Great Shearwaters turning up off Australia?

Two great shearwaters in the foreground and two sooty shearwaters in the background

Simon Mustoe who lives in Australia has been seeing Great shearwaters off the southern coast of Australia.  This is extremely rare.  Great shearwaters should be off the coast of South America or South Africa at this time of year and would migrate to the North Atlantic as summer approaches.  Read his article on Bird-O  http://bird-o.com/2011/04/03/the-great-shearwater-invasion/

Great Shearwaters Start to Move

The satellite tagged greater shearwaters in the South Atlantic are starting to begin their migration to the North Atlantic after spending time off Argentina preparing themselves for the long trip. Several birds are now off Brazil. http://www.seaturtle.org/tracking/index.shtml?project_id=452

The northward migration of the greater shearwaters have never been tracked by satellite and it will be interesting to see the route, just as it was the first season our researcher, Rob Ronconi, placed the first satellite transmitters on shearwaters in 2006. Tracks for the three years of tracking greater shearwaters in the Bay of Fundy and their southward migration can be found at:

2006: http://www.seaturtle.org/tracking/index.shtml?project_id=176
2008: http://www.seaturtle.org/tracking/?project_id=311
2009: http://www.seaturtle.org/tracking/index.shtml?project_id=436

In 2007, two sooty shearwaters were tracked: http://www.seaturtle.org/tracking/index.shtml?project_id=237

Herring Gull Makes Round Trip

Who would have thought that herring gulls would be a harbinger of spring!?

One of the herring gulls tagged last spring on Kent Island, a small island off the coast of Grand Manan Island has completed a round trip from Kent Island to the Chesapeake Bay area and back. The bird was one of three that were fitted with satellite transmitters to follow their movements in the Bay of Fundy. The added benefit is that all three birds were migratory, spending the winter in Chesapeake Bay area. Normally this would be a great place for a herring gull but the area was plagues with severe winter storms this year. The other two birds have not returned yet and we wait to see if they will show site fidelity and nest again on Kent Island. the tracks of all three birds can be found at http://www.seaturtle.org/tracking/index.shtml?project_id=428.

Of the nine greater shearwaters fitted with satellite tags last summer, only two remain transmitting, over 200 days of data. The failure of the tag is often the battery but sometimes the birds die. One tag transmitter for several weeks from Inaccessible Island in the South Atlantic where shearwaters nest. it is suspected that the bird was prey to a skua, a large predatory seabird, which patrol the nesting colonies. We also had a transmitter returned last year from a Brazilian fisherman who had caught the shearwater on longlines. Bycatch in fisheries can be a major factor in seabird mortality. The birds are attracted to the baited hooks and can not see the hook. Surface drift nets may also entangle large numbers of seabirds. There are efforts in some areas to reduce the bycatch but it is still a problem in some areas. The tracks of the greater shearwaters can be seen at http://www/seaturtle.org/tracking/?project_id=435

Rob Ronconi, one of our seabird biologists, spent three months in the South Atlantic last fall including time on both Gough and Inaccessible Islands. He helped tag 22 nesting or pre-nesting greater shearwaters. The birds have been wide ranging from South America to South Africa in the same areas that the birds we have tagged from the summer in the Bay of Fundy also range once they reach the South Atlantic. Although four tags have failed, it is hoped that the tags last long enough that the northward migration may be captured as well as the forging in the South Atlantic. These tracks can be viewed at http://www.seaturtle.org/tracking/index.shtml?project_id=452

Nesting Shearwaters

Dr. Rob Ronconi has returned from just over three months on two nesting islands for shearwaters and other pelagic seabirds in the South Atlantic (Tristan da Cunha island group including Gough and Inaccessible Islands). Pelagic seabirds are those that live on the ocean except when nesting. The greater shearwaters that come to the Bay of Fundy each year are some of the birds that make these islands their home.

This rare opportunity allowed Rob to experience many species of seabirds including albatrosses, petrels and shearwaters while helping with research programs, including removing alien plant and mammal species that have been introduced.

While there he also put on more satellite transmitters (22 in total). You can track these birds on the seaturtle.org website (http://www.seaturtle.org/tracking/index.shtml?project_id=452). There is also a more detailed account of the project on this webpage. I'm looking forward to Rob's stories - I'm sure there will be many about the work he was doing.