiian islands of Kauai, Maui and Lānai. According to the lawsuit the transportation department’s failure to protect these Hawaiian endemic seabirds at its facilities violates the USA’s Endangered Species Act.

Newell's Shearwater, photograph by Eric Vanderwerf

“The seabirds are attracted to bright lights, like those at the department’s airport and harbor facilities. Indeed, those facilities are among the largest documented sources in the state of injury and death to the birds. The seabirds become disoriented and circle the lights until they fall to the ground from exhaustion or crash into nearby buildings. On Kauai, which is home to most of the threatened Newell’s shearwaters remaining on the planet, bright lights have contributed significantly to the catastrophic 94 percent decline in the Newell’s shearwater population since the 1990s. At the same time, Hawaiian petrel numbers on Kauai have plummeted by 78 percent. Remnant breeding populations of the imperiled seabirds cling to survival on Maui and Lānai” (click here).

Read more accounts in ACAP Latest News on threats and conservation activities relating to the two species here.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 29 August 2017

Dan Rapp (Hawaii Pacific University, Marine Science Programs at Oceanic Institute, Waimanalo, Hawaii, USA) and colleagues have published in the Marine Pollution Bulletin on ingested plastics in both chicks and adults of globally Near Threatened Black-footed Phoebastria nigripes and Laysan P. immutabilis Albatrosses and other seabirds at Hawaii’s French Frigate Shoals.

The paper’s abstract follows:

“Between 2006 and 2013, we salvaged and necropsied 362 seabird specimens from Tern Island, French Frigate Shoals, Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Plastic ingestion occurred in 11 of the 16 species sampled (68.75%), representing four orders, seven families, and five foraging guilds: four plunge-divers, two albatrosses, two nocturnal-foraging petrels, two tuna-birds, and one frigatebird. Moreover, we documented the first instance of ingestion in a previously unstudied species: the Brown Booby. Plastic prevalence (percent occurrence) ranged from 0% to 100%, with no significant differences across foraging guilds. However, occurrence was significantly higher in chicks versus adult conspecifics in the Black-footed Albatross, one of the three species where multiple age classes were sampled. While seabirds ingested a variety of plastic (foam, line, sheets), fragments were the most common and numerous type. In albatrosses and storm-petrels, the plastic occurrence in the two stomach chambers (the proventriculus and the ventriculus) was not significantly different.”

Black-footed and Laysan Albatrosses, photograph courtesy of the Kure Atoll Conservancy

Reference:

Rapp, D.C., Youngren, S.M., Hartzell, P. & Hyrenbach, K.D. 2017. Community-wide patterns of plastic ingestion in seabirds breeding at French Frigate Shoals, Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Marine Pollution Bulletin doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2017.08.047.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 28 August 2017

UPDATE: Get the whole story from island Conservation's Operation Lehua website.

Lehua is a small, crescent-shaped island situated a kilometre off the coast of Kauai in the USA’s Hawaiian Islands. Small numbers of Black-footed Phoebastria nigripes and Laysan P. immutabilis Albatrosses, both globally Near Threatened, have bred on Lehua since at least 2002. Large numbers of Wedge-tailed Shearwaters Ardenna pacifica also breed.  Lehua is managed as a State Seabird Sanctuary.

Lehua Island, photographs by Eric Vanderwerf

An attempt to rid the island of Pacific Rats Rattus exulans in 2009 was unsuccessful but now after study and discussion over several years and the issuing of the necessary permits the operation is being repeated. The first of three planned aerial drops of bait totalling 10 tons containing the first-generation anticoagulant rodenticide Diphacinone was undertaken this week, with the following drops expected in the next few weeks depending on the weather. Ground baiting was also undertaken.

“The [first stage of the] operation was executed as planned - successfully, safely, and under the close watch of regulators from the Hawaii Department of Agriculture and an independent monitoring team from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.” (click here).

Read more media reports here and here.

Read more on Lehua Island and its albatrosses in ACAP Latest News here.

View the Lehua Island Restoration Project Final Environmental Assessment for more information.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 25 August 2017, updated 26 August 2017

The National Geographic Society’s Grant Programs is making a call for applications to study long-distance migratory species.

Priority will be given to projects that aim to do one or more of the following:

• fill critical knowledge gaps that can help reverse negative population trends;
• demonstrate methods for improving population viability;
• seek to promote the effective conservation of migratory populations and species;
• develop intervention plans to help overwintering, breeding, or stopover sites; or
• use public-private partnership models to protect migratory species and pathways.

Applicants may request US$10 000 - US$150 000 over one or two years.

New Zealand to South America (and back): the Northern Royal Albatross is a long-distance migrant, photograph by Aleks Terauds

“Projects may be focused around conservation, education, research, storytelling, or technology, but all applications should explicitly state the plan for evaluating the impact of the work. Preference will be given to proposals that include feasible plans to measure baselines or demonstrate change in key indicators (e.g., migratory habitat size, habitat trends, population size, population trends and connectivity, vital rates, threat factors).”

The deadline for submission of proposals is 1 October 2017.

Find more information here.

With thanks to Mark Carey.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 24 August 2017