ACAP Latest News

Read about recent developments and findings in procellariiform science and conservation relevant to the Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels in ACAP Latest News.

Indian Yellow-nosed Albatrosses occasionally visit Marion Island, but do not breed there

IYNA fledgling King Penguin Bay Marion 15 April 2005 Bruce Dyer 1
Fledgling Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross, King Penguin Bay, Marion Island, 15 April 2005, photograph by Bruce Dyer

Five species of albatrosses breed in numbers on South Africa’s sub-Antarctic Prince Edward Islands in the southern Indian Ocean, with two more species recorded breeding as singletons.  Four species breed on both Marion and Prince Edward; they are the Wandering Diomedea exulans, Grey-headed Thalassarche chrysostoma, Sooty Phoebetria fusca and Light-mantled P. palpebrata.  The fifth, the Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross T. carteri, breeds only on the smaller Prince Edward Island, 22 km away from Marion.  Additionally, a single Black-browed Albatross T. melanophris has attempted breeding (with a Grey-headed Albatross partner) on Marion over a number of years (click here) and a “Shy-type” Albatross,  thought to be a White-capped T. steadi, was found incubating on Prince Edward in 2008; its partner unknown (click here).

Prince Edward Island is rarely visited but on Marion Island team researchers have studied seabirds year-round for many years, when sightings of non-breeding visitors, both seabirds and terrestrial birds, have been reported from time to time.  These vagrant records were summarized in a 2010 publication.  However, it explicitly stated that it did not consider records of globally Endangered Indian Yellow-nosed Albatrosses seen ashore on Marion Island.  Indian Yellow-nosed Albatrosses occasionally seen ashore on Marion over the years have generally gone unreported in the literature, although there is a published but undated  BxW photograph from 1965/66 (No. 76 by E.M. van Zinderen Bakker, Jr) of an adult "visiting Ship's Cove" on Marion Island.

IYNA Marion vz Bakker
The 1960s record, see details in text above

To fill this gap, we list here eight records made between 2005 and 2020 that have appeared in team newsletters or have been made directly to one of us.

Records of Indian Yellow-nosed Albatrosses ashore on Marion Island by month

15 April 2005 fledgling King Penguin Bay
  May 2014 King Penguin Bay
  August 2016 Bullard Beach
15 October 2007 adult Long Ridge between Sea Elephant and Blue Petrel Bays (click here)
05 November 2013 Sealer’s Beach
26 November 2018 Macaroni Bay
  December 2020 adult Grey-headed Albatross Ridge
18 December 2011 adult Archway Bay

indian yellow nosed albatross marion island by chris oosthuizen
The 2007 adult Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross on Long Ridge, photograph by Chris Oosthuizen

According to the ACAP Species Assessment, Indian Yellow-nosed Albatrosses arrive in colonies to commence breeding around the beginning of August and chicks fledge over April - May.  The lack of mid-winter records for Marion for June and July is thus not surprising.  Both the two records from April and May are likely to be of fledglings, whereas the others are all likely to be breeding adults that have “gone astray”.  All but one of the Marion records are from the east coast of the island that faces Prince Edward, the assumed source of all eight birds.  This, however, is to be expected as this coast is more regularly visited and surveyed than elsewhere.  The exception is the adult reported from Grey-headed Albatross Ridge on the island’s southward-facing coast in December 2020.  This locality is the main breeding site for Grey-headed Albatrosses, which we assume was a source of attraction for the vagrant.  If Indian Yellow-nosed Albatrosses are ever to breed on Marion Island, this is likely where it would take place, given that these two mollymawk albatrosses breed in mixed colonies on Prince Edward Island.

Indian Atlantic Gough Chris Jones
Gough second IYNA Sept 2021 Vonica Perold

Left:  The vagrant Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross with its paler head is on the left.  On landing on Gough Island, it engaged in bill fencing with the Atlantic Yellow-nosed Albatross on the right, photograph by Christopher Jones
Right: The second record of an
Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross on Gough Island; photograph by Vonica Perold

Much farther away than to 22-km gap between Marion and Prince Edward and well outside its breeding range a vagrant Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross was photographed ashore on Gough Island in the South Atlantic in January 2019, where it briefly interacted with a resident Atlantic Yellow-nosed Albatross T. chlororhynhchos (click here).  A second bird was seen and photographed on Gough in September 2021 (click here),  Both birds were adults (and possibly were the same individual as they were seen in the same vicinity).

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.

Oosthuizen, W.C., Dyer, B.H. & de Bruyn, P.J.N. 2010.  Vagrant birds ashore at the Prince Edward Islands, southern Indian Ocean, from 1987 to 2009.  African Journal of Marine Science 31: 445-450.

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

Ryan, P. [G.] 2009.  Sixth albatross species breeding on Prince Edward Island.  Africa - Birds & Birding 14(2): 14.

Ryan, P.G., Dilley, B.J., Risi, M.M., Jones, C.W., Osborne, A., Schofield, A., Repetto, J. & Ratcliffe, N. 2019.  Three new seabird species recorded at Tristan da Cunha archipelago. Seabird 32: 122-125.

Ryan, P.G., Jones, M.G.W., Dyer, B.M., Upfold, L. & Crawford, R.J.M. 2009.  Recent population estimates and trends in numbers of albatrosses and giant petrels breeding at the sub-Antarctic Prince Edward Islands.  African Journal of Marine Science 31: 409-417.md jus

Van Zinderen Bakker Sr, E.M., Winterbottom, J.M. & Dyer, R.A. (Eds) 1971.  Marion and Prince Edward Islands. Report on the South African Biological and Geological Expedition / 1965-1966.  Cape Town: A.A. Balkema.  427 pp.

John Cooper, ACAP News Correspondent & Bruce Dyer, 15 December 2022

The Southern Ocean Observing System prepares for its inaugural Symposium in 2023

SOOS symposium header

The inaugural Southern Ocean Observing System (SOOS) Symposium, "Southern Ocean in a Changing World" will take place from 14 – 18 August 2023 in Hobart, Australia.

“The Southern Ocean plays a critical role in the Earth System, and our understanding of the ongoing changes and our ability to project future changes are reliant on sustained observations. The SOOS has built a strong network of community-driven initiatives and tools that combine to enhance and facilitate the delivery of a sustained observing and data delivery system for the Southern Ocean”. 

 The Symposium will feature plenary presentations, parallel sessions and workshops incorporating a wide spectrum of Southern Ocean research under the Symposium’s theme, "Southern Ocean in a Changing World" and focused around the topics listed below:

• Circumpolar observations and programmes
• Regional observations and programmes
• Data systems
• New observing technology and systems in Southern Ocean observations

Find out more information on the Symposium’s topics and register for updates on the event at the SOOS Symposium website.

14 December 2022

 

Wisdom the 71-year-old Laysan Albatross returns to Midway, but is unlikely to breed this season

Wiadom U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Keegan Rankin 24 November 2022 2
Wisdom, easily identified by her red colour band Z333, Midway Atoll, 24 November 2022.  Photograph by Keegan Rankin, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Wisdom, a female Laysan Albatross Phoebastria immutabilis, the world’s oldest known wild bird, was sighted back on Midway Atoll in the northern Pacific Ocean on 24 November 2022.  She is considered to be at least 71 years old.  First banded by the late Chandler Robbins in 1956 as a breeding adult and thus at least five years of age, she could be much older.  According to Jonathan Plissner, supervisory wildlife biologist at the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge, it has been estimated that Wisdom has produced 50-60 eggs and as many as 30 chicks that fledged successfully over her lifetime.

Her mate, Akeakamai, has yet to be seen this breeding season.  Wisdom has not been seen  since her first sighting last month and as most Laysan Albatrosses have already laid their eggs on Midway it seems she will not be breeding for another year (click here).  The Facebook page of the Pacific Islands: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service states that Wisdom's interactions with other birds in the vicinity and the absence of Akeakamai suggest that Wisdom might be widowed, noting the male of the pair usually arrives on the atoll before their female mate.  In the previous season Wisdom returned to her nest site for only two days in November and was not then seen interacting with neighbouring birds.

Click here to access the many posts about Wisdom in ACAP Latest News over the last decade.

John Cooper, ACAP News Correspondent, 13 December 2022

New research reveals insights into Wandering Albatrosses dynamic soaring

rsos WA Dynamic Soaring Philip Richards PaperFigure 1. Schematic of a wandering albatross flying in an across-wind direction using an S-shaped dynamic soaring manoeuvre consisting of a series of upwind and downwind turns through the boundary layer (redrawn after Sachs [6]). The bird extracts mechanical energy from the wind by climbing headed upwind and descending headed downwind. Wave heights are typically large in the Southern Ocean. Wind–wave interactions cause a more complicated instantaneous wind field than the average shown here, and waves themselves induce updrafts. Albatrosses appear to efficiently exploit these fine-scale variations in wind velocity, making modelling their flight challenging. 

Philip Richardson (Department of Physical Oceanography, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, USA) and Ewan Wakefield have published open access in the journal Royal Society Open Science an analysis of the wandering albatrosses’ utilisation of dynamic soaring using GPS tracking data and model simulations.

The paper’s abstract follows:

Wandering albatrosses exploit wind shear by dynamic soaring (DS), enabling rapid, efficient, long-range flight. We compared the ability of a theoretical nonlinear DS model and a linear empirical model to explain the observed variation of mean across-wind airspeeds of GPS-tracked wandering albatrosses. Assuming a flight trajectory of linked, 137° turns, a DS cycle of 10 s and a cruise airspeed of 16 m s−1, the theoretical model predicted that the minimum wind speed necessary to support DS is greater than 3 m s−1. Despite this, tracked albatrosses were observed in flight at wind speeds as low as 2 m s−1. We hypothesize at these very low wind speeds, wandering albatrosses fly by obtaining additional energy from updrafts over water waves. In fast winds (greater than 8 m s−1), assuming the same 10 s cycle period and a turn angle (TA) of 90°, the DS model predicts mean across-wind airspeeds of up to around 50 m s−1. In contrast, the maximum observed across-wind mean airspeed of our tracked albatrosses reached an asymptote at approximately 20 m s−1. We hypothesize that this is due to birds actively limiting airspeed by making fine-scale adjustments to TAs and soaring heights in order to limit aerodynamic force on their wings.

An article explaining the paper’s findings has been released by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) on their website.

Reference:

Richardson P.L. and Wakefield E.D. 2022 Observations and models of across-wind flight speed of the wandering albatross Royal Society Open Science. 9211364211364 http://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.211364

12 December 2022

ACAP’s Secondment Programme supports Argentinian and New Zealand collaboration to reduce bycatch

ACAP Secondee Maxi with Yvan at Dragonfly NZ Sarah Wilcox 2022ACAP Secondee Maximiliano Hernandez (right) with Dragonfly's Environmental Data Scientist, Yvan Richard (left); photograph courtesy of Sarah Wilcox

There may have been a delay of two-years for Argentinian Maximiliano Hernandez to complete his secondment developing an Ecological Risk Assessment within a framework of seabird conservation, but from his perspective, it was worth the wait. Maximiliano had initially planned for the secondment to take place in November 2020, however the COVID-19 pandemic put his travel to New Zealand on hold.

Maximiliano is a PhD student at the Institute of Marine and Coastal Research, National University of Mar del Plata in Argentina, and is interested in the development of Ecological Risk Assessments specific to species known to interact with Argentinian fisheries, which includes a number of ACAP-listed species. 

His successful application to ACAP’s Secondment Programme in 2019 included the New Zealand Department of Conservation facilitating opportunities for Maximiliano to work with experts in ecological risk assessment whilst ACAP provided funding for travel and living expenses during the proposed project. 

BBA Sarah WilcoxA Black-browed Albatross - one of the first species, alongside the White-chinned Petrel, Maximiliano chose for his first assessments due to the abundance of population data and their high catch rates in Argentinian fisheries; photograph by Maximiliano Hernandez

Maximiliano was afforded the opportunity to work under the guidance and expertise of Dr Yvan Richard, an Environmental Data Scientist with Wellington-based company, Dragonfly Data Science. Yvan has over 10 years’ experience in carrying out Ecological Risk Assessments and introduced Maximiliano to several programming tools used to write code for the assessments, skills which will benefit not just Maximiliano but his Argentinian colleagues on his return. The results of the analyses will contribute to the effective implementation of Argentine NPOA-Seabirds.

Capacity building through the fostering of collaboration and knowledge-sharing between Parties are key tenets that underpin the philosophy of the ACAP Secondment Programme. The ACAP Secretariat is delighted to finally report on the successful completion of Maximiliano’s secondment, which highlights how a collaborative approach between Parties serves the Agreement in striving toward its central purpose - to improve conservation outcomes for all ACAP-listed species.

Read more about Maximiliano and his time spent with Yvan Richard in Dragonfly’s article on the project by Sarah Wilcox (link). 

9 December 2022

The Agreement on the
Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels

ACAP is a multilateral agreement which seeks to conserve listed albatrosses, petrels and shearwaters by coordinating international activity to mitigate known threats to their populations.

About ACAP

ACAP Secretariat

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Hobart TAS 7000
Australia

Email: secretariat@acap.aq
Tel: +61 3 6165 6674