New Zealand has the greatest number and diversity of seabird species, 90% of which are threatened or at risk of extinction. This includes the Antipodean Albatross Diomedea antipodensis (pictured), listed as Endangered by the IUCN. Photograph by Kerry-Jayne Wilson

Each year thousands of albatrosses and petrels die through entanglements with fishing gear and swallowing baited hooks and drowning. A new “Seabird-Safe Fishing Toolkit” aims to tackle the problem.

The project, which has been welcomed by the fishing industry, Governments and NGO’s, is being developed by the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Ocean and Fisheries Working Group (OFWG) and was presented to a recent APEC roundtable by New Zealand’s Department of Conservation (NZDOC) and the Southern Seabirds Trust.

The toolkit facilitates direct engagement with the fishing industry and equips them with essential information to help reduce seabird bycatch. This includes, the ocean areas important to threatened seabirds, access to distribution maps for all ACAP species, information on seabird bycatch mitigation options (including ACAP’s Best Practice Advice guidelines), as well as information on fisheries monitoring tools for verification.

Igor Debski is the Convenor of ACAP's Seabird Bycatch Working Group (SBWG) and was Lead Technical Advisor in the development of the toolkit. Commenting on the project, he said:

“The toolkit represents a new and exciting approach to improve the implementation of ACAP’s Best Practice Advice by engaging directly with the vessel-to-market supply chain. Improved bycatch mitigation in fisheries is a key action needed to address the conservation crisis faced by ACAP-listed species.”

ACAP recommends that the most effective approach to reduce or avoid seabird bycatch in longline fisheries is through the simultaneous use of line weighting to sink baited hooks as close to the vessel as possible to reduce their availability to seabirds, bird scaring lines to deter birds from baited hooks, and setting longlines at night.

The Agreement’s comprehensive range of Best Practice Advice guidelines and factsheets containing proven mitigation measures are available in multiple languages and are accessible through the ACAP website.

ACAP’s Advisory Committee endorsed and encouraged support for the development of the toolkit at its meeting in May (AC13), the plans for which were presented to the Eleventh Meeting of the SBWG (SBWG11). Sebastian Jiminez and Dimas Gianuca, the ACAP SBWG Convenors, along with Ed Sullivan, an SBWG member, are also involved in the development of the toolkit as members of the expert reference groups for the project. 

Development of the tollkit will take place over 2024 and will be presented to the APEC Oceans and Fisheries Working Group in August 2024.

18 December 2023

“Faces of Seabird Conservation” is the theme of the 51st Annual Meeting of the Pacific Seabird Group (PSG) next year in February, and a special exhibition is planned for the event which will celebrate the "people who love and work with seabirds".

Organisers are putting a final call-out for the public to get involved and submit a profile of a seabird scientist they feel should be featured in the exhibition. The exhibiton style is based on the famed Humans of New York project which combines candid photos with short first-person vignettes highlighting personal experiences.

Profiles submitted to the exhibition should adhere to the following specifications as requested by PSG:

Overall guidelines

• Profiles and photos should be created and submitted by someone other than the subject. In other words, you can’t interview yourself, but you are welcome to ask someone else to photograph and interview you! 
• Interview subjects can include people who work with seabirds in any capacity: not only PSG members and those in traditional academic, agency, or NGO positions, but anyone from any walk of life. Think journalists, artists, educators, guides, volunteers, boat captains, technicians, elected officials, local community members, tribal partners, administrators, and anyone else for whom seabird conservation is an important part of their life and work.
• Please provide the subject’s name and e-mail so that we can verify that we have their permission to use their story and image. Subjects will be able to choose whether or not they would like their name to be shared along with their profile.

Photos

• Photos may be vertically or horizontally oriented and show all or part of the subject’s body.
• The setting should be visible and preferably outdoors (i.e., not a plain or studio backdrop) and can include materials related to the story or meaningful to the subject.
• Photos should be sufficiently high resolution to be printed at up to 8x10 inch dimensions.

Vignettes

• Written vignettes should be in the first person (I, me) and should be no more than 400 words in length (preferably shorter). Longer entries will be accepted but may be edited.
• The vignette should describe a specific personal story, philosophical statement, or biographical detail, rather than covering the subject’s entire life or career. You may condense a longer interview as long as you maintain the subject’s words and voice.
• Interviews can be conducted in any language. If your profile is not in English, please submit the original along with an English translation if possible.

Submissions received on or before 31 December 2023 will be considered for inclusion in the exhibit at the 2024 Annual Meeting. Further information on the "Faces of Seabird Conservation" project, including examples, a link to example interview questions, and the profile submission link, can be found, here. If you have any questions, please contact, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

The 51st Annual Meeting of the Pacific Seabird Group (PSG2024) is being held in Seattle, Washington, United States, 21-23 February 2024. Further information about the meeting can be found at the PSG2024 meeting page, here.

15 December 2023

The latest ACAP Species Infographic, released today and the fourteenth to be produced in the series, is for the Near Threatened Grey Petrel Procellaria cinerea.  It is the first to be produced for an ACAP-listed petrel, the previous 13 infographics all being for albatrosses.  It is being produced in the three official ACAP languages of English, French and Spanish; versions the latter two languages will be released shortly.  The Grey Petrel infographic has been sponsored by the Australian Antarctic Program.

The ACAP Species Infographic series has been designed to help inform the public, including school learners, of the threats faced by albatrosses and petrels and what is being and can be done to combat them.  They serve to complement the more detailed and referenced ACAP Species Assessments, the concise and illustrated ACAP Species Summaries and the ACAP Photo Essay series.  English and Portuguese* language versions of the infographics produced to date are available to download here.  French and Spanish versions can be found in their respective language menus for the website under Infographies sur les espèces and Infographía sobres las especies.

All the 14 infographics produced to date may be freely downloaded at a high resolution to allow for printing professionally in two poster sizes (approximately A2 and A3).  Please note they are only being made available for personal use or when engaging in activities that will aid in drawing attention to the conservation crisis faced by the world’s albatrosses and petrels – when ACAP will be pleased to receive a mention.  They should not be used for personal gain.

One more ACAP Species Infographic is currently in production, for the Vulnerable White-chinned Petrel P. aequinoctialis, which will also be produced in Portuguese.  A further five species have been sponsored, with work on them to commence in the new year.

The ACAP Species Infographics have all been created by Thai illustrator Namasri ‘Namo’ Niumim from Bangkok.  Namo is a graduate of the School of Architecture and Design, King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Communication Design.

With thanks to ‘Pep’ Arcos, Jonathon Barrington, Karine Delord, Johannes Fischer, Graham Parker, Richard Phillips and Peter Ryan for their help.

*Being produced for the six ACAP-listed species that regularly visit waters off Brazil.  To date, these are the Tristan Albatross D. dabbenena and the Black-browed Albatross Thalassarche melanophris.

John Cooper, Emeritus Information Officer, Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels, 14 December 2023

Hybrid Black-browed-Grey-Headed Albatross Red Y48 incubating an egg, Grey-headed Albatross Ridge, Marion Island, 21 October 2023, photograph by Michelle Risi

UPDATE:  On 07 December the next was empty, with the hybrid seen close by before it flew off. If seen again an attempt will be made to pluck a feather to assign gender.

A Black-browed Albatross Thalassarche melanophris - Grey-headed Albatross T. chrysostoma hybrid has been recorded incubating an egg on sub-Antarctic Marion Island in the southern Indian Ocean.  One of two such hybrids known from the island (click here) the colour-banded bird (left leg red Y48, right leg metal SAFRING 9A-45744) was first observed occupying an empty nest during the current 2023/24 breeding season on 06 October 2023 on Grey-headed Albatross Ridge in the south of the island.  On a second visit on 21 October the bird was seen to be incubating.  This is the first record of a hybrid albatross breeding on Marion Island, and apparently the first definite breeding by a known hybrid Thalassarche albatross anywhere (click here).  The bird’s partner is a Grey-headed Albatross (left leg red Y96, right leg metal SAFRING 9A-87577) seen on the nest prior to laying and subsequently photographed taking an incubation shift on 18 November.  The hybrid and its partner’s genders are not known.

The hybrid bird on its empty nest on 06 October 2023.  The red colour band on its left leg is partially visible, photograph by Michelle Risi

The hybrid is believed to have been metal banded on Grey-headed Albatross Ridge as a non-breeding bird in the 2008/09 breeding season.  On 7 October 2019 the colour band was added by Stefan Schoombie.  A publication in the journal Antarctic Science suggests that the bird may have fledged from the same Black-browed – Grey-headed Albatross mixed pair that successfully fledged a different hybrid bird in May 2007, that was subsequently seen (and described) back in the colony as a non-breeder nine years later in 2016.  In February 2018 this known-age bird  was photographed by Chris Jones occupying an empty nest.  That the two hybrid records are not of the same individual is confirmed because the 2007 bird was metal banded on its left leg prior to fledging (as are all fledglings within monitoring colonies on Marion Island), whereas the breeding hybrid discussed here wears its metal band on its right leg (as a bird of unknown age).

Further visits will be made during the breeding season to the hybrid’s nest to ascertain if the egg hatches and was therefore fertile.

Grey-headed Albatross red Y96 incubating on 18 November 2023 (when it was banded) is the hybrid’s partner.  Their nest is marked with a short section of a numbered PVC electrical conduit pole, photograph by Michelle Risi

Mixed species breeding pairs in the genus Thalassarche have been recorded producing fledglings between Black-browed and Campbell T. impavida Albatrosses on Campbell Island and between a Black-browed and a White-capped T. steadi Albatross on Bird Island in the South Atlantic.  Hybrids from these two mixed pairs have not been recording breeding.  Within the Diomedeidae, mixed pairs have produced hybrid young between Black-footed Phoebastria nigripes and Laysan P. immutabilis Albatrosses and between Northern Royal Diomedea sanfordi and Southern Royal D. epomophora Albatrosses.  In contrast to these Thalassarche hybrids, both Phoebastria and Diomedea hybrids have been recording breeding.

Another view of red Y48 incubating in a colony of Grey-headed Albatrosses, photograph by Michelle Risi

With thanks to Maëlle Connan, Chris Jones, Richard Phillips, Stefan Schoombie and Kim Stevens.

Selected References:

Jones, M.G.W., Techow, N.M.S., Risi, M.M., Jones, C.W., Hagens, Q.A., Taylor, F. & Ryan, P.G. 2019.  Hybridization and cuckoldry between black-browed and grey-headed albatrosses.  Antarctic Science 32-10-14.  (click here).

Moore, P.J., Taylor, G.A. & Amey, J.M. 1997.  Interbreeding of Black-browed Albatross Diomedea m. melanophris and New Zealand Black-browed Albatross D. m. impavida on Campbell Island.  Emu 97: 322-324.

Phillips, R.A., Cooper, J. & Burg, T.M. 2018.  Breeding‐site vagrancy and hybridization in albatross.  Ibis 160: 907-913. (click here).

Rutt, C. 2013.  Hybridization of the black-footed and Laysan Albatrosses.  Western Birds 44: 322-333. (click here).

John Cooper, Emeritus Information Officer, Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels & Michelle Risi, Marine Apex Predator Research Unit, Nelson Mandela University, South Africa, 30 November 2023