An Antipodean Albatross pair on Adams Island, photograph by Colin O’Donnell ONZM

Graeme Elliott ONZM (Department of Conservation, Nelson, New Zealand) and colleagues have produced a final report for the Conservation Services Programme of the New Zealand Department of Conservation that summarizes research conducted on the Gibson’s subspecies of the ACAP-listed and Endangered Antipodean Albatross Diomedea antipodensis gibsoni on Adams Island, Auckland Islands during the 2024/25 breeding season.

The report’s summary follows:

“Gibson’s wandering albatross (Diomedea antipodensis gibsoni) have been in decline since 2005.  Research into the causes of and solutions to the falling numbers of Gibson’s albatross includes an annual visit to the main breeding grounds on Adams Island and this report describes the results of the 2025 breeding season.  Breeding success in 2024 was 46%, the lowest for 8 years, with only 37 chicks produced from the study colony.  The number of pairs nesting in three representative census blocks in 2025 was close to the average of the last ten years, with the poor breeding season in 2024 probably a “blip” rather than the start of a steep decline. Survival of both males and females has improved though confidence intervals around the most recent estimates are so large the level of improvement is not yet clear.

Satellite transmitters taped to the back feathers of 29 adult Gibson’s wandering albatross in January 2022 remained attached for an average of 179 days and those attached in January 2024 to 20 adults for 251 days, providing detailed information on patterns of use of the Tasman Sea.  A combined total 10,204 days of tracking was recorded from even numbers of adult males and females, 19 of which were not-breeding and 30 of which were.  One breeding female was almost certainly caught in June 2024 in the mid Tasman Sea by a longliner flagged to Chinese Taipei.  Given the limited number of birds with transmitters and days tracked, this capture suggests an annual mortality rate of adults in fisheries interactions of 3.5% in the two years.  Sixteen Gibson’s wandering albatross chicks about to fledge from Adams Island were fitted with satellite transmitters in late December 2024 and their movements will be followed throughout 2025.

In January 2024 and January 2025 aerial photographs were taken using drones of the entire breeding grounds of Gibson’s albatross on Adams Island.  All 4,000ha of albatross nesting habitat was photographed across the two seasons, and 24% was photographed in both years. Orthomosaic images were constructed from the photos and the number of albatrosses on the ground in the orthomosaics were counted.  Ground calibration checks undertaken at the same time as the photographs were used to provide correction factors of the proportion of birds on the ground which had eggs (has-egg rate; mean was 54% in 2024 and 67% in 2025).  Another correction was made for the likely proportion of eggs not yet laid or nests that had failed at the time the photographs were taken.  This lay-fail correction was derived from regular visits to the study area. The two corrections were applied to the number of birds counted from the drone imagery on Adams Island in 2024 and 2025.  To estimate each year’s whole island number of breeding pairs, a growth-rate estimate from blocks counted both years was applied to blocks only counted in one year.  The mean of the two year’s estimates was 4,497 breeding pairs.  This is the first time since 1997 the number of breeding pairs nesting on Adams Island have been comprehensively assessed across the island.  The proportion nesting in annual count blocks in 2024 (9.2%) and 2025 (9.7%) are similar to that recorded in 1997 (10.7%), indicating that the annual count blocks remain representative of whole-island trends in nest numbers.  Compared to the ground counts undertaken in 1997, the drone-based estimates provided better coverage as drones could easily go everywhere but nesting birds couldn’t be distinguished from other birds on the ground from drone imagery.  Therefore, the number of nesting birds is estimated not counted. In contrast, counts undertaken on foot can easily miss birds either obscured by vegetation or in places that are too difficult to walk, but the number of nesting birds is counted not estimated.  It is not possible to objectively judge which method is better, but the drone estimates are easier.”

Reference:

Elliott, G., Walker, K., Rexer-Huber, K, Tinnemans, J., McDonald, A., Rawlence, T. & Parker, G. 2025.  Gibson’s Wandering Albatross: Drone-based Population Estimate, Demography and at-sea Distribution.  Report Prepared for New Zealand Department of Conservation.  33 pp.

John Cooper, Emeritus Information Officer, Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels, 01 September 2025

“The Scientific Program Committee of the 2026 Pacific Seabird Group Annual Meeting is now accepting proposals for workshops, symposia, and round-tables to be held at the virtual meeting scheduled for the week of February 23-27, 2026. In addition, the Awards Committee is now accepting nominations for 2025 recipients of PSG's Lifetime Achievement Award and Special Achievement Award.

This meeting will be held fully online and will be themed around "Seabirds: Connecting Oceans, Islands, and People." We are excited to hold a fully online conference for the first time since 2021, and we hope that this meeting will increase access opportunities to all of our membership while reducing the environmental costs of our annual meeting.

The deadline for meeting proposals and award nominations is 01 September 2025.

Click here to submit your workshop, symposia, and/or round-table proposal.

Workshops are hands-on learning exercises where participants engage in a mix of lectures and activities and leave with some new skill or knowledge set. Examples might include navigating software like R, eBird, or Raven; learning emerging ornithological techniques, such as tracking devices, Motus, and passive acoustic monitoring; gaining insights into how to write a successful grant proposal or prepare a paper for publication; and becoming familiar with bird education curricula through hands-on activities and demonstrations.  

Symposia are an opportunity for an integrated synthesis of a new or timely topic or theme that will have broad appeal at the conference. Organizers are expected to invite speakers that will share new findings and insights and provide diverse perspectives and voices. The invited talks within a symposium should be focused around a central theme or question and allow for thorough coverage of that topic.

Round-tables are open forum discussions on predetermined ornithological topics, with one or more moderators. Participants are given equal rights to discuss, share ideas and information, and debate, in an organized and respectful way. Example topics include conservation strategies, emerging threats, and more.

Contact the Scientific Program Chair, Don Lyons (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) for further information.

We are also seeking nominations for two awards to be conferred at this year's meeting:

PSG Lifetime Achievement Award -  A seabird researcher, educator, or conservationist who has made significant, long-term contributions to seabird science, conservation and education in the Pacific Ocean or the world.

PSG Special Achievement Award -  An individual who has performed outstanding, long-term service for the Pacific Seabird Group, or who has achieved an outstanding and significant exemplary accomplishment for the betterment of seabird research, education, and/or conservation, or both.

To submit a nomination, please e-mail the Past Chair, Juliet Lamb (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) by 01 September with a written description of why your nominee is deserving of PSG recognition. Please include your contact information and confirm your commitment to writing up an awards essay for the 2024 meeting program and the following Pacific Seabirds issue if your nominee is chosen. Make sure your description provides enough information to make your case - not all members of the awards committee will know all nominees personally! Nominees are evaluated on contributions to seabird research, conservation, education/mentoring, leadership and professional growth of PSG, service to PSG, connection to the region or theme of the upcoming meeting, and modeling ethical and professional conduct.”

John Cooper, Emeritus Information Officer, Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels, 29 August 2025

Black Petrel chick by Maureen Bennetts of Artists & Biologists Unite for Nature (ABUN), after a photograph by Biz Bell

Elizabeth ‘Biz’ Bell (Wildlife Management International, New Zealand) and colleagues have produced a final report for the Conservation Services Programme of the New Zealand Department of Conservation that summarizes research conducted on ACAP-listed Black Petrels Procellaria parkinsoni on Aotea/Great Barrier Island.

The report’s Executive Summary follows:

“This report is part of the ongoing study of the tākoketai/black petrel (i) on Aotea/Great Barrier Island that began in the 1995/96 breeding season.  During the 2024/25 breeding season, 486 tākoketai study burrows were intensively monitored within the Mt Hobson/Hirakimata study area on Aotea. Throughout the study colony, there were 313 (64.4%) burrows occupied by breeding pairs, 106 (21.8%)  ccupied by non-breeding birds, and 67 (13.7%) were unoccupied at the time of check. Overall, 212ochicks were produced from the study burrows that are estimated to fledge representing a breeding success rate of 67.7%. This does not include one chick that was banded in April 2025 but subsequently found dead outside the Department of Conservation Okiwi office, later on in June 2025  having presumably crash-landed on its maiden voyage.

Nine census grids were monitored within the study area and accounted for 200 of the inspected study burrows. Of these, 121 were occupied by breeding pairs (60.5%) and 78 chicks were produced representing a fledging success rate of 64.4%.  A total of 714 adults and 218 fledgling chicks were captured during the 2024/25 field season of which

with 143 adults were banded this season.  Of the 218 fledgling chicks banded during the 2024/25 field season, 213 were banded in study burrows and five chicks were banded in unmarked burrows.

There have been nocturnal surveys undertaken throughout the 30-year study period, but only over the past four seasons (2021/22 to 2024/25) has this effort been increased to 6-8 hour (between 9.15 pm to 5.15 am) searches each night. Over 940 nights of ad-hoc surveys undertaken between 1995/96 and 2020/21, 811 adults were recaptured, of which 365 were already banded and 108 were returned chicks.

Over 51 nights of intensive surveys between 2021/22 and 2024/25, 516 adults were recaptured, of which 285 were already banded and 106 were returned chicks. At-sea surveys have also been conducted by WMIL over this same period with only 22 banded birds being caught and nine being recaptured chicks (Burgin 2024).  The percentage of banded tākoketai caught out of all captures is higher for intensive night surveys (51.3%) than the ad-hoc surveys (45%). This pattern is also the same for the percentage of returned chicks captured (intensive 19.4%, ad-hoc 13.3%), for the number of banded tākoketai caught per survey (intensive n=5.3, ad-hoc n=2.1) and for returned chicks caught per survey (intensive 2.0 returned chicks/survey, ad-hoc 0.6 returned chicks/survey).

There have been a total of 491 returned chicks recaptured at the colony since they were banded prior to fledging. Of these, 138 returned chicks were identified during the 2024/25 breeding season; 34 of which were caught for the first time at the colony. Not all cohorts were represented this season as no re-captures of returned chicks were made from the 1995/96, 2000/01 and 2002/03 cohorts.  Nonetheless, this season saw the highest number of cohorts represented (by at least one individual).  Over the entire study, the majority of the 491 returned chicks were from the 2010 /11 cohort followed by the 2006/07 cohort. Understanding the factors affecting return rates of chicks within the 35-ha study site is vital. It is important to determine whether it is related to low juvenile survival and/or recruitment or if it is simply due to a lack of detection. Understanding juvenile survival and recruitment is necessary for accurate demographic modelling and for species risk assessment modelling. Therefore, it is recommended that efforts to obtain this data is completed with urgency.

There was a single feral cat predation event on an unbanded adult tākoketai (not an individual from the study burrows but found in the wider study area) and two rat predation events at the study colony on Hirakimata this season. Introduced species still pose a threat to the tākoketai population and it is imperative pest control measures continue.

WMIL recommends that:

• Intensive population monitoring using the study burrows on Aotea continues with three visits (i.e., at egg-laying (December); at chick hatching/chick guard in late January/early February and at chick fledging in late April/early May) per season to the colony to track population trends and determine impacts to the birds and colony.
• Multiple-night expeditions to focus on recruitment (i.e., nocturnal surveys to capture pre-breeders and returned chicks) to the Aotea study colony continue to determine juvenile survival and recapture probabilities.
• Implement a remote/trail camera monitoring network at key-launch sites around the colony to identify potential time-windows of peak population activity outside the routinely monitored timeframes
• Sexing of all tākoketai caught during the recruitment expedition and in the study, burrows is completed to determine any sex biases and survival differences between sexes at the colony and within the study burrows.
• A focused, consistent and repeatable mark/recapture session (e.g., a 2-hour capture period at known launch sites) is completed over a number of nights to capture as many banded and unbanded birds as possible. Data can then be used to provide another population estimate and compared to estimates obtained from at-sea captures and burrow monitoring.
• Transect surveys across the core tākoketai habitat (1000 ha around the summit) are undertaken to provide an updated population estimate for the core breeding area of Aotea.
• Syatellite tracking of chicks to, and in, South American waters is undertaken to determine migration routes and foraging areas to estimate risk in these areas.
• The possibility of collaborative at-sea capture expeditions in Ecuador is investigated. Discussions between DOC and New Zealand Government with Ecuadorian Government and researchers will have to be conducted to enable this type of collaborative work. At-sea work in Ecuador could determine the level of juvenile tākoketai presence in this area and risk within this area, and this mark/recapture work could provide another population estimate to compare with the New Zealand data.
• Further investigation to determine whether particular areas of the colony are more at risk to rainfall events than others (e.g., burrows in flatter areas being more prone to flooding) as a preliminary assessment on climate resilience.
• In-depth modelling on the effect of age, age difference in pairs, and experience on breeding success is completed to understand this relationship in tākoketai.
• Analysis of, and comparison between, breeding success in public, and non-public, access areas is completed to determine whether human disturbance is a factor at the Aotea colony.
• Investigation into possible deterrence methods of all predators, but specifically feral pigs and feral cats, should be continued at Cooper’s Castle.

Reference:

Bell, E.A., Lamb, S. & Ray, S. 2025.  Key Demographic Parameters and Population Trends of Tākoketai/Black Petrels (Procellaria parkinsoni) on Aotea/Great Barrier Island: 2024/25.  Wildlife Management International Ltd. Technical Report to the Conservation Services Programme.  Wellington: Department of Conservation.  40 pp.

John Cooper, Emeritus Information Officer, Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels, 28 August 2025

Highlights of life on Midway by Ilana Nimz

The Friends of Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge (FOMA) held its first art contest during June, announcing the winners last month (click here). All the submitted entries are now available for viewing here.  Three entrants, Isabelle Beaudoin, Ilana Nimz and Holly Parsons, have previously supported the Albatross and Petrel Agreement with their artworks, photographs and writings.  Their submitted artworks, along with descriptions follow.

Ilana Nimz: “This is a whimsical repeating tile pattern depicting highlights of life on Midway, including rafting Moli [Laysan Albatross], dancing Ka'upu [Black-footed Albatross], endangered ‘ilio holo i ka ua ua [Hawaiian Monk Seal], numerous shorebirds, and the cryptic nunulu [Bonin Petrel]. The lagoon is home to a resident pod of naia [dolphins], and the ponds have thriving Laysan ducks.”

“George and Geraldine” by Holly Parsons

Holly Parsons: “The pointillist portrait “George and Geraldine” depicts the beloved pair of Short-tailed Albatross who have chosen to nest on Kuaihelani [Midway Atoll], unlike the rest of their species, who nest in Japan.  Quite the pioneering couple!”

“The Yawn” by Isabelle Beaudoin

Isabelle Beaudoin submitted three artworks in her “Weird Chicks” series drawn from life on Kure Atoll. “The Yawn”, depicted here, along with “Wing Stub Stretch” and “The Aeroplane Stretch”.

John Cooper, Emeritus Information Officer, Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels, 27 August 2025