“The last vestiges of light are fading over Paparoa National Park, Westland in the South Island of New Zealand.  As the skies darken, a magnificent silhouette can be seen soaring above a small group of scientists.  Soon one silhouette becomes many and within fifteen minutes of the first sighting, birds begin to plummet down into the bush, hitting the ground with a disarming crash.  There ensues a cacophony of sound as birds call to their nesting partners, or perhaps to each other – a wild kind of party on the forest floor in this remote part of the country.”

Kate Whitley of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa explains in her illustrated on-line account how to extract an ACAP-listed and Vulnerable Westland Petrel Procellaria westlandica from its burrow at the species’ only breeding site.  A burrowscope is first used to check for presence, the birds are then carefully removed (with gloves!) so that previously fitted GPS loggers can be downloaded of the birds' at-sea movements.

Westland Petrel, photograph by Susan Waugh

“The local community [is] embracing the fact that they have a unique Petrel colony on their doorstep, and this year launched the inaugural ‘Return of the Westland Petrel’ festival.  The highlight of the festival was a beach parade where locals could witness the birds soaring in overhead on their return to the nesting site.”

One of the May festival’s highlights was also the unveiling of a huge model petrel in a tree above the entertainment stage (click here).

Click here for the whole article by Kate.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 17 August 2015

The Pacific Seabird Group will hold its 43rd Annual Meeting over four days from 10-13 February 2016 at Turtle Bay, Oahu, Hawaii, USA, with seabird professionals from across North America and the Pacific expected to attend.  The Local Committee Chair is albatross researcher This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. of Pacific Rim Conservation with Nina Karnovsky as Scientific Program Chair.  Both oral and poster sessions are planned, and before and after field trips will be held.

“As home to some of the greatest plant and animal biodiversity on the planet in addition to some of the world’s largest seabird colonies, Hawaii offers the perfect venue for PSG’s annual meeting and serves as a mid-point between our membership which spans the Pacific Rim and beyond.  In keeping with our locale this year, the meeting theme is “Seabirds: Responses and Resilience” and there will be a variety of technical sessions and symposia in keeping with this theme.”

Early registration and abstract submissions open on 21 August 2015.  Visit the meeting’s website for more information on important dates and other details.

The meeting venue is close to the James Campbell National Wildlife Refuge where attempts are being made to create a new breeding colony of Laysan Albatrosses Phoebastria immutabilis (click here).

A Laysan Albatross eyes up three models in the James Campbell National Wildlife Refuge, photograph by Lindsay Young

Click here to access abstracts from the 2014 PSG annual meeting.

Meanwhile it has been reported that the (UK) Seabird Group will hold its 13th International Conference in September 2016; details will follow as they become available.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 16 August 2015

ACAP-listed and Critically Endangered Balearic Shearwaters Puffinus mauretanicus, along with other seabirds, are set to be counted from today by the Peniche Seabird Project as they fly past Cabo Carvoeiro on the tip of the peninsula at the Portuguese coastal city of Peniche north of Lisbon.  The project aims for a complete coverage of systematic counts until mid-November this year.

The Peniche Seabird Project’s website gives the scope of the project:

“The Peniche peninsula breaks off the Portuguese coast and functions as a migration obstacle for seabirds following the Iberian coast heading south to African waters in autumn.  The seabirds have to round the peninsula and are therefore easy to observe in the right wind conditions.  Off the peninsula lies the Berlengas Islands which hold internationally important numbers of breeding Cory’s Shearwaters [Calonectris borealis] and Madeiran Petrels [Madeiran Storm Petrel Oceanodroma castro].  The waters off these islands are deep and rich in nutrients and are an added attraction to feeding seabirds. Despite these possibilities, the migration past Peniche is poorly documented compared to European migration watchpoints further north.  The scope of this project is to document the numbers of seabirds migrating past Peniche during15th August – 15th November 2015.  Particular attention will be paid to the Critically Endangered Balearic Shearwater.  Seabirds will not just be counted, but flock sizes, flight directions and – where applicable – age categories will be quantified for later analysis.”

Balearic Shearwater at sea, photograph by Pep Arcos

The project is being managed by Helder Cardoso from Portugal and Erik Hirschfeld from Sweden, along with Johan Elmberg, also from Sweden, as scientific advisor (click here).

The project is looking for volunteers prepared to stay at least two weeks at Peniche to undertake “standardised counts of migrating birds from dawn until 10 am and from 3 pm to dusk each day, except for days with storms, when counting will have to take place for the full day.”  Transport to Peniche and free accommodation is on offer (click here).

ACAP Latest News aims to report on the project from time to time as information becomes available.

Across the water, Balearic Shearwaters are also the subject of a planned survey this month off the coast of southern England (click here).

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 16 August 2015

The following report by Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service Ranger Anna Lashko is taken from the on-line newsletter "This week at Macquarie Island" for 24 July.  It shows that ACAP-listed Grey Petrels Procellaria cinerea are returning to previous breeding sites following vegetation recovery after the eradication of European Rabbits Oryctolagus cuniculus and rodents by the Macquarie Island Pest Eradication Project (MIPEP) four years ago.

“On our recent trip down island, Andrea [Turbett] and I went searching for grey petrels at some of the remote west coast breeding sites.  Many of these sites suffered major degradation in the years prior to the Macquarie Island Pest Eradication Program [sic] due to the combination of rabbit burrowing destabilising sites and high grazing pressure removing vegetation cover.  During the worst years, some of these sites were so unstable that rangers were unable to safely visit to check if petrels were present.  Happily, these sites are now recovering and are once again accessible.

Many of these sites have had no sign of breeding for around 10 years, so I did not hold out huge hopes for a successful search.  Still, not finding birds breeding is an important result and so off we headed northwards along the coast from Davis Point one grey morning.  Sure enough, at the first site we checked (North Double Point) there was no sign of petrel activity - no burrows with scratching at the entrance, or poo or the distinctive petrel smell.

Our second stop for the day was at Flynn Point where, searching up on the ridgeline, Andrea poked her head up from a burrow entrance with a cheeky grin.  “You'll be visiting here again!” she said, and passed me the camera she'd just poked into the burrow to see into its depths.  There was a downy grey petrel chick, the first seen at the site since 2004!  We were lucky again at our third and final spot for the day, Sellick Pt, where we found another grey petrel chick, the first at that site since 2006.

It was a red letter petrel hunting day for the rangers and a very promising one for grey petrels on Macquarie Island.”

Click here for a previous ACAP Latest News item on Macca’s Grey Petrels.

Grey Petrel breeding on Macquarie Island

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 14 August 2015