The fifth and last year of transferring Globally Vulnerable and New Zealand endemic Chatham Albatross Thalassarche eremita chicks from their breeding colony on the Pyramid for hand rearing at Point Gap in the Chatham Islands by the Chatham Island Taiko Trust commenced last month.  As in the four previous years the chicks will be hand fed until they fledge in the hope that they will recruit to the translocation site, leading to a new breeding colony becoming established (click here). Sixty chicks were transferred bringing the total number over the five years to 282.

“The sea finally calmed down just about enough to get on and off the Pyramid the other day - we only really went for a look because we were worried there weren't many albatross chicks this year but we ended up jumping ashore & quickly getting 60 chicks - it looks like it’s not too bad a year! The chicks are now safely back at Point Gap settling in to their new home” (click here).

Chatham Island residents are invited to come and see the albatross chicks at the Point Gap colony on 10 February.  "This is the final year of the albatross transfers so its your last chance to come and see the feeding in action and see the chicks while they're still cute and fluffy!"  View a video of the 2018 chicks on their artificial nests at Point Gap here.

Translocated Chatham Albatross chicks among decoys at Point Gap in a previous year

Decoys and a sound system will be left in place at the translocation site at Point Gap after the last cohort fledges to help attract returning birds.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 06 February 2018

Note:  For once, there is not too much albatross and petrel news about, so here instead is a great cartoon by Qual Albatroz for your Monday.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 05 February 2016

For the third year running, New Zealand’s Department of Conservation has set up a webcam beside a nest in the mainland colony of globally Endangered Northern Royal Albatrosses Diomedea sanfordi at Taiaroa Head. The egg in the nest on view has recently hatched (click here).

“The egg was laid on 7 November 2017 and since then the parents (known as YWK and KGY) have been taking turns on the nest. They will now continue to take turns feeding the chick for the next five or six weeks. They then leave the chick unguarded, except for feeding visits, until it fledges in spring. The sex of the chick is unknown at this stage.”

Watch the albatross chick grow via the Royalcam here.

A colour-banded Northern Royal Albatross stands up on its egg at Taiaroa Head

There are 32 occupied nests in the colony in the current season, growing from one breeding pair in 1937 to about 65 pairs in 2017 (the species is a biennial breeder when successful).

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 02 February 2018

Rowan Mott and Rohan Clarke (School of Biological Sciences, Monash University, Clayton, Australia) have published in the journal Emu - Austral Ornithology on geographic biases with studying seabirds at sea.

The paper’s abstract follows:

“The distribution of wildlife informs conservation planning. In marine systems, spatial information for seabirds is acquired primarily using vessel-based at-sea survey, aerial survey or animal-borne tracking devices. Many factors contribute to geographic biases in marine spatial research and we use a structured database search to review global patterns resulting from these biases. Although survey effort has been substantial, many large marine sectors were poorly represented. Poor representation often coincided spatially with hotspots of seabird species richness or areas experiencing high cumulative human impact, particularly in southern hemisphere and equatorial regions. Therefore, future seabird research priorities should reflect high species-richness areas including the south-west Pacific, particularly waters surrounding New Zealand. Furthermore, under-represented areas of Asia, and the Atlantic coasts of South America and Africa require greater research effort because of high cumulative human impacts in these areas. National gross domestic product (GDP) was positively related to the number of papers a country produced (determined by the first author’s address). This is indicative of constraints imposed by inherent costs of marine research. We recommend international collaboration between scientists from high-GDP nations with those in developing countries to address this. Further uptake of platforms of opportunity may also reduce this imbalance.”

A Black-footed Albatross Phoebastria nigripes at sea in the North Pacific, photograph by Vicki Miller

Reference:

Mott, R. & Clarke, R.H. 2018. Systematic review of geographic biases in the collection of at-sea distribution data for seabirds. Emu - Austral Ornithology. DOI:10.1080/01584197.2017.1416957.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 01 February 2018