FROM SEA TO NEST: UNCOVERING THE LINKS BETWEEN FORAGING, PROVISIONING AND FISHERIES IN NORTHERN ROYAL ALBATROSS

CASUAL SEMINAR IN BIODIVERSITY AND EVOLUTION

Monitoring and protection of seabirds that spend much of their lives at sea pose difficult conservation problems. In the case of pelagic seabirds, such as albatrosses, they can spend up to 95% of their lives at sea, and travel great distances. During these periods away from breeding colonies, the birds are exposed to a wide range of anthropogenic threats, including interactions with commercial fisheries and exposure to marine pollution. Despite continuous, colony-based management of a small population of the endangered northern royal albatross (Diomedea sanfordi) at Taiaroa Head, New Zealand, little is known about the relationship between their at-sea distribution, fisheries overlap, or chick provisioning. By incorporating information on how at-sea behaviour affects chick survival, land-based albatross management at Taiaroa Head could be facilitated and complimented. In this seminar, I will discuss findings from my PhD research on linking parental foraging behaviour at sea with provisioning patterns at nest, in particular with regard to fine-scale overlap with fisheries, for northern royal albatross. I will also discuss age-related differences in at-sea foraging behaviour and habitat use between breeders and pre-breeders and their respective association with fisheries.

Junichi is a Spatial Ecologist who recently finished his PhD in Zoology at University of Otago, New Zealand. Prior, he worked in Palau to establish a state nature park and achieve sustainable utilisation of the natural environment. He then completed his Master’s degree at University of Hawai‘i at Hilo, studying the effects of residential development on habitat use of a Hawaiian honeycreeper. His main research interest lies in examining how distribution and behavioural patterns of animals vary within habitat in relation to environmental variability, prey availability and human activities.

[Host: Nuno Queiroz, Ecology and Evolution of Aquatic Organisms]

Image credits: Junichi Sugishita