United States

**Abstract:**

The most recent assessment of threats to seabirds at the global level confirmed that Invasive Alien Species (IAS), bycatch and climate change are the main drivers of decline of several species. Most seabirds, especially globally threatened ones, face multiple threats. IAS affects the highest number of species, but bycatch has a greater impact in terms of severity. In this study, we used data collected for the global revision to analyse in detail the threats facing seabirds occurring in Europe and in the EU28 (pre-2018). We found that, at European level, the main perils on land are hunting/trapping, pollution and IAS (affecting 46.8 %, 35.1 % and 33.8 % of species respectively). At sea, the main threats are bycatch (33.8 %), climate change/severe weather and overfishing (both 22.1 %). Marine threats have the greatest average impact on European species, even though they affect a smaller percentage of them compared to the major threats on land. In Europe, seabirds are among the bird families with the higher proportion of threatened and nearly threatened species (34,5% at EU level according to the last EU 2020 Red List assessment), with c. 25% experiencing population declines (especially Podicipedidae and Anatidae families). The study sheds light on the main threats faced by European seabirds during different phases of their annual cycles for both breeding and wintering species, and will contribute to the identification of key species and the measures needed to mitigate their most critical and deadly threats. In addition, this analysis will help guide current and future conservation and policy work in the region to drive effective conservation measures and identify where there is a shared political responsibility with third-party countries. This is particularly important for some highly mobile European species that spend a significant amount of time in the high seas where they encounter threats that have an impact on their survival.

**Authors:**

Antonio Vulcano¹, Maria Peixe Dias¹, Anna Staneva¹, Daniel Mitchell², Claire Rutherford¹

¹BirdLife International, ²Stichting BirdLife Europe

3rd World Seabird Conference

Threats to seabirds in Europe: a regional review

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!

poster

**Abstract:**

Penguins are in trouble. The International Union for Conservation of Nature lists 10 of the 18 species as threatened, making penguins the second most threatened family of seabirds. The IUCN Penguin Specialist Group (PSG) is developing a Penguin Global Conservation Agenda. In 2016, the PSG coordinated threatened status reviews for the IUCN Red List based on penguin status data and conservation needs from its membership. The PSG also held two conservation strategy workshops to: 1) identify gaps in penguin research and conservation towards increasing population resilience in wild penguins and minimising threats and impacts, and 2) develop consensus on the species considered to be conservation priorities. Here, we summarise the PSG work to-date to guide and support future penguin research and to inform much-needed policy and legislative interventions. Among the top 12 research priorities, four are relevant to all penguins: (i) assessing population trends, (ii) determining vital biological rates, (iii) documenting environmental changes, and (iv) improving understanding of foraging ecology. We also identified four other conservation priorities relevant to several species: (v) improving understanding of effects of fisheries, (vi) enhancing support for marine spatial planning, (vii) developing species-specific action plans, and (viii) improving stakeholder engagement. Conservation action is needed for all penguin taxa, but we recognised that African, Galapagos and Yellow-Eyed Penguins need immediate scientific collaboration and policy interventions. We discuss crucial avenues for improving science-informed conservation of these species. The conservation actions for penguins would have broad biodiversity benefits in the Southern Hemisphere's marine biodiversity hotspots. By fostering communication and policy action toward these priorities, our goal is to ensure wild penguins exist in perpetuity.

**Authors:**

Pablo García Borboroglu¹, P. Dee Boersma¹, Susie Ellies², Charly-Andre Bost³, Tom Schneider⁴, Philip Seddon⁵, Alejandro Simeone⁶, Phil Trathan⁷, Lauren Waller⁸, Barbara Wienecke⁹, Natasha Gownaris¹, Andre Chiaradia¹⁰

¹University of Washington, ²International Rhino Foundation, ³Centre d'Etudes Biologiques de Chizé, CNRS, ⁴Detroit Zoological Society, ⁵University of Otago, ⁶Universidad Andres Bello, ⁷British Antarctic Survey, ⁸University of the Western Cape, ⁹Australian Antarctic Division, ¹⁰Phillip Island Nature Parks

Towards a Penguin Global Conservation Agenda promoted by the IUCN SSC Penguin Specialist Group

**Abstract:**

To prevent additional seabird extinctions, conservation practitioners need to know what species to focus on, what actions to take, and where to take them. We created a spatially explicit meta-population viability analysis (mPVA) model for all IUCN threatened (Critically Endangered, Endangered, Vulnerable) seabirds. We generated the model parameters by combining a global database on the breeding location, population meta structure, and anthropogenic threats to seabirds with a detailed seabird demographic and population database. Potential conservation interventions can be entered into the model to estimate the change they will have on extinction risk. We completed an extinction risk analysis for 94 insular threatened seabird species to determine which species are at Extreme (>75% of model runs predicted species extinction) or High (50 - 75% of model runs predicted species extinction) risk of extinction within 100 years. Our analysis identifies five conservation priorities and opportunities: 1) seabird species at extreme or high risk of extinction in the next century, 2) families of seabirds (Procellarids) that include the largest proportion of species with extreme or high risks of extinction, 3) the potential for mitigation of extinction risk to be gained by conducting all feasible eradications of damaging invasive vertebrates on at least one breeding island of extreme/high risk seabirds, 4) the potential for mitigation of extinction risk to be gained by conducting translocations/reintroductions to establish/re-establish breeding colonies of extreme/high risk seabirds, and 5) opportunities where innovation of new tools or competencies will significantly reduce the probability of extinction of threatened seabirds.

**Authors:**

Donald Croll¹, Kelly Zilliacus¹, M. Tim Tinker², Diana Ruiz¹, Bernie Tershy¹

¹University of California, Santa Cruz, ²Nhydra Ecological Consulting

Global meta-population viability analysis determines relative extinction risk among threatened seabirds

**Abstract:**

The largest remaining Hawaiian petrel colony (ʻuaʻu, Pterodroma sandwichensis) exists in alpine and sub-alpine habitats on Haleakalā, Maui. The Maui Nui Seabird Recovery Project has monitored the portion of the colony and the vegetation community within the Kahikinui Forest and Nakula Natural Area Reserves following ungulate exclusion in 2014. Here we report on the expansion of the ʻuaʻu colony in these recently protected areas, and how management has positively impacted the habitat. We use Automated Acoustic Monitoring (AAM), annual standardized burrow searching, and burrow monitoring during the breeding season to assess activity, recruitment, and reproductive success of ʻuaʻu. Vegetation surveys are conducted at burrow sites and annually at randomly generated permanent plots to determine abundance and coverage of native and non-native plant species. The number of ʻuaʻu burrows is increasing at an average of 22 annually, and reproductive success has steadily increased to 58% in 2020. Results of AAM surveys show greater ʻuaʻu activity over time, particularly in locations popular with prospecting birds. Vegetation surveys reveal that although native species diversity remains unchanged, the abundance of uncommon native shrubs is increasing. Overall, vegetation characteristics at burrow sites do not differ from the surrounding landscape, suggesting that the resilience of the high-elevation community makes it attractive as a recruitment site. Our results show how an ecosystem-level approach can facilitate the assessment and recovery of a population of endangered seabirds.

**Authors:**

Jennifer Learned¹, Martin Frye¹, Cecelia Frisinger¹, Jay Penniman¹

¹Maui Nui Seabird Recovery Project

Recovery of sub-tropical alpine habitat and the endangered Hawaiian petrel on leeward Haleakalā, Maui

**Abstract:**

The conservation of highly migratory species presents unique challenges due to their complex life histories and the vast spatial scales involved in their annual life cycle. To address such challenges meaningfully, transdisciplinary approaches may be particularly effective. The Pink-footed Shearwater (Ardenna creatopus) is an endemic Chilean breeder but is a trans-hemispheric migrant during the non-breeding season. The species is listed as Vulnerable by the IUCN and Endangered by Chile and Canada. Both colony-based and at-sea threats exist for this species, including impacts of invasive mammals, breeding habitat degradation, a chick harvest on one of the breeding islands, and competition with and bycatch in multiple fisheries. In this presentation, we provide an overview of the collaborative approaches we have taken over 18 years and the need for further transdisciplinary involvement to address conservation threats to this species. We have worked intentionally at the local community level with schools, artist cooperatives, cattlemen's associations, artisanal fishing cooperatives, and other community groups as well as with non-governmental organizations and Chilean federal agencies. Important outcomes include the first mammal-excluding conservation fence of its kind in Chile, national conservation plans in Chile and Canada, collaborations with Chilean fisheries agencies, NGOs and fishing communities, new education programs in local schools, and community-based collaborations with artists. Significant challenges remain that require diverse expertise and perspectives, including improving estimates of bycatch in fisheries of multiple nations, increasing local stewardship by improving the lives of people living on the breeding islands, incorporating social scientific approaches to build community support for invasive-species eradication programs, solving methodological difficulties in quantifying population trends in their forested breeding habitat, and understanding the species' vulnerability to prey dynamics driven by climate change and fisheries extraction.

**Authors:**

Peter Hodum¹, Veronica Lopez², Ryan Carle², Pablo Manriquez², Tiare Varela², Paola Gonzalez², Hector Gutierrez², Valentina Colodro², Michelle Hester²

¹University of Puget Sound / Oikonos, ²Oikonos

Overcoming challenges to the conservation of Pink-footed Shearwaters: A transdisciplinary approach

**Abstract:**

Recent changes in our long-term study site (25 yrs) in the Bay of Fundy/Gulf of Maine have drawn us to examine the variety of mechanisms that might be affecting the alcids breeding there, given recent exceptionally rapid ocean warming and associated changes in diet. Seabirds are endotherms so manage their own temperature internally; but their prey are ectotherms whose physiology responds directly to changes in the marine environment. I consider some consequences of this 'metabolic asymmetry' on the availability of fish to seabird predators. Fish metabolic rate rises with water temperature, so more energy is needed for metabolism leaving less for growth; yet their ability to secure oxygen declines both because of haemoglobin's reduced affinity to bind oxygen in warmer water, and because warmer water holds less oxygen. The 'burst speed' of fish also increases with temperature, so fish prey are not only fewer (from reduced survival) and smaller (from slower growth) but harder to catch. It is to this increasing mismatch of predator and prey that the dearth of pursuit-diving seabirds in tropical oceans has been attributed. Changes lower in the food-chain add to these challenges for marine birds. In many phytoplankton communities, diatoms tend to be replaced by dinoflagellates; diatoms are the major source of 'essential' (unsaturated) fatty acids (UFAs) in marine ecosystems, which therefore become depleted. UFAs are important in maintaining flexibility in cell membranes, allowing cells to adjust to low temperatures, and therefore predominate in cold-water fish; warm-water fish have no need to maintain cell structure at low temperatures and contain less lipid, in which saturated fatty acids predominate. Fish prey available to seabirds as the ocean warms are likely to be fewer, smaller, faster, and less nutritious ('junk food') than those currently available to seabirds in boreal and arctic waters.

**Authors:**

Tony Diamond¹

¹University of New Brunswick

Fewer, faster, leaner: a seabird's-eye view of chasing fish in a warming ocean; mechanisms from cell membranes to body-size selection

**Abstract:**

The island of Helgoland (Germany) in the southern North Sea holds several cliff-breeding seabird species, some of them close to the southern edge of their breeding range. In spring and summer 2018, unusual high air temperatures in combination with low wind had considerable impact on these seabirds. Various observations indicated that especially adult northern gannets and black-legged kittiwakes were under heat stress, leading to extensive nest abandonment before hatching, especially in parts of the colony with long sun-exposure and shelter from wind. Although heat continued throughout that summer and very high temperatures were measured at the nests, chick rearing appeared to be less affected, but overall breeding success was untypical low in gannets and close to colony failure in kittiwakes. Common murre chicks left the colony at younger age and with critical body mass, many of them died just after jumping from the breeding ledges. As food provisioning in parts of the colony protected from solar radiation appeared to be good and because species with different prey and ways of foraging were involved, it is unlikely that feeding conditions and food supply were responsible for the poor breeding success. To a lesser extent, the observed phenomena recurred in 2019, when spring was very warm again. In the light of predicted warming due to climate change it is discussed whether the breeding range of North Atlantic seabirds might retreat northwards in future.

**Authors:**

Volker Dierschke¹, Jochen Dierschke², Nils Guse³, Stefanie Rolfsmeier⁴

¹Gavia EcoResearch, ²Institute of Avian Research, ³Christian-Albrechts-Universität Kiel, ⁴Helgoland

The temperate zone in a changing climate: too warm for North Atlantic seabirds?

**Abstract:**

Pygoscelid penguins in Antarctica require ice-free terrain for nesting, open-water access to their colonies on the coast, and adequate marine food supplies nearby, thus the presence or absence of penguin colonies act as proxy for these conditions. Ornithogenic soils are formed over hundreds to thousands of years and contain a natural archive of well-preserved tissues that can be used to track the initiation and abandonment of penguin colonies over geologic time. This 'penguin record' complements traditional paleoclimate and sea-ice records such as ice cores and lake and marine sediment cores. Previous radiocarbon dating of Adélie penguin (Pygoscelis adeliae) tissues from ornithogenic soils in the northern Antarctic Peninsula have suggested a very young occupation, dating to less than 800 calendar years before present (BP). This is at odds with other proxies that indicate earlier deglaciation of this region. To address this enigma we excavated active and abandoned Adélie penguin colonies at the Danger Islands, Paulet Island, and Brown Bluff, Tabarin Peninsula, along the northern Antarctic Peninsula to determine their occupation history. We discovered that Adélie penguins first occupied the Danger Islands and Paulet Island approximately 2820 to 2935 BP. In contrast, ornithogenic soils at Brown Bluff dated to less than 400 BP, similar to previous dates on soils in this region. When compared to past studies these new dates indicate a north-to-south occupation across breeding colonies in the northeastern Antarctic Peninsula that began around 2900 BP. This agrees with paleoclimate and sea-ice proxies that suggest that the northern Antarctic Peninsula underwent complete deglaciation following the Last Glacial Maximum by approximately 6000 to 3000 BP. However, a mismatch remains between the late Holocene age of ornithogenic soils and the middle Holocene age of marine sedimentary deposits and penguin guano bio-elements in lake sediments from the region that warrants future investigations.

**Authors:**

Michael Polito¹, Gemma Clucas², Tom Hart³, Rachael Herman⁴, Chantel Michelson¹, Heather Lynch⁴, Hanumant Singh⁵, Stephanie Jenouvrier⁶, Steven Emslie⁷

¹Louisiana State University, ²Cornell University, ³University of Oxford, ⁴Stony Brook University, ⁵Northeastern University, ⁶Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, ⁷University of North Carolina at Wilmington

Penguins as paleoclimate and sea-ice proxies: Radiocarbon dating indicates a late Holocene, north-to-south, penguin colonization in the northern Antarctic Peninsula

**Abstract:**

Brazilian albatrosses and petrels biological sample bank (BAAP) was proposed under the National Plan of Action for the Conservation of Albatross and Petrels (PLANACAP) and presented to the Population and Conservation Status Working Group (PaCSWG) of the Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels (ACAP) once it facilitates sample access to achieve its goals. The two leading institutions in BAAP's creation are The National Centre for Bird Conservation and Research (CEMAVE) of Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMBio) and Projeto Albatroz, a Brazilian non-governmental organization. BAAP aims to manage a network of institutions holding biological samples from albatrosses and petrels to promote information and sample interchange. BAAP participants are able to transfer their surplus samples to other institutions, ask for samples lacking in their collection and also make public the list of samples they maintain. One of the benefits from an integrated biological sample bank working as a regional node for Procellariiformes is to precisely know what the collections have to offer from each species. Thus, you can maximize the types of samples that can be collected from a carcass forwarding each one to the most needed institutions. Besides, an organized sample bank helps researchers to precisely know what is the amount of samples necessary to collect, saving money and efforts in field expeditions. BAAP currently houses 3,956 samples, and gathers nine institutions, including museums, universities, private and non-governmental organizations in Brazil. Searches for samples accessioned in BAAP's collection are straightforward, as well as accessing information on samples housed in other participant institutions, which share their information on the same node. BAAP works within Brazil at this moment, but hopes to inspire other initiatives regionally, to facilitate research that will subsidize albatrosses and petrels conservation actions.

**Authors:**

Alice Pereira¹, Tatiana Neves¹, Cristiane Kolesnikovas², Dimas Gianuca¹, Patricia Serafini³

¹Projeto Albatroz, ²Associação R3 Animal, ³MMA

Brazilian albatrosses and petrels biological sample bank for research and conservation: a potential regional node to facilitate sample directory

**Abstract:**

In the European Union, the conservation of the marine environment is supported by the Marine Strategy Framework Direction (MSFD, released in 2008). The aim is to get from status assessments to measures allowing to achieve good environmental status in future. Seabirds constitute a component of biodiversity, and their status shall be described by abundance, demography, distribution, bycatch in fisheries and habitat quality. Whereas indicators have been developed for the first four criteria, an indicator describing habitat quality has been lacking and was drafted only recently. We present an approach to assess habitat quality for seabirds at sea as expressed by the level of disturbance from human offshore activities: First, the influence of multiple activities on the species of interest is estimated using integrative regression techniques applied to offshore bird survey data. Then these models are used to predict the distribution and abundance of the species throughout the study area, in both the current situation, with human activities, and in a hypothetical situation without the effects of the human activities. Two different measures allow to compare between the two scenarios: One highlights critical regions where locally high bird abundance is co-localized with large declines in abundance due to human activities. As a global metric, the other quantifies the overall condition of seabird habitat in the study area in relation to human disturbance. This indicator framework was tested for three species wintering in the southern North Sea (red-throated loon, herring gull, common murre) and the German section of the Baltic Sea (long-tailed duck, herring gull) compared to the spatial distribution of three human activities (offshore windfarms, shipping, bottom-trawling fishery). This way of cumulative assessment gave a high amount of disturbed habitat for red-throated loon and common murre, whereas in the areas examined the disturbance was low for herring gulls and long-tailed duck. The availability of suitable and undisturbed habitat is a prerequisite for the conservation of threatened and declining species. Therefore, the assessments of this indicator can substantially support assessments in the abundance indicators by highlighting fields where measures need to be applied.

**Authors:**

Volker Dierschke¹, Nele Markones², Moritz Mercker³

¹Gavia EcoResearch, ²Christian-Albrechts-Universität Kiel, ³Bionum - Büro für Biostatistik und Ökologische Statistik

A habitat disturbance indicator for seabirds in northern Europe

**Abstract:**

In 2014, Spain declared 39 marine Special Protected Areas (SPA) in order to protect the 10% of its waters. European Storm Petrel has been identified as one of the key species to delimitate and declare the SPA for seabirds in the Gulf Cádiz, in the framework of Natura 2000 marine Network. This migratory species uses this area during their post-breeding migration for foraging and the SPA should guarantee its protection. This study analyse the distribution area of the European Storm Petrel and the oceanographic features related to in the Gulf of Cadiz using data of 10 years of oceanographic vessel campaigns to figure out the Key Area of the species in region. We conducted 103 census units during 2006-2018 covering more than 5,000 km and we detected 361 European Storm Petrel in 99 census units. We used Kernel Density Estimation to calculate the home range of the species and predictive Maxent models to determinate which oceanographic variables influence this petrel distribution. Our results show that the key area of the species was displaced to the west from to the current protected area, so this species could be not well adequately protected in the area. Using Maxent approach, the distance to Guadiana river mouth, distance to the Continental Platform and the concentration of Chlorophyll a have been identified as the main environmental variables that explain the European Storm Petrel distribution in the Gulf of Cádiz. These results contribute to a better understanding of the dynamic of the regional distribution of marine species and help to define a more suitable SPA and its management

**Authors:**

Andres de la Cruz Muñoz¹, Gonzalo Muñoz Arroyo¹

¹University of Cadiz

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Towards a Penguin Global Conservation Agenda promoted by the IUCN SSC Penguin Specialist Group

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