Over the last few decades efforts, mostly successful, have been made to eradicate introduced predatory mammals on many of the Southern Ocean’s sub-Antarctic islands, notably New Zealand’s Campbell Island and Australia’s Macquarie Island among others. For some islands (e.g. New Zealand’s Antipodes) final results of eradication attempts are still awaited. Plans are being made to rid the UK’s Gough Island and South Africa’s Marion Island of their introduced House Mice Mus musculus over the next three years. An ambitious plan to rid New Zealand’s Auckland Island of its feral pigs Sus scrofus domesticus and cats Felis catus, as well as of its mice, is also currently being developed.

News is now to hand that the French have commenced a year’s research on the feral cats, Norway Rats Rattus norvegicus and House Mice on Amsterdam Island in the southern Indian Ocean (click here). Population estimates of rodents will be made, and cats will be monitored with camera traps.

Amsterdam Island, photograph from Thierry Micol

According to the article, the Norway Rat is suspected of being a carrier for the bacterium Pasteurella multocida, responsible for avian cholera which kills chicks of the globally Endangered Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross Thalassarche carteri, on the island, of which two- thirds of the world population breeds on Amsterdam’s Entrecasteaux cliffs. Rats will be sampled for Pasteurella.

Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross with its chick, photograph by Jeremy Demay

The intention is for the research to inform planning for the simultaneous eradication of the three alien mammals. The island’s feral cattle Bos taurus were eradicated in 2010 (click here).

ACAP Latest News will report on progress towards a pest-free Amsterdam Island as information becomes available, in the expectation that in time it will join the growing panoply of pest-free islands in the Southern Ocean.

Read more here.

References:

TAAF 2010. Plan de gestion 2011 - 2015 Réserve naturelle des Terres australes françaises. Saint Pierre, La Réunion: Terres australes et antarctiques françaises. 35 pp.

Weimerskirch, H. 2004. Diseases threaten Southern Ocean albatrosses. Polar Biology 27: 374-379.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 04 January 2018

The first three seasons of translocating globally Vulnerable Hawaiian Petrels Pterodroma sandwichensis and the first season for globally Endangered Newell’s Shearwaters Puffinus newelli to a predator-proof enclosure at Nihoku within the Kīlauea Point National Wildlife Refuge on the Hawaiian island of Kauai has resulted in 75 hand-reared birds fledging. Totals of 49 petrels and 26 shearwaters have fledged from the 76 moved; with a 100% success rate in the last two years.

“The birds were collected from colonies in Hono o Na Pali Natural Area Reserve and Upper Limahuli Preserve - located in Kaua‘i’s rugged, mountainous interior, some of the last main strongholds for these species on Kauai and a single Newell’s Shearwater was translocated from within an area outside of the predator-proof fence at the … refuge. Once carefully extracted from their burrows, the birds were flown by helicopter to the Princeville Airport where they were then driven to the Nihoku enclosure.

There the birds were placed into artificial burrows and, over the course of several weeks were fed and cared for by a dedicated team until they finally fledged.”

According to Pacific Rim Conservation, who looked after the birds “the success of the first three years of translocation is the result of many individuals and organizations working together to make a better future for these native birds. Each time one of these young birds fledges from Nihoku it brings us one step closer to our goal of recovery for these unique seabirds. It is comforting and exciting to know that when they return as adults they will have a safe place to raise young of their own.”

Newell's Shearwater chick, photograph by Andre Raine

Read more:

http://kauaiseabirdproject.org/index.php/media/kesrp-press-releases/75-endangered-hawaiian-seabirds-fledge-first-three-years-relocation-effort/

http://usfwspacific.tumblr.com/post/168302743165/75-endangered-hawaiian-seabirds-fledge-in-first

https://www.islandconservation.org/relocation-saves-generations-of-seabirds/

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 03 January 2018

It’s all on the go with the hands-on management of globally Near Threatened Laysan Albatrosses Phoebastria immutabilis on the Hawaiian islands of Kauai and Oahu. Last month, as has been happening for the last 12 years, eggs were collected from the US Navy’s Pacific Missile Range Facility on Kauai. The breeding birds are a risk to flight operations at the facility, but rather than just destroying their eggs those deemed fertile by candling (click here) are fostered out to Laysans elsewhere on the island that have infertile eggs (often because both members of a pair are females). For this breeding season the Pacific Missile Range Facility at Barking Sands delivered fertile eggs to 22 Laysan Albatross nests on three private properties on Kauai.

A Laysan Albatross receives a fertile egg on the island of Kauai, photograph by Hob Osterlund

View a video clip of a bird receiving its new egg on Kauai.

But this left a number of collected eggs with no suitable nests for fostering on the island. In the last three years these surplus eggs have taken a short flight by aeroplane to Oahu where the NGO Pacific Rim Conservation has artificially incubated them and then after hatching hand-reared the chicks in the James Campbell National Wildlife Refuge, in an endeavour to create a new colony (click here)

This season a different tack has been taken as Pacific Rim Conservation reports by Facebook. “Every year there are more eggs than foster nests on Kauai, and this year instead of hand-raising these chicks at James Campbell, they were given to foster parents at Kaena Point [Natural Area Reserve] to bolster that population.” Twenty-one eggs have been fostered, meaning that over 40 eggs have been saved from destruction.

Read more here.

Meanwhile the Laysan Albatrosses in the Kaena Point Natural Area Reserve are doing just fine with a record 105 eggs laid this breeding season, as reported to ACAP Latest News by Lindsay Young of Pacific Rim Conservation. “A lot of [banded] birds born in 2009 and 2010 (both large cohorts) are breeding for the first time this year which is why there has been such a bump in the numbers.”

100th breeding attempt at Kaena Point in the 2017/18 season, photograph by Lindsay Young

With thanks to Hob Osterlund (Kauai Albatross Network) and Lindsay Young (Pacific Rim Conservation) for information and photographs. The egg transfer project is supported by the Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources and the U.S. Navy.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 02 January 2018

Wisdom, a female Laysan Albatross Phoebastria immutabilis considered to be at least 67 years old based on her band history, has returned once more to Midway Atoll in the North Pacific.

“U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Refuge staff spotted Wisdom and her mate, Akeakamai, near their nest in late November, and on December 13 staff confirmed that Akeakamai was on the nest incubating an egg. Wisdom and her mate return to the same nest site on Midway Atoll each year. Since 2006, Wisdom has successfully raised and fledged at least nine chicks…” (click here).

Wisdom's mate stands over her egg last month; a photograph of Wisdom for the current breeding season is awaited

Photograph courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service

Read more about Wisdom’s annual breeding activity in ACAP Latest News here.

View photos and videos of Wisdom here.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 01 January 2018