Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels

Shy Albatross by Drew Lee

The Shy Albatross Thalassarche cauta is endemic to Australia, breeding on only three small islands around Tasmania.  It currently has a global status of Near Threatened, although a long, ongoing review By BirdLife International is considering whether it should be uplisted to Vulnerable.

In Australia, it was already categorized as nationally Vulnerable, but has now been uplisted to Endangered on the country’s threatened species list by the Federal Government.

The Federal Minister for the Environment the Hon. Sussan Ley MP said in a media release: “although significant progress had been made in mitigating threats, through the protection of breeding sites and reductions in bycatch from commercial longline fishing, significant threats still remained.  Bycatch in other commercial fisheries, disease and competition with other seabirds were all key factors in my decision to list the species as endangered.”  The reassessment was conducted “by the independent expert Threatened Species Scientific Committee, which recommended that I uplist the species because of its limited breeding range and population decline.”

 Shy Albatrosses on Albatross Island, photograph by Matthew Newton

The Minister made the announcement on World Albatross Day last month, writing on her Facebook page:

“On the first international day dedicated to the albatross I have upgraded the threatened species listing for Australia’s Shy Albatross from vulnerable to endangered.  As Australia’s only endemic albatross species, the Shy Albatross breeds on just three islands in the world – all off the coast of Tasmania.  Significant progress has been made in abating threats to the Shy Albatross, including the protection of breeding sites, but bycatch in commercial fisheries and disease were all key factors in my decision.

World Albatross Day is held on 19 June to mark the anniversary of the signing of the international Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels (ACAP) in Canberra in 2001 - Australia was at the forefront of establishing ACAP to achieve and maintain a favourable conservation status for threatened albatrosses and petrels.”

The global threat status of the Shy Albatross, along with those of all the ACAP-listed species, were considered at last year's meeting of ACAP's Population and Conservation Status Group (PaCSWG5 Doc 03).

The Shy Albatross is included in both Australia’s National Recovery Plan for Threatened Albatrosses and Giant Petrels (2011) and the Threat Abatement Plan for the Incidental Catch (or Bycatch) of Seabirds during Oceanic Longline Fishing Operations (2018).

Read a popular report of the uplisting.

With thanks to Jonathon Barrington, Australian Antarctic Division.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 01 July 2020

Joe Wynn (Oxford Navigation Group, Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, UK) and colleagues have an in-press paper in the journal Current Biology that provides the first evidence for magnetoreception in a pelagic seabird, the Manx Shearwater Puffinus puffinus.

The paper’s summary follows:

“In migratory animals for whom post-natal care is limited, it is essential that there are inherited mechanisms whereby an individual can navigate—first, to the terminus of their migration, and second, back to a suitable breeding site. In birds, empirical evidence suggests that orientation on first migration is controlled by an inherited navigational vector, a direction and a distance in which to move (the “clock and compass” model).  The mechanism and information that underlie the return to the natal breeding site are, however, almost entirely unknown.  A potential solution to this problem would be for an animal to learn the values for spatially and temporally stable gradient cues that specifically indicate the location of the natal site.  One potential cue for latitude is magnetic inclination.  Here, we use ringing recoveries made over the last 80 years to investigate whether magnetic inclination might be used as a navigational cue to control the latitude of recruitment in a trans-global migrant, the Manx shearwater (Puffinus puffinus).  We find that small changes in inclination between when a bird fledges and when it returns from first migration correlate with probabilistic changes in latitude at recruitment, in doing so quantitatively fulfilling a priori predictions as to the magnitude and direction of latitudinal shift.  This, we believe, suggests that (1) natal magnetic inclination is learnt prior to fledging and (2) is used to provide latitudinal information when making the first return trip from the wintering grounds.”

Manx Shearwater, photograph by Nathan Fletcher

Reference:

Wynn, J., Padget, O., Mouritsen, H., Perrins, C. & Guilford, T. 2020. Natal imprinting to the Earth’s magnetic field in a pelagic seabird.  Current Biology doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2020.05.039.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 30 June 2020

A Light Mantled Albatross Phoebetria palpebrata (globally Near Threatened and nationally Declining) was found “in the middle of a busy intersection” a couple of hundred metres inland in Petone, a suburb of Lower Hutt on the north shore of Wellington Harbour this month.  It was then taken into captivity by The Nest Te Kōhanga animal hospital at New Zealand’s Wellington Zoo where it was found to be suffering from a thin body condition, weighing only 1.6 kg, and dehydration (click here).

The bird “received supportive care, pain relief and fluids as [it was] very weak and underweight.  Yesterday we did a full health check, including X-rays and blood tests. Since his arrival, he’s much stronger, brighter and has gained weight thanks to the amazing work of our Vet team.”  However, the bird did not survive: “We're sad to report that the albatross we were caring for at The Nest Te Kōhanga passed away … our Vet team conducted a post mortem and found that the cause of death was a blockage at the exit of the stomach, caused by two small pieces of plastic.  Due to the obstruction, the bird wasn’t able to absorb any nutrients from his food and that was likely causing his emaciation.”  Information from Wellington Zoo’s Facebook page.

It has been suggested the larger item found in the albatross stomach is a rubber ring used for docking the tails of lambs

Ingestion of plastic items, sometimes leading to death, has been reported previously for a number of albatross species, notably for the Laysan Albatross Phoebastria immutabilis of the North Pacific.  Watch a video of a Southern Royal Albatross Diomedea epomophora that died after swallowing a 500-ml plastic bottle – as previously reported in ACAP Latest News.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 28 June 2020

At the Eleventh Meeting of ACAP’s Advisory Committee (AC11) held in Florianópolis, Brazil during May 2019, Tatiana Neves, the founder and General Coordinator of the Brazilian NGO, Projeto Albatroz and Vice Chair of the ACAP Advisory Committee, sat down with ACAP’s honorary Information Officer to chat informally about the history of the Albatross and Petrel Agreement.  The 13 and a half-minute video comes with Portuguese subtitles.  For detailed information on ACAP’s early history, including the activities that led to it coming into force, consult the publication referenced below.

Tatiana Neves and John Cooper in Florianópolis, Brazil at the Eleventh Meeting of ACAP’s Advisory Committee

Tatiana Neves, do Projeto Albatroz, entrevista o oficial de informações da ACAP sobre a história do Acordo

Na décima primeira reunião do Comitê Consultivo da ACAP (AC11), realizada em Florianópolis, Brasil em maio de 2019, Tatiana Neves, fundadora e coordenadora geral da ONG brasileira, Projeto Albatroz, sentou-se com o oficial de informações honorário da ACAP para conversar informalmente sobre a história do Acordo de Albatroz e Petrel, resultando no vídeo a seguir.

With thanks to Projeto Albatroz.

Reference:

Cooper, J., Baker, G.B., Double, M.C., Gales, R., Papworth, W., Tasker, M.L. & Waugh, S.M. 2006.  The Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels: rationale, history, progress and the way forward.  Marine Ornithology 34: 1-5.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 26 June 2020