First assessment of Endangered Northern Rockhopper Penguins since 2011 oil spill

Almost a year since thousands of endangered penguins’ lives were threatened by an oil spill on Nightingale Island – part of Tristan da Cunha, a UK Overseas Territory in the South Atlantic – a survey to assess the birds’ population has taken place.

The bulk carrier, MS Oliva, ran aground on 16 March last year, a huge effort to rescue the penguins was launched.  The ship was travelling from Brazil to Singapore with a cargo of 65,000 tonnes of soya beans and 1,500 tonnes of bunker fuel when it ran aground.  As the ship broke up in the rough seas, the soya and oil were discharged into the waters around Nightingale.  In the days that followed, the oil reached Inaccessible Island, a World Heritage Site, and Tristan more than 30km away.

With the group of islands being home to over 65% of the global population of endangered northern rockhopper penguins, residents of Tristan da Cunha, known as Tristanians and the Tristan Conservation Department, followed by staff from the RSPB (BirdLife in the UK) and Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB), came together and moved quickly to collect and clean up the oiled birds and prevent many more from coming into contact with the oil.

Although efforts to rescue and rehabilitate the penguins were huge, it has been unknown until now just how much the rockhopper population has been affected by the spill.  While results from the latest counts suggest the breeding population hasn’t suffered as much as anticipated, scientists are warning that the news should be met with caution.

Dr Juliet Vickery, the RSPB’s head of international research, said:  “It’s a big relief that the initial results of the counts are better than we had anticipated. We should not, however, relax our watch. There is much we don’t know about this species and the extent to which breeding colony counts reveal the true picture of population trends is hard to ascertain.

“Though immediate impact is not as bad as we feared, there may be longer term sub-lethal effects reducing breeding success, so it is vital that we continue to monitor the birds closely for several more years to establish the true impact of the oil spill.”

Estimations show approximately 154,000 penguins bred on the island in 2011 but estimates in the 1950s suggest there were ‘millions’ of birds, with two million pairs on Gough alone. The species remains globally threatened and the causes of the historic decline remain unknown.

As well as the long-term effects on the penguins, the oil spill has caused concern for the important rock lobster fishery. The fishery, which is Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) certified as a sustainable and well-managed fishery, is a mainstay of the island’s economy.

Read more:  http://www.birdlife.org/community/2012/02/first-assessment-of-endangered-northern-rockhopper-penguins-since-2011-oil-spill/

Albatrosses off the hook in the nick of time

Hope as legislation forces fishing nations to take action

November 2011: Accidentally snagged on longline fishing hooks and then left to drown, the albatross populations in the South Atlantic are among the fastest-declining in the world.

But a new resolution brokered and ratified at the ICCAT (The International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas) meeting in Istanbul earlier this month is giving hope to these beleaguered birds as Atlantic tuna and swordfish fishing nations will have to ensure vessels take preventative action to avoid accidentally catching these birds.

Worryingly fast decline in numbersOne third of the world's albatrosses nest on the South Atlantic UK Overseas Territories: the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and Tristan da Cunha. ICCAT manages all tuna and swordfish fisheries in the Atlantic outside territorial waters. These measures will significantly reduce the number of birds being killed.

At the ICCAT meeting, the seabird measure was jointly proposed by the EU, Brazil, South Africa and Uruguay, as well as the UK on behalf of its overseas territories.

Dr Cleo Small, representing the RSPB and BirdLife International, attended the meeting. Speaking from Turkey on the meeting's outcome, she said: ‘This offers significant hope to the protection of these iconic UK birds, whose population declines are among the fastest of any seabird species worldwide. We now have an agreement that all boats working in the open waters of the South Atlantic will have to adopt at least two measures to avoid catching seabirds.'

Great news for other seabirds too'This is great news for albatrosses and other seabirds, many of which die needlessly every minute of the day; the accidental casualties in the tuna and swordfish fisheries.'

The new legislation requires all longline vessels fishing south of latitude 25 degrees S - roughly Brazil to Namibia - to use two out of three measures to reduce bycatch, from a choice of bird streamer (tori) lines, setting lines at night, or adding weight to their baited hooks.

The UK's overseas territories host one third of the world's population of albatross and they have more than half of the population of the Southern Ocean. The South Atlantic has seven species of albatross which nest regularly, and six of these are considered to be facing extinction and overlap with the tuna and swordfish fishing fleets: wandering albatross; sooty albatross; grey-headed albatross; Tristan albatross; black-browed albatross; and Atlantic yellow-nosed albatross.

 http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/albatross-bycatch.html