Buller's Albatross by ABUN artist Virginia Nicol; after a photograph by Laurie Smaglick Johnson

The Conservation Services Programme (CSP) of New Zealand’s Department of Conservation works to reduce the impact of commercial fishing on protected species in New Zealand fisheries waters. Here is one of its most recent reports by David Thompson (National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research, Wellington, New Zealand) and Paul Sagar.

The report’s Executive Summary follows:

“This report presents a summary of the results of demographic studies at three study colonies of southern Buller’s albatrosses Thalassarche bulleri bulleri breeding at The Snares from 27 March to 13 April 2022.

Demographic studies at the three study colonies on North East Island have been undertaken annually from 1992 to 2022, with the exception of 2018 and 2021, and so this report incorporates some of these data in the current analysis. Estimates of the numbers of breeding pairs, made by recording the contents (chick, egg or egg fragments) of each nest mound, increased in two of the three colonies to over the numbers recorded during 2020 to be at all-time highs for the 30-year duration of the study.

With the assumption that the combined total number of breeding pairs in the three study colonies was representative of North East Island as a whole, and notwithstanding the maximal counts in two of the study colonies recorded in 2022, then the breeding population probably peaked around 2005-2006 and has since undergone marked annual variations.

A total of 379 birds were [sic] recaptured that had been banded previously in the study colonies as breeding adults of unknown age. A further 137 breeding birds were banded in the study colonies - these are presumed to be first-time breeders – during the latest 2022 survey. Estimates of annual survival of birds banded as breeders continued to decline, with estimates close to 0.9, or lower, in recent years. During the period 1992-2004 all chicks that survived to near-fledging in the study colonies were banded and their survival to return to the study colonies in subsequent years has been monitored. In 2022, 139 of these birds were recaptured, with birds from cohorts banded from 1996 to 2004 being recaptured for the first time. This demonstrates the long-term monitoring required to obtain reliable estimates of survival of such known-age birds. Of these recaptured 139 known-age birds, 11 were found breeding for the first time, and so were recorded as being recruited to the breeding population. In addition, three birds that had been banded as near-fledging in the study colonies during September 2013 and September 2014 were also recaptured for the first time.

In 2020 50 Global Location Sensing (GLS) tags were attached to the metal leg bands of breeding birds in the Mollymawk Bay study colony; of these, 31 were retrieved, and a further 7 recorded as being lost, during the 2022 field season.

Twelve trail cameras were deployed at breeding colonies during the 2022 fieldwork: 11 set to record one photograph every hour during daylight, and one set to record 30 seconds of moving images daily, until they are retrieved in April 2023.”

Reference:

Thomson, D. & Sagar, P. 2022.  Population studies of southern Buller's albatross on The Snares.  Prepared for Conservation Services Programme, Department of Conservation: CSP Project 2019-04.  Wellington: National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research Ltd.  19 pp.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 17 May 2022

 
Amsterdam Albatross off Amsterdam Island by ABUN artist Birgit Bührlé; after a photograph by Kirk Zufelt

With the third World Albatross Day not too far away now, ACAP is marking the days until 19 June with a daily artwork posted to the Home Page, with a different ACAP-listed species featured each day.  The series commences with the Endangered Amsterdam Albatross Diomedea amsterdamensis and continues in alphabetical order to end with the Vulnerable White-chinned Petrel Procellaria aequinoctialis during ‘WADWEEK2022’ (13-19 June).

White-chinned Petrel by ABUN artist Anju Rajesh

The 31 chosen artworks (from over 500) come from three fruitful collaborations with Artists and Biologists Unite for Nature (ABUN) over the last three years.

With grateful thanks to ABUN Co-founder Kitty Harvill and all the ABUN artists for their ongoing support of albatross and petrel conservation

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 16 May 2022

A fledgling Cory's Shearwater is grounded by street lights; photograph by Beneharo Rodríguez

Today (14 May) is the first of the year’s two World Migratory Bird Days, both with the theme of light pollution under the slogan “Dim the Lights for Birds at Night!” (in French Des nuits noires pour les vols migratoires; in Spanish; Noches oscuras, migraciones seguras).

Three ACAP-listed species are notably affected by light pollution, Spain’s Critically Endangered Balearic Puffinus mauretanicus and Chile’s Vulnerable Pink-footed Ardenna creatopus Shearwaters and New Zealand’s Endangered Westland Petrel Procellaria westlandica.  The other four ACAP-listed Procellaria petrels, that come ashore and fledge from burrows at night, breed in dark sky locales (Southern Ocean  islands and for the Vulnerable Black Petrel P. parkinsoni, New Zealand's Great and Little Barrier Islands.  Similarly, the diurnal and so largely unaffected albatrosses and giant petrels tend to breed in areas with little light pollution.

A number of non ACAP-listed burrowing procellariiforms is affected by light pollution during breeding.  These include the Vulnerable Yelkouan Puffinus yelkouan, Critically Endangered Newell's P. newelli, Endangered Hutton's P. huttoni, Least Concern Cory's Calonectris borealis, Least Concern Scopoli’s C. diomedea, Least Concern Short-tailed A. tenuirostris Shearwaters and the Endangered Hawaiian Petrel Pterodroma sandwichensis.  These are the species towards which research and mitigation efforts are mostly directed, as is reported from time to time in ACAP Latest News.

Attraction of seabirds to well-lit vessels at sea appears to affect mainly the smaller, non-ACAP listed procellariiform species (storm petrels, diving petrels, prions), rather than any of the larger ACAP-listed species.

To access the World Migratory Bird Day 2022 Campaign Strategy document click here.  The document provides the strategic goals and key messages for the 2022 campaign as agreed by the three main organizing partners of World Migratory Bird Day: the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS), the African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbird Agreement (AEWA) and the non-profit organization, Environment for the Americas (EFTA).

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 14 May 2022

A Wandering Albatross about to make a sea landing in stormy weather, by ABUN artist Maureen Bennetts for ACAP; after a photograph by Dimas Gianuca

Elham Nourani (Department of Migration, Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior, Radolfzell, Germany) and colleagues have posted open access in the preprint server BioRxiv on how seabirds, including two albatross species, behave under extreme wind conditions at sea.

The preprint’s summary follows:

“Flying seabirds are adapted for windy environments. Despite this, storms can cause widespread strandings and wrecks, demonstrating that these seabirds are not always able to avoid or compensate for extreme conditions. The maximum wind speeds that birds can operate in should vary with morphology and flight style, but this has been hard to quantify due to the challenges of collecting data during infrequent events. Yet this information is crucial for predicting how seabirds are impacted by and respond to extreme events, which are expected to increase in intensity and frequency under climate change. We analyzed > 300,000 hours of tracking data from 18 seabird species, representing all major seabird guilds in terms of flight style. We quantified the range of wind speeds that seabirds use during their foraging trips in relation to the wind speeds available, and assessed evidence for avoidance of particular wind conditions. The maximum wind speeds that birds flew in increased with wing loading, in line with general aeronautical predictions. Two species of albatross flew in extreme winds > 23 m s^-1. Within the 18 species studied, we found no general preference or avoidance of specific wind speeds. Nonetheless, in a very small number of instances, albatrosses avoided speeds below their operable maxima, demonstrating that even the most wind-adapted birds avoid extreme speeds in particular scenarios. The Atlantic yellow-nosed albatross and the wandering albatross avoided the maximum wind speeds by flying towards and tracking the eye of the storm. Extreme winds therefore might pose context-dependent risks to seabirds, and there is a need for more information on the factors that determine the of risk, given the impact of global change on storm intensity.”

Reference:

Nourani, E., Safi, K., de Grissac, S., Anderson, D.J., Cole, N.C., Fell, A., Grémillet, D., Lerma, M., McKee, J.L. Pichegru, L., Provost, P., Rattenborg, N.C., Ryan, P.G., Santos, C.D., Schoombie, S., Tatayah, V., Weimerskirch, H., Wikelski, M. & Shepard, E.L.C. 2022.  Extreme tolerable winds for seabirds are determined by morphology.  Bioxiv doi.org/10.1101/2022.05.02.490292 .

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 13 May 2022