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From mollymawks, as the smaller species are known, to the great albatrosses, these super-soarers cover tens of thousands of miles in their oceanic forays. Individuals of some species circumnavigate the globe, covering miles a day at sustained speeds of 50 miles per hour. And then they somehow find their way home—even when home is an outpost in the ocean like the Pyramid, not much bigger than an aircraft carrier. At the start of their breeding season, albatrosses have been tracked making almost ruler-straight trips from distant foraging areas to their nests.
Because the birds maintain their course day and night, in cloudy weather and clear, scientists believe they use some kind of magnetic reckoning to fix their position relative to the earth's magnetic field. The birds also seem able to predict the weather. Southern Buller's albatrosses were found to fly northwest if a low-pressure system, which produces westerly winds, was imminent, and northeast if an easterly wind-producing high-pressure system prevailed.
The birds typically chose their direction 24 hours prior to the arrival of the system, suggesting they can respond to barometric cues. In his autopsy room in Wellington, ornithologist Christopher Robertson slit open a plastic bag containing a white-capped albatross.
The swan-sized carcass had been thawing for several days. Along with dozens of other seabirds in Robertson's freezers, this one had been collected at sea for the government's fisheries science program. Robertson carefully unfolded the bird's wings—wings that would have carried it halfway around the world, between its breeding grounds in New Zealand's Auckland Islands and its feeding grounds in South African seas.
The albatross bore a raw wound at the elbow. Its feathers and skin had been rasped down to bare bone, presumably by the thick steel wires—called warps—that pull a trawl net. Of the 4, albatrosses and other seabirds Robertson's group has autopsied over nine years, nearly half have been killed by trawl fisheries, which use giant sock-shaped nets towed at depths of a quarter mile to capture 40 tons of fish in a single haul.
Albatrosses and other large, soaring birds tend to die as a result of collisions with the warps, while smaller, more agile fliers such as petrels and shearwaters are more likely to get ensnared in nets—to be crushed or drowned—while feeding. The finding has surprised the fishing industry and conservation groups, which have considered longline fishing—in which thousands of baited hooks are fed out behind the fishing vessel—a greater threat to seabirds.
There are no reliable figures for the number of birds killed per year through contact with commercial fishing operations, but estimates for the Southern Ocean are in the tens of thousands. Vessels in well-regulated fisheries are required to minimize their impact on seabirds and report any accidental deaths, but there is a large shadow fleet of illegal, unregulated and unreported IUU vessels operating outside the regulations, answering to no one. Many New Zealand fishers have adopted ingenious methods to reduce injuring and killing seabirds—or attracting them to boats in the first place see sidebar, opposite.
However, there is some evidence to suggest that fisheries may benefit albatross populations: a ready supply of discarded fish reduces competition for food between and within albatross species and provides an alternative food source to predatory birds such as skua, which often attack albatross chicks. Sagar and Stahl's research in the Snares Islands suggests that the free lunch boosts the number of chicks that fledge in a given year.
They found that 70 percent of feedings brought by adult birds to their chicks contained discards from nearby fisheries. Does this mean that fishing is a net benefit to seabird populations? Should the industry be given "a conservation award for the thousands of seabirds it supports," as one fisheries consultant gamely suggested to me? Not at all, says Stahl. In albatrosses—long-lived, slow-maturing species that produce a single chick every one to two years—the long-term negative impact of adult death far outweighs the short-term benefit of chick survival.
It may take three, four or even five successful chick rearings to compensate for the death of just one parent, says Stahl. He calculates that "even small increases in adult mortality can wipe out the benefit of tons of discards fed to chicks.
Although Scofield's tracking of Chatham albatrosses shows that they, too, frequent the same fishing grounds as deep-sea trawlers, not enough work has been done to compare the benefits of chick survival with the costs of adult deaths from fishing vessels. One albatross population that has unashamedly been propped up is the colony of endangered northern royal albatrosses at Taiaroa Head, near the city of Dunedin, on New Zealand's South Island.
Taiaroa Head is one of the only places in the world where a visitor can get close to great albatrosses. The colony is tiny, with only individuals, and the breeding effort is managed assiduously—"lovingly" would not be too strong a word. Royal albatross chicks are nest-bound for nine months. Providing meals for these chicks is so demanding that the parents take a year off before breeding again.
Lyndon Perriman, the senior ranger, described to me some of the ingenious techniques used to maximize reproductive success. But we prefer not to interfere. It could simply be that the partner has hit a patch of calm weather somewhere and is struggling to get back. But at day 20 it's pretty clear the partner isn't coming back, and a chick with only one parent won't survive, so we take the fiberglass egg away, and the bird figures out that breeding for that year is over.
Adult birds at Taiaroa have died of heat exhaustion, so rangers turn on sprinklers during hot, still days. There was no danger of the birds overheating when I visited, with raindrops spattering the tinted windows of the observatory.
I picked up a toy albatross, a life-size replica of a fully grown chick. It was surprisingly heavy, weighted to match the real thing: 20 pounds. It regularly feeds in sheltered harbours and straits Secker , and sometimes gathers at outfalls of unmodified sewage Milledge Foraging behaviours such as flying long distances to search for food, following boats, feeding aggressively on offal and diving for baits makes the species susceptible to being drowned in longline fishing gear DEH Banding returns suggest that adult Wandering Albatross and young disperse or migrate east Tickell Banding of the Wandering Albatross at feeding concentrations near eastern NSW has shown that birds of all age groups from all southern breeding colonies visit this area, principally between July and November Gibson The Wandering Albatross is uncommon south of the Antarctic Convergence in winter, indicating that there is a northward shift in distribution then Szijj The distance travelled by the Wandering Albatross is related to wind speed.
Gibsoni , with which it was previously regarded as conspecific Magrath et al. The Wandering Albatross is conspicuous at sea and on land. It frequently attends fishing boats Magrath et al. At sea, the Wandering Albatross can be surveyed using shipboard surveys. On land, it can be surveyed by observing from onshore vantage points using a telescope. These methods detect nests and flying birds.
Surveys of beach cast birds may present an opportunity of detecting this species, although they provide little information on the origins of specimens, as bodies are usually displaced by currents and winds McGrath et al. The mobility of the Wandering Albatross means that individuals have a high probability of encountering longline fishing boats from which they take bait, frequently swallowing hooks and drowning, or dying from injuries after release Brothers ; Gales et al.
Oceanic longline fishing has been used to target pelagic and demersal fish in the southern oceans since the s, and is used in almost all Australian waters today DEH Internationally, some longline fishing fleets still operate without substantial by-catch mitigation measures.
Hook and plastic ingestion also potentially threaten the Wandering Albatross. Hook ingestion by albatross and giant-petrels appears to have increased in recent years. Between 50 and million hooks are set each year in the Southern Ocean and as many as 1.
The population of the Wandering Albatross breeding on Macquarie Island was devastated by sealers during the 19th century. There was an initial population increase on Macquarie Island following the cessation of sealing. The Wandering Albatross is shot for bait, or to prevent it from scavenging bait from dropline fisheries Environment Australia f.
The species may also die from collisions with cables and warps used on fishing trawlers. Outside of the Australian Fishing Zone, trawlers carrying netsonde monitor cables or their equivalent may cause substantial mortality in albatrosses Environment Australia f; Gales ; Weimerskirch et al. Trolling trailing a line with baited hooks for pelagic species such as Albacore Tuna Thunnus alalunga is another potential threat Environment Australia f; Gales ; Weimerskirch et al.
The incidental catch of seabirds during oceanic longline fishing operations was listed as a key threatening process on Schedule three of the Endangered Species Protection Act The threat abatement plan aims to reduce seabird by-catch to below 0. The long-term aim is to achieve a zero by-catch of seabirds in longline fisheries, especially of threatened albatross and petrel species AGDEH q. Marine bioregional plans have been developed for four of Australia's marine regions - South-west, North-west, North and Temperate East.
Marine Bioregional Plans will help improve the way decisions are made under the EPBC Act, particularly in relation to the protection of marine biodiversity and the sustainable use of our oceans and their resources by our marine-based industries. Marine Bioregional Plans improve our understanding of Australia's oceans by presenting a consolidated picture of the biophysical characteristics and diversity of marine life. They describe the marine environment and conservation values of each marine region, set out broad biodiversity objectives, identify regional priorities and outline strategies and actions to address these priorities.
Click here for more information about marine bioregional plans. Go to the conservation values atlas to view the locations of these Biologically Important Areas. About us Contact us. Diomedea exulans — Wandering Albatross. Other Commonwealth Documents.
Distribution Map. Australian Distribution. The current range of the Wandering Albatross is stable Gales ; Woehler Global Distribution. Population Information. Life Cycle. Movement Patterns. Survey Guidelines. Detectability The Wandering Albatross is conspicuous at sea and on land. Recommended Methods At sea, the Wandering Albatross can be surveyed using shipboard surveys. Threat Abatement and Recovery. Marine Bioregional Plans.
Management Documentation.
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