United States

**Abstract:**

Understanding how both quality and quantity of prey affect the population dynamics of marine predators is a crucial step toward predicting the effects of environmental perturbations on population-level processes. The Junk Food Hypothesis, which posits that energetic content of prey species may influence reproductive capacity of marine top predators regardless of prey availability, has been proposed as a mechanism by which changes in prey populations could affect predator populations in high latitude systems; however, support for this hypothesis has been inconsistent across studies, and further data are needed to elucidate variation in the relative importance of prey quantity and quality among predator species and across ecological systems. We tested the relative importance of prey quantity and quality to nestling survival, condition, and stress levels in the eastern brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis carolinensis) across 9 breeding colonies in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Compared to previous results from cold-water systems, we found lower and less variable energy densities (4.4 kJ g−1, vs. 5.2 to 6.5 kJ g−1 in other studies) and lipid content (9% dry mass, vs. 16 to 23% in other studies) of common prey items. As a result, energy density of meals was not a strong predictor of fledging success, body condition, or stress levels of nestlings. However, both feeding frequency and meal mass were significantly correlated to energy provisioning rates and nestling survival. We also found that levels of the stress hormone corticosterone in nestling feathers collected at 3-4 weeks of age correlated strongly with provisioning rates and predicted both pre-and post-fledging survival more effectively than did one-time measures of body condition. We conclude that quantity rather than quality of prey, particularly small schooling fish, is the main driver of brown pelican reproductive success in this system, and that environmental perturbations affecting biomass, distribution, and abundance of forage fish could substantially affect brown pelican reproductive success. Moreover, our results suggest that feather corticosterone can provide information on both nutritional stress and survival rates in free-living seabird nestlings.

**Authors:**

Juliet Lamb¹, Yvan Satge², Katie O&#39;Reilly³, Patrick Jodice⁴

¹University of Rhode Island, ²Clemson University, ³University of Portland, ⁴US Geological Survey

3rd World Seabird Conference

Diet composition and provisioning rates of nestlings determine reproductive success in a subtropical seabird

SEB’s Annual Conference is celebrated for creating the perfect composition of research, new discoveries, and collaborative connections. Be creative and innovative by exchanging ideas and knowledge with masters of biology from all over the world.

**This year’s theme was “Resilience.”**

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Each year at our Annual Conference, we honour George Parker Bidder and Harold Woolhouse with two key Plenary Lectures. These lectures, along with the Cell Biology and OED Plenary Lecture, are given by scientists prominent in their field and are nominated by the committees of their respective sections.<br>

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SEB Conference 2026

SEB’s Annual Conference is celebrated for creating the perfect composition of research, new discoveries and collaborative connections. Be creative and innovative by exchanging ideas and knowledge with masters of biology from all over the world. 

**Abstract:**

Understanding how both quality and quantity of prey affect the population dynamics of marine predators is a crucial step toward predicting the effects of environmental perturbations on population-level processes. The Junk Food Hypothesis, which posits that energetic content of prey species may influence reproductive capacity of marine top predators regardless of prey availability, has been proposed as a mechanism by which changes in prey populations could affect predator populations in high latitude systems; however, support for this hypothesis has been inconsistent across studies, and further data are needed to elucidate variation in the relative importance of prey quantity and quality among predator species and across ecological systems. We tested the relative importance of prey quantity and quality to nestling survival, condition, and stress levels in the eastern brown pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis carolinensis) across 9 breeding colonies in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Compared to previous results from cold-water systems, we found lower and less variable energy densities (4.4 kJ g−1, vs. 5.2 to 6.5 kJ g−1 in other studies) and lipid content (9% dry mass, vs. 16 to 23% in other studies) of common prey items. As a result, energy density of meals was not a strong predictor of fledging success, body condition, or stress levels of nestlings. However, both feeding frequency and meal mass were significantly correlated to energy provisioning rates and nestling survival. We also found that levels of the stress hormone corticosterone in nestling feathers collected at 3-4 weeks of age correlated strongly with provisioning rates and predicted both pre-and post-fledging survival more effectively than did one-time measures of body condition. We conclude that quantity rather than quality of prey, particularly small schooling fish, is the main driver of brown pelican reproductive success in this system, and that environmental perturbations affecting biomass, distribution, and abundance of forage fish could substantially affect brown pelican reproductive success. Moreover, our results suggest that feather corticosterone can provide information on both nutritional stress and survival rates in free-living seabird nestlings.

**Authors:**

Juliet Lamb¹, Yvan Satge², Katie O'Reilly³, Patrick Jodice⁴

¹University of Rhode Island, ²Clemson University, ³University of Portland, ⁴US Geological Survey

technical paper

Welcome Seabirders!  

Welcome to Virtual World Seabird Conference 3 - vWSC3! Whether you are in your office or lab, at home, in a coffee shop or bar poaching some wifi, or at a remote field site or research vessel – we are very excited to welcome you to the third ever World Seabird Conference. 

We would like to thank ALL of you for being so patient as WSC3 was scheduled, postponed, rescheduled, revised to virtual, and scheduled again. Throughout all those iterations there was one message that remained perfectly clear – seabirders were eager to meet and share their science. If we could not meet in person then virtual it would have to be, but a 3rd WSC was something everyone wanted. That support and commitment helped the WSU Board of Directors and Member Societies sort through all of the challenges they faced to plan and hold this conference. 

The list of those that need to be thanked is long and, while we plan on recognizing many during the live closing plenary, it is important to do so here in writing as well. 

The Australasian Seabird Group was our Local Host for our plan to meet in Hobart, Tasmania. They invested substantial time and effort to find venues and plan events that we unfortunately were not able to visit. Nonetheless we appreciate their work on behalf of WSC3 and encourage all of you to thank them when you see their members in Gathertown or elsewhere during our virtual meeting. Their willingness to host created the initial excitement for WSC3 and without that our vWSC would not have been possible.

We also wish to thank the Science Program Committee, the Virtual Committee, and the Early Career Scientist Committee for their hard work planning the logistics, events, and schedule for vWSC3. These committees also had to deal with changing parameters and short timelines that made what is always a challenging task even more challenging. The Travel Awards Committee also invested time and effort in developing procedures for awarding travel funds that ultimately would not be implemented. 

Our ability to shift from an in-person to a virtual meeting, and to do so in a way that would be financially feasible, was due to the effective efforts of The International Fundraising Committee and to our financial sponsors. The IFC raised funds to support WSC3 and then, through the good relationships they built with sponsors, ensured we could re-envision how those funds could be used to support a virtual conference that would be affordable and high-quality.

We all owe the WSU Board of Directors and the Representatives of the Member Societies a great deal of thanks. They are the ones who manage the WSU and, for the past 18 months, have had to have a series of challenging meetings and conversations, have had to make a series of difficult choices, have had to do all of that while considering the short- and long-term health of WSU and the World Seabird Conferences, and did this while also managing their own challenges at their day jobs. We are grateful for their diligence, patience, foresight, and throughout all of the meetings, their collegiality. Also – a 6-year term is quite a commitment!

There would not be a WSC3 without a successful WSC1 and WSC2. Thanks go to the Pacific Seabird Group for their support of WSC1 in Victoria, Canada, and to the African Seabird Group for their support of WSC2 in Cape Town, South Africa. In each of these endeavors and for our current conference we were fortunate to work with a dependable and trustworthy partner in Podium Conferences. Michelle Smith and Marischal de Armond have become valued members of our team and have not only helped us plan conferences but have assisted and advised the WSU Chairs and Board on issues above and beyond conference planning. 

As we embark on our vWSC3 week we extend to all of you our thanks for showing up, for being patient, and most importantly for the work you do with seabirds. We are all part of a unique, global community that shares an interest, a fascination, and a passion for birds that make a living in our world’s oceans. We have advanced the science, conservation, and management of seabirds as well the ecosystems they inhabit. We are consistently impressed and motivated by the work you do. 

The WSU formed in 2010 because we saw the need for a global organization to address challenges at a global level. Over the past 11 years WSU has grown, adapted, and evolved to become the community that this week is making vWSC3 a reality. Enjoy the week, appreciate and support the friends and colleagues you have made in the community, and if you see us in a virtual hallway please stop and say hello! 

Thank you for the opportunity to serve all of you and the WSU over the past few years,

Nicholas Carlile, Interim Chair, WSU<br>
Patrick Jodice, 2nd Chair of the WSU<br><br>

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Join us for four days of science, networking and virtual engagement with delegates from around the world!

**Abstract:**

The ever-growing recognition that the global system is a collection of interconnected components, has increased awareness of the importance of biodiversity and its conservation. Climate-driven changes in the Southern Ocean ecosystems are among the most globally pronounced and have resulted in a major system shift. Studies on the trophic ecology of populations are valuable for detecting and monitoring changes in lower trophic levels and the ecosystem as a whole. This lends to the assessment of vulnerability and responses to changing environmental conditions. The endangered Sooty Albatross, Phoebetria fusca, is one of the four albatross species breeding on sub-Antarctic Marion Island. This study used a combination of stomach content and stable isotope analysis to assess changes in the diet, trophic level and location of feeding zones over three years (2015-2017) including a pronounced El-Niño event (2015/16). A total of 4481 upper and 4035 lower accumulated cephalopod beaks were isolated from diet samples collected from 65 individuals. A dietary shift was evident in 2016 which had a significantly lower cephalopod species diversity and relative abundance compared to 2015 and 2017. Furthermore, there was a complete shift in dominance between Batoteuthis skolops and Galiteuthis glacialis in the diet. The decrease in cephalopod relative abundance in 2016 coincided with an increase in bird remains in their diet. Stable isotope analysis revealed that most individuals fed in similar waters over the three-year study period indicating that environmental conditions, rather than different foraging locations, were likely responsible for the dietary shift. This is suggestive of a dynamic nature in the structure of the Southern Ocean cephalopod community. The sensitivity of lower trophic levels to environmental variability, as demonstrated through the use of a marine top predator as a biological sampler, suggests that Southern Ocean communities are likely to experience significant changes in this rapidly changing environment.

**Authors:**

Shamiso Banda¹, Tegan Carpenter-Kling¹, Maelle Connan¹, Pierre Pistorius¹

¹Nelson Mandela University

A significant shift in cephalopod diet of the Sooty Albatross (Phoebetria fusca) during a pronounced El-Niño event

**Abstract:**

Breeding seabirds respond to changes in prey availability, leading to shifts in diet, foraging effort, breeding success and possibly species interactions. Capelin (Mallotus villosus) is the primary forage fish species on the Newfoundland Shelf in eastern Canada. Capelin migrate in high abundance into coastal regions to spawn during the summer, dramatically increasing inshore prey availability. Due to changes in ocean climate, however, the biomass and timing of arrival of spawning capelin has become highly variable. To investigate responses of razorbills (Alca torda) to varying prey availability, we combined ship-based measures of capelin biomass with device-based measures of foraging trip and dive characteristics (e.g., trip distance, number of dives) and colony-based measures of chick/adult body condition across three years (2017, 2019, 2020). Shifts in razorbill interactions with common murres (Uria aalge) and Atlantic puffins (Fratercula arctica) were examined by quantifying isotopic niche overlap (δ15N, δ13C) of all three species across four years (2017 - 2020). Foraging effort (e.g., trip distance, number of dives) increased in the year with lower capelin biomass (2020), which was also associated with lower adult and chick body condition. Razorbills also experienced increased isotopic niche overlap with other species in this year, due to increased species-specific niche breadth, suggesting a convergence of seabird species on a similar wider variety of alternate prey types. Findings suggest that low capelin availability during breeding will lead to increased foraging effort, fitness consequences and the potential for increased interspecific competition, which may influence the persistence and coexistence of seabird species in coastal Newfoundland.

**Authors:**

Lauren Lescure¹, Gail Davoren¹

¹University of Manitoba

Shifts in diet, foraging effort and chick/adult condition of razorbills in coastal Newfoundland along with species interactions under varying prey availability

**Abstract:**

Quantifying spatial and temporal variations in the distribution of seabirds is a fundamental component of their conservation. A common approach uses vessels or aircraft to record animals along transect lines, and species distribution models or geostatistical interpolation to produce density surfaces. However, individual surveys cannot record distributions at annual, seasonal and continental scales. The tendency to use spatiotemporally explicit information when constructing density surfaces also produces outputs representing instantaneous distributions at the time of surveys or the intensity of survey effort, rather than overall distributions. This study uses a combination of methods to produce density surfaces of 12 species at a monthly and 10km resolution over 30 years in the north-eastern Atlantic. First, 1.6 million kilometers of surveys were collated from 15 sources. Second, ecologically informed species distribution models based on relevant environmental variables were developed. This approach produced sensible estimations of seasonal distributions. These widely applicable approaches provide inputs into a range of complementary analyses into ecosystem-level processes, as well as management strategies aiming to identify and mitigate impacts on populations.

**Authors:**

James Waggitt¹, Peter Evans¹

¹Bangor University

Ecologically informed distribution maps for seabird communities in the north-eastern Atlantic Ocean

**Abstract:**

Understanding seabirds' diets is key in understanding species reactions to current and future marine ecosystem changes. Finding appropriate and practical methods for diet sampling and ensuring comparability between historical and current studies is therefore essential. We studied the diet of common guillemot (Uria aalge) chicks at the Baltic Sea island of Stora Karlsö ((57° N, 17° E)) using a multi-method approach, combining dawn-to-dusk feeding watch studies (2005-2019), stomach content analysis (2008-2020), and nest sampling of discarded prey (1972-1976 + 2015-2021). Local chick diet composition was previously based on secondary data: prey dropped in nests not verified to represent consumed prey, and ocular feeding observations not allowing for distinction between sprat (Sprattus sprattus) and herring (Clupea harengus). By collecting 200+ chicks (deceased by unsuccessful landing during fledging), stomach content could be analyzed. This material was then compared with dropped prey of the same period. The material from the two sources matched, confirming the usefulness of dropped fish as an indicator of consumed prey. This allowed for a historical comparison of dropped fish, showing both some change in prey species composition and in prey size between the 1970s and today. Monitoring diet change over time can inform about both local seabird conditions, and marine ecosystem changes at large, and is fundamental in prey based models. Climate change, fisheries, eutrophication and population dynamics in all trophic levels possibly effect seabird diet composition and by comparing historical and current trends more can be known about links in marine ecosystems.

**Authors:**

Per-Arvid Berglund¹

¹Baltic Seabird Project

A multi-method approach to monitor and categorize changes in diet composition in common guillemots in the Baltic Sea

**Abstract:**

Parental investment is any action of the parents that generates costs in their biological efficacy, but benefits their offspring. In birds it shows at any stage of reproduction: egg laying, incubation and chick rearing. Hatching asynchrony (HA) and egg size dimorphism (ESD) generate an intra-clutch hierarchy that affect growth and survival of Magellanic penguin's chicks. In our study colony (Ría Deseado, Argentina; 47°45'S, 65°53'W) females in a better body condition lay larger second eggs but also, both parents´ condition determine nestling growth. Therefore, parental body condition can mask the effect of the egg volume and HA on intra clutch hierarchy. Using a cross-fostering experiment we were able to disentangle the effect of HA and ESD from parental body condition. We found that hatching asynchrony had a negative effect on last-hatched chicks, but this disadvantage was mitigated by egg size dimorphism in their favor. Moreover, females in good condition invest more in second than in first chicks, which, added to a greater investment by foster fathers, leading to offspring fledging in good condition. On the contrary, for the first-hatched chicks, we found that body condition of the biological father was an important factor for their growth. We conclude that raising more than one chick seems to be a decision based on parental condition throughout the breeding season.

**Authors:**

Nahuel Marchisio¹

¹CONICET

Intra-clutch factors affecting growth and fledgling success of Magellanic penguin chicks: A cross fostering experiment

**Abstract:**

Animal personality is defined as consistent between-individual differences that are stable across contexts and persist through time. These between-individual differences can result in divergent foraging behaviour and reproductive success and influence how individuals respond to environmental change, with the potential to alter population dynamics. Although personality has been found in numerous taxa throughout the animal kingdom, few studies have focused on seabird species. This study aimed to determine whether personality can be identified in razorbills (Alca torda) from the family Alcidae. Three tests of personality were carried out on chick-rearing razorbills (n=31) during 2021 in coastal Newfoundland, Canada, to quantify the frequency of personality traits along the shy-bold continuum. Personality tests involved quantifying behavioural responses to extraction from the rock crevice breeding site and to a period of restraint, along with human ratings of boldness for each individual. Preliminary findings suggest these methods may be successful at identifying personality in this species, as razorbills exhibited a wide range of behavioural responses along the shy-bold continuum along with individual consistency between tests. Personality was investigated in relation to reproductive success, breeding site complexity and previous overwintering distribution. The next steps include repeating personality tests on these same individuals in subsequent years to test behavioural consistency across time and contexts (i.e. varying prey availability) and further relating these personality differences to variation in reproductive success and foraging/ movement patterns during the breeding and non-breeding season. This study represents a first step in quantifying personality in this alcid species, which will inform intraspecific response diversity and, thus, the ability of razorbills to cope with future environmental change.

**Authors:**

Matthew Legard¹

¹University of Manitoba

Identifying personality in razorbills (Alca torda)

**Abstract:**

Most petrels are nocturnal on land and use calls as the main channel of communication among them. Gadfly petrels, especially unpaired birds, use aerial calling during their courtship flights, but factors influencing this behaviour are poorly studied. The Cape Verde petrel (Pterodroma feae) is a gadfly petrel endemic of Cabo Verde, breeding secretively at low densities in the mountains, where they seldom vocalize. In contrast, they are extremely noisy during courtship flights, which normally occurs over the top of high mountain areas of difficult access, thus complicating the study of their call behaviour. In this study, we deployed sound recorders at the main courtship areas located at the four islands (Santo Antão, São Nicolau, Santiago and Fogo islands) where Cape Verde petrels breed to shed a light on the courtship behaviour. Sound recorders were programmed to register sounds up to 48KHz from sunset to midnight for 5 min recording intervals every 5 minutes for a minimum of 2 months of continuous recording. We evaluated how the call behaviour was influenced by the hours since the sunset and the moon cycle and how it varied by island and throughout the breeding season. We found a lower number of calls in nights with high moonlight intensity, typically in the previous days to full moon and during the first hours after sunset. There were important differences across islands, probably reflecting distinct bird abundances. The peak of callings occurred during the pre-laying and hatching periods, probably matching the main courtship periods, i.e., before laying and after early breeding failure. The Cape Verde petrels are being threatened by light and noise pollutions and by the construction of anthropogenic infrastructures at the study courtship areas. The use of sound recorders can facilitate the monitorization of seabirds' activity with low economical and logistic effort, the assessment of the impact of on-land threats and help seabird conservation management.

**Authors:**

Teresa Militão¹, Júlia Pujol-Casado¹, Manuel Rodríguez¹, Jacob González-Solís¹

¹University of Barcelona

Courtship activity of the secretive Cape Verde petrel: a multi-locality approach using sound-recorders

**Abstract:**

Seabirds are nature's greatest navigators, efficiently utilising resources many hundreds of kilometres away from their breeding colonies. Recent work has elevated Procellariiform seabirds to one of the main models for animal navigation, and as a consequence much is now known about the sensory requirements for long distance homing in these species. Despite now understanding the cues probably involved in seabird navigation (e.g. atmospheric odours, sun azimuth), little is known about the more cognitive aspects of space-use over the world's oceans. Here, we present the analysis of data from free-ranging and experimentally displaced Manx shearwaters (Puffinus puffinus) aimed at understanding the learning and information processing aspects of seabird navigation by capitalising on shearwaters' reluctance to fly over land. Analysing the homing portions of free-ranging GPS tracking data, we find that shearwaters appear to navigate without knowledge of islands and peninsulas that intervene between their location and home (the colony) suggesting that often they do not consult a familiar area map. Furthermore, when we translocated shearwaters to the far side of the island of Ireland we found that 4 out of 13 birds navigated home via the longer route travelling 900 km further as a result. This corroborates our assertion that often free-ranging Manx shearwaters use true navigation even from places which are probably familiar, but also raises a question about whether outward journey information might inform shearwater navigation, since large detours the wrong way around islands are not observed in natural tracks. We discuss whether these data really amount to evidence for a true navigational map, and what we believe they tell us about the navigational algorithms which underpin animal space-use more broadly.

**Authors:**

Oliver Padget¹, Tim Guilford¹

¹University of Oxford

The role of learning in seabird navigation

**Abstract:**

Social aggregations of chicks often occur in avian species with precocial young. Chicks are left alone for periods of time by both parents while they forage, and may or may not be guarded by other parents feeding their own chicks. The benefits of chick aggregations are thought to include reduced predation, increased thermoregulation, and social information transfer but few studies have examined the effects of sociality on chick survivorship. Our study investigated variation in chick sociality in a colonial seabird, the sooty tern Onychoprion fuscatus on Accession Island, South Atlantic. The number of chick associates (or 'friends') varied with chick age, at first increasing with age and then declining as fledging approached. Our results indicate that social group size may be a response to predation pressures during a period of increased vulnerability related to developmental stage. This has conservation management implications in terms of the need for introduced predator control together with further understanding of the predation rates by endemic Ascension Frigatebirds Fregata aquila. Our study highlights the importance of the accountability of offspring social connectivity as a driver of population-level breeding performance in demographic studies of species with socially aggregating young.

**Authors:**

Jonathon Sadler¹, John Colbourne¹, Roger Dickey², Sam Weber³, Adriana Maldonado-Chapirro¹, James Reynolds¹

¹University of Birmingham, ²Land Forces Directorate, ³Ascension Island Government

Friends with benefits: The importance of chick sociality for survivorship in a precocial seabird

**Abstract:**

Little is known about sleep and vigilance in terns despite nocturnal predators causing widespread breeding failure. In a 2013-2018 study of two North American Common Tern breeding colonies, we found surprisingly large differences in sleep duration and vigilance that we hypothesized were due to long-term predation risk (e.g., 64% of night with eyes open at the high-risk site versus 17% at the low-risk site). Here, to tease out the effects of predation from other colony-specific differences, we take advantage of a natural experiment in 2019 (when predation pressure was reversed) and expand this work to include diurnal sleep patterns. We recorded sex-specific sleep and vigilance behaviors during incubation for marked adults at both sites using 1-min time-lapse photographs taken throughout 48-h periods for 19 nests. In 2020, we investigated evidence for compensatory sleep at roosts and in 2021 we used time-lapse video to explore fine-scale sleep behavior. The presence of active predators at the low-risk site reduced the sleep of terns three-fold, but there were no diurnal differences in sleep between sites or sexes. Sexes distributed nocturnal incubation evenly and were equally vigilant, but at the high-risk site only one partner was ever present at night, even on nights when predation was not evident. Sleep at roosts was uncommon and reduced on nights when predators were present. In 2019, incubating terns at the high-risk site were never observed in deep sleep, and at the low-risk site terns entered deep sleep for <70 min on average. There was no evidence for compensation by sleeping during the day or at roosts. Thus, nest predators caused substantial reductions in sleep. While research on other taxa suggests that some birds may accommodate periods of sleep deprivation during migration, the physiological and fitness consequences of predator-induced sleep reduction during breeding have yet to be explored.

**Authors:**

Jennifer Arnold¹, Stephen Oswald¹, Paul Curtis², Ryan Hartman¹, Emily Case¹, Alexis Albu¹, Devin Tipton¹

¹Penn State University, Berks Campus, ²Cornell University

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