Hello tweets,

i don't mean to ruin your holidays with this message, but it is
important that we become more knoweldgable about the plight of
yet more of the species that share their world with us (we have
been terrible houseguests, in my opinion).

regards,

Devorah A. N. Bennu, PhD
email:nyneve at amnh.org or nyneve at myUW.net
work page http://research.amnh.org/ornithology/personnel/bennu.htm
personal pages http://research.amnh.org/users/nyneve/

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Extinction Near for Albatross, Experts Warn

By James Owen
for National Geographic News
(http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/04/0417_030417_albatross.html=
)
April 17, 2003

'God save thee, ancient Mariner!
From the fiends, that plague thee thus!
Why look'st thou so? With my cross-bow
I shot the ALBATROSS.

The albatross in Coleridge's famous poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,
is killed for no real reason. It's a mindless act. The bird's death, and
the Mariner's nightmarish fate, show what can happen when humans alienate
themselves from the natural world.

Today, Coleridge's poem seems much more than just a fable. Modern-day
mariners are killing tens of thousands of real-life albatrosses each year.
The birds are being killed on hooks meant for fish. Killed for no reason at
all.

Seafarers once believed the albatross a bird of good omen. As both relied
on fair winds for their ocean travels, the bird was welcomed as a kindred
spirit. To harm one was to bring bad luck.

These days many commercial fishermen see them as little more than a
nuisance, and their deaths as purely incidental.

Longlining is a fishing method that uses hooks instead of nets. These
lines, which can be 130 kilometers (80 miles) long, are set for open ocean
species like swordfish and tuna.

But fish aren't the only marine creatures they catch. Seabirds,
particularly albatrosses and petrels, regularly grab the baited hooks. Many
albatrosses are dragged to their deaths=97more than 100,000 each year.

Conservation groups now warn that 17 of the 24 albatross species face
extinction unless urgent action is taken. They say illegal 'pirate' fishing
and non-cooperation from key countries pose the main threat to the bird's
survival.

At a United Nations fisheries conference held in Rome last month,
conservationists branded 14 countries "longline laggards" for failing to
implement measures to protect albatrosses and other seabirds.

The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization had set a 2001 target date for
27 countries to establish a national plan of action (NPOA) to combat the
threat of longlining to seabirds. But the majority, including Argentina,
China, and France, have yet to do so.

"Efforts to tackle the problem are being undermined because 14
irresponsible countries seem to be unwilling or unable to take the
necessary action," said Leon Vilijoen of BirdLife International, a bird
conservation group representing over 100 nations.

He added: "Unless these 14 countries develop NPOAs, globally threatened
species such as the spectacled petrel and wandering albatross will be
driven closer to extinction."

BirdLife International also highlights the threat from pirate fishermen.
According to UN estimates their vessels now account for up to a quarter of
the world's total fish catch.

Richard Thomas, BirdLife International's communications manager, said:
"It's very hard to prevent pirate fishermen from killing seabirds because
they operate beyond the rules. They just throw their longlines out the back
and don't give a damn what's going on."

Flags of convenience

Pirate vessels are registered with 'flag of convenience' countries like
Cambodia and Honduras. This helps them to avoid fisheries regulations.

"It's frighteningly easy to register a boat with a flag of convenience
country," said Thomas. "You can do it over the Internet for about U.S.$200.=
"

Many of these vessels head for the southern oceans, to the major albatross
feeding grounds. It's hidden treasure the pirates are after. Not gold, but
Patagonian toothfish. Also known as Antarctic cod, Chilean sea bass, and
mero, it fetches around U.S.$6,000 a tonne (U.S.$6,614 a ton).

The scale of the problem was revealed last month by the Convention on the
Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR).

The convention's scientific committee says since 1996 pirate longliners
have killed up to 144,000 albatrosses and 400,000 petrels in Antarctic
waters alone.

Albatrosses are particularly at risk from longlining because of the huge
distances they cover. With their long, narrow wings, providing maximum lift
and minimum drag, they are perfectly designed for harnessing the winds and
wave-deflected airflows of the world's most inhospitable seas.

The birds clock up serious air miles as they scour the southern oceans for
food. Ornithologists have recorded single feeding trips of 15,000
kilometers (9,320 miles) by nesting wandering albatrosses.

Seafarers have long been aware of their aeronautical abilities. In 1887,
shipwrecked sailors on the remote Crozet Islands decided against the usual
message-in-a-bottle routine. Instead, they tied their SOS around an
albatross's neck. Two weeks later the note was found on a beach in
southwest Australia; 5,600 kilometers (3,500 miles) away.

This year more remarkable feats of flying endurance were revealed by the
British Antarctic Survey (BAS).

Using the latest tracking technology, its scientists discovered albatrosses
make the equivalent of 20 return trips to the moon (over 10 million miles)
in a lifetime.

But these same findings led to more worrying conclusions about the
likelihood of albatrosses encountering longline fishing vessels.

The BAS links declines in the breeding populations of four albatross
species in South Georgia with longlining.

This follows the development of a new device called a geolocator. Unlike
satellite tracking devices, it measures light levels to estimate a bird's
position.

"The big advantage of this device is that it's very small, can be attached
to a ring on a bird's leg, and lasts much longer than conventional tracking
systems," said BAS scientist Janet Silk.

Crucial Data

The geolocator allows researchers to track a bird for two years, providing
crucial data between breeding periods when albatrosses remain at sea.

"This new information is telling us where the birds are going and the risks
they face from fisheries," added Silk.

However, albatrosses are also regurgitating clues right where they
nest, snapped lines and other longline debris often turn up with fish
fed to chicks.

For a bird with an extremely slow rate of reproduction, one chick every
two to three years, even relatively small losses to longlining could
endanger its survival. Scientists say an increase in adult mortality of
just two to four percent could halve an albatross population in 50 years.

Given this, it's no wonder the albatross has the highest percentage of
endangered species of any bird. For example, the world's entire population
of Amsterdam Island albatrosses now numbers less than 100.

And yet the heavy death toll inflicted by longlining is relatively easy and
inexpensive to remedy.

Practical solutions include bird-scaring devices, weights and underwater
setting tubes to keep lines beyond the reach of birds, dyeing bait an
unappetising blue, and fishing at night.

Richard Thomas suggests such measures would actually make economic sense
for fishing companies.

"It's in their interest to catch fish not birds," he said. "Studies have
found that up to 30 percent of the bait gets plundered by seabirds."

Last year Japanese tuna boats fishing in New Zealand waters had to
introduce measures to reduce their seabird by-catch. Deaths were cut from
4,000 to just 12. Curiously, the same controls did not apply to New Zealand
vessels.

This arbitrary approach to saving the magnificent albatross from extinction
is symptomatic of conservation efforts globally.

Those who haven't got the message yet would do well to read The Rime of the
Ancient Mariner.