An international workshop on Marine Important Bird Areas in Malta and the Mediterranean will be held over 23 – 25 November 2015 organized by the LIFE+ Malta Seabird Project and BirdLife International  in the Hotel Ta’ Cenc, Gozo, Malta.  The workshop is described as being “a key opportunity to gather knowledge and experience on protecting seabirds across national boundaries and international waters of the Mediterranean as well as set the way forward for international collaborations in protecting our common seabird heritage.”

“Within the Mediterranean seabirds face threats both on land and at sea, such as overfishing, by-catch, invasive predators, habitat destruction from poor planning and marine pollution. However only 4% of the Mediterranean is currently protected through the EU Natura 2000 network in Europe and the Barcelona Convention’s Specially Protected Areas of Mediterranean Importance.  At a regional scale there are still many important gaps to fill in the protected area network for seabirds, particularly for sites at sea. The meeting will enable scientists, nature conservationists and policy makers to further coordinate efforts for seabird protection at a regional scale through capacity building and the sharing of specialist knowledge.

The meeting will start with the presentation of a draft inventory of Marine Important Bird Areas for seabirds in Maltese and international waters identified under the LIFE+ Malta Seabird Project.  This will be followed by sessions on knowledge sharing and gap analysis for the entire Mediterranean region, identifying sites within and beyond national jurisdiction, priority areas and policy mechanisms from across the Mediterranean.”

Click here to read more about the workshop, including the meeting agenda and registration details.

Yelkouan Shearwaters at sea

Malta supports breeding populations of both Yelkouan Puffinus yelkouan and Scopoli’s Calonectris diomedea Shearwaters.  The ACAP-listed Balearic Shearwater P. mauretanicus also breeds within the Mediterranean.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 23 August 2015

SeabirderSaturday will once again have a themed forum discussion.  Today Jennifer Provencher (Department of Biology, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada) will be leading the discussion on seabird and marine litter interactions (click here).  To join the discussion, or just learn more about litter and seabirds, join us on Twitter at 1700 - 1900 GMT, and follower #SeabirderSaturday and Jennifer at @jenni_pro.

The discussion is introduced:

“As global travellers seabirds are considered important sentinel species of the world’s oceans.  While seabirds are primarily in search of food, increasingly marine birds are also ingesting, getting tangled and incorporating into their nests plastics and other marine debris.  Although man-made marine debris has likely been entering the oceans for centuries, plastic, the largest component of marine litter, was initially invented in the early 1900s.   By 1988, 30 million tons of plastic was produced annually, with this amount increasing almost 10 fold over since that timae. Interactions between seabirds and marine plastic were first reported in the 1960s, with reports increasing since this time.

Although reports of litter ingestion was first reported [sic] in the 1960s, efforts to standardize, track and monitor the marine debris ingestion by seabirds was pioneered in the North Sea by the ‘Save the North Sea’ group in the early 1990s.  While some data series on marine debris ingestion date back to the 1980s, most regions began this phenomenon in the early 2000s.  Although initial concerns with marine debris ingestion centred around the physical impacts of ingested debris more recently studies have shown that plastics may also be a vehicle for chemicals, including environmental contaminants shown to have deleterious effects on wildlife.  Less work has been done on entanglement and nest incorporation but both have been shown to have negative impacts on seabirds.  UNEP has listed marine plastics as an emerging global environmental challenge.  Given that seabirds have been shown to be an important group for both environmental monitoring and assessing the impacts of plastics debris on wildlife, seabird research can play a critical role in helping to address and understand this global environmental problem."

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Black-footed Albatross entangled with a balloon

Laysan Albatrosses can ingest floating plastic artefacts, photograph by Ross Wanless

"Some discussion topics:

1. What are the best practices for monitoring and assessing debris ingestion in seabirds worldwide given the variety of: a) seabird foraging strategies, and thus ingestion rates; b) retention of debris; c) methods of bird collections available; and d) method of assessing plastic interactions?
2. What effects are ghost nets having on seabird populations globally?
3. How do we best assess the impacts of debris on seabirds, both physically and chemically?
4. What is the fate of ‘bio’ plastics in the environment and the digestive system of seabirds? Does it break down?
5. What long terms studies are available for debris interactions, and what do they tell us?
6. What are the emerging questions about plastics that seabird researchers should focus on?
7. How do we take information collected to better make population level assessments?
8. What geographical areas are lacking in data and coordinated efforts that should be focused on?
9. How do we incorporate plastics at sea data into spatial modelling of seabird threats?
10. Are regional assessments or summaries of plastic interactions useful to science? To policy makers?
11. What form should marine litter data be presented in to be the most useful to policy makers?”

Selected Literature:

Bond, A.L., Montevecchi, W.A., Guse, N., Regular, P.M., Garthe, S. & Rail, J.F. 2012.  Prevalence and composition of fishing gear debris in the nests of northern gannets (Morus bassanus) are related to fishing effort.  Marine Pollution Bulletin 64: 907-911.

Bond, A.L., Provencher, J.F., Elliot, R., Ryan, P.C., Rowe, S., Jones, I.L., Robertson, G. & Wilhelm, S. 2013.  Ingestion of plastic marine debris by common and thick-billed murres in the Northwest Atlantic from 1985 to 2012.  Marine Pollution Bulletin 77: 192-195.

Cadee, G.C. 2002.  Seabirds and floating plastic debris.  Marine Pollution Bulletin 44: 1294-1295.

Good, T.P., June, J.A., Etnier, M.A. & Broadhurst, G. 2010.  Derelict fishing nets in Puget Sound and the Northwest Straits: patterns and threats to marine fauna.  Marine Pollution Bulletin 60: 39-50.

Kühn, S., Bravo Rebolledo, E.L. & van Franeker, J.A. 2015.  Deleterious effects of litter on marine life.  In: Bergmann, M., Gutow, L. & Klages, M. (Eds).  Marine Anthropogenic Litter.  Cham: Springer International.  pp. 75-116.

Provencher, J.F., Bond, A.L. & Mallory, M.L. 2015.  Marine birds and plastic debris in  Canada: a national synthesis and a way forward.  Environmental Reviews 23: 1-13.

Ryan, P.G. 2008.  Seabirds indicate changes in the composition of plastic litter in the Atlantic and south-western Indian Oceans.  Marine Pollution Bulletin 56: 1406-1409.

Ryan, P.G. 2015.  A brief history of marine litter research.  In:  Bergmann, M., Gutow, L. & Klages, M. (Eds).  Marine Anthropogenic Litter.  New York: Springer International. pp. 1-25.

Ryan, P.G., Moore, C.J., van Franeker, J.A. & Moloney, C.L. 2009.  Monitoring the abundance of plastic debris in the marine environment.  Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B-Biological Sciences 364: 1999-2012.

van Franeker, J.A., Blaize, C., Danielsen, J., Fairclough, K., Gollan, J., Guse, N., Hansen, P.L., Heubeck, M., Jensen, J.K., Le Guillou, G., Olsen, B., Olsen, K.O., Pedersen, J., Stienen, E.W.M. & Turner, D.M. 2011.  Monitoring plastic ingestion by the northern fulmar Fulmarus glacialis in the North Sea.  Environmental Pollution 159: 2609-2615.

Vegter, A.C., Barletta, M., Beck, C., Borrero, J., Burton, H., Campbell, M.L., Eriksen, M., Eriksson, C., Estrades, A., Gilardi, K., Hardesty, B.D., Ivar do Sul, J.A., Lavers, J.L., Lazar, B., Lebreton, L., Nichols, W.J., Ribic, C.A., Ryan, P.G., Schuyler, Q.A., Smith, S.D.A., Takada, H., Townsend, K.A., Wabnitz, C.C.C., Wilcox, C., Young, L. & Hamann, M. 2014.  Global research priorities for the management and mitigation of plastic pollution on marine wildlife.  Endangered Species Research 25: 225-247.

Yamashita, R., Takada, H., Fukuwaka, M.A. & Watanuki, Y. 2011.  Physical and chemical effects of ingested plastic debris on short-tailed shearwaters, Puffinus tenuirostris, in the North Pacific Ocean.  Marine Pollution Bulletin 62: 2845-2849.

John Cooper, ACAP Information officer, 22 August 2015

The Kauai Endangered Seabird Recovery Project (KESRP) has turned to lasers in an effort to halt Endangered Newell’s Shearwaters Puffinus newelli from flying into power lines at night.  A shortened version of KERSP’s news report follows.

““We have power lines that go all around the island and the birds … obviously have trouble seeing them because the lines stretch across the fly paths,” said KERSP’s Andre Raine.

The Kauai Island Utility Cooperative and Kauai Endangered Seabird Recovery Project came up with a plan. They installed 30 lasers on utility poles in ‘Ele’ele which creates what they call a light fence. “So we are firing the lasers in front of the lines and the idea is make the lines more visible,” said Raine.  After more than year of positive results the laser experiment will continue. Starting this month new lasers will be installed and testing will run through December.

The biologists observed birds flying above the light fence to avoid it, but it is too soon to tell if the experiment is a success, so that is why [they] are continuing the project.  The lasers run parallel to the ground and pose no threat to aircraft or people.  In addition to the lasers, the groups will be installing bird diverters, known as firefly units.  The devices hang from the power lines and have reflectors and glow in the dark features that make them visible to birds in low light conditions. The lasers are also meant to keep other endangered seabirds safe as well.”

Newell's Shearwater, photograph by Eric Vanderwerf

The KESRP is a Division of Forestry and Wildlife (DOFAW) project, administered through the Pacific Studies Co-operative Unit of the University of Hawai’i.  Formed in 2006, the project focuses primarily on three threatened seabirds found on the island of Kauai – Newell’s Shearwater, Hawaiian Petrel Pterodroma sandwichensis and Band-rumped Storm Petrel Oceanodroma castro.  Work involves identifying the breeding distribution of these rare seabirds, monitoring their breeding colonies, undertaking research projects to better understand their life histories and the various threats which they face, and working with partner projects and organizations to ensure their long-term conservation.

Read earlier news items on Newell’s Shearwater in ACAP Latest News including on its status as a full species.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 21 August 2015

Kidney Island lies 0.5 km off Kidney Cove in East Falkland in the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas)*.  The 32-ha island (Isla Celebroña in Spanish) rises to 18 m and is almost completely covered in dense stands of Tussac Grass Parodiochloa flabellata.  The coastline consists of boulder beaches, cliffs and a sandy bay.

Tussock-covered Kidney Island, photograph by Sarah Crofts

Field hut among the tussock on Kidney Island, photograph by Sarah Crofts

Kidney Island's sandy bay (with seal and human), photograph by Sarah Crofts

Boulder beach at a White-chin breeding area on Kidney Island, note the person on the left for scale, photograph by Sarah Crofts

Southern Rockhopper Penguin cliff on Kidney Island, photograph by Stephen Pringle 

ACAP-listed White-chinned Petrels Procellaria aequinoctialis breed on the island in two areas.  During summer 2005, 23 occupied burrows were found; 27 occupied burrows were located in 2006.  Larger numbers (“a few hundred pairs”) have been reported breeding in the past and a 1992 estimate of “up to 1,000 pairs” appears in the literature.  Whether this information reflects a real decrease appears uncertain, given the lack of systematic surveys in the past.  A total of 123 White-chins, two banded, was found dead from unknown causes along the island’s shoreline in October 2000 (click here).

White-chinned Petrels in the South Atlantic, photograph by Ben Phalan 

Large numbers of Sooty Shearwaters Puffinus griseus, a few Great Shearwaters P. gravis (the only known breeding site in the island group) and Grey-backed Storm Petrels Garrodia nereis breed on the island, as has the Common Diving Petrel Pelecanoides urinatrix in the past.

Sooty Shearwaters gather off Kidney Island at dusk, photograph by Anton Wolfaardt

The sandy bay on Kidney Island, photograph by Paulo Catry

The island is protected as a National Nature Reserve designated in 1964.  Along with nearby Cochin Island, it is also an Important Bird Area (IBA) designated by BirdLife International (click here).  Landings with a guide following a half-hour boat journey from Stanley are allowed under permit. A small hut nestles within the tussock. It has no introduced mammal pests and has never supported grazing animals, although in the past tussac was cut for fodder.

Read of a 2012 visit to the island here.

White-chinned Petrels are known to breed at only three other localities in the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas)*: Bottom, New and Top Islands.

With thanks to Neil Anders, Paulo Catry, Sam Cockwell, Sarah Crofts, Farrah Peck, Richard Phillips, Stephen Pringle, Kalinka Rexer-Huber and Anton Wolfaardt for photographs and information.

Selected Literature:

[Falklands Conservation] 2006.  Important Bird Areas of the Falkland Islands.  London: Falklands Conservation.  160 pp.

Reid, T.A., Lecoq, M. & Catry, P. 2007.  The White-chinned Petrel Procellaria aequinoctialis population of the Falkland Islands.  Marine Ornithology 35: 57-60.

Wolfaardt, A.[C.], Rendell, N. & Brickle, P. 2010.  Falkland Islands Implementation Plan for the Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels (ACAP): Review of Current Work and a Prioritised Work Programme for the Future.  Stanley: Falkland Islands Government.  57 pp.

Woods, R.W & Woods, A, 1997.  Atlas of the Breeding Birds of the Falkland Islands. Oswestry; Anthony Nelson.  190 pp.

Woods, R., Ingham, R. & Brown, A. 2006.  Falkland Islands.  In: Sanders, S. (Ed.).  Important Bird Areas in the United Kingdom Overseas Territories.  Sandy: Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.  pp. 99-162.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 20 August 2015

*A dispute exists between the Governments of Argentina and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland concerning sovereignty over the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas), South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands (Islas Georgias del Sur y Islas Sandwich del Sur) and the surrounding maritime areas.