Possible Oahu populations offer new hope for Hawaiian seabirds

January 22, 2019, American Ornithological Society

The two seabird species unique to Hawaii, Newell's Shearwaters and Hawaiian Petrels, are the focus of major conservation efforts—at risk from habitat degradation, invasive predators, and other threats, their populations plummeted 94% and 78% respectively between 1993 and 2013. However, a new study in The Condor: Ornithological Applications offers hope of previously undetected colonies of these birds on the island of Oahu, from which they were believed to have vanished by the late 1700s.

Shearwaters and petrels nest colonially in crevices, burrows, and under vegetation at mid to high elevations. They currently breed on other Hawaiian islands including Kauai and Maui, but were both believed to have extirpated from Oahu prior to European contact in 1778; biologists believed that occasional records from the island were birds thrown off-course at night by city lights.

Pacific Rim Conservation's Lindsay Young and her colleagues used a spatial model based on elevation, forest cover, and illumination to identify potential suitable breeding habitat for both species on Oahu, then deployed automated acoustic recording units at 16 sites on the island to listen for the birds' calls in 2016 and 2017, accessing remote mountain locations via helicopter. To their surprise, they detected petrels at one site and shearwaters at two sites.

"We were doing a statewide survey for these species for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service as part of recovery action planning, but Oahu was not initially included as one of the sites to survey, since evidence suggested they weren't there," says Young. "Since we're Oahu-based, we thought we would at least put a few recording units out to see if there was anything. And we were surprised, to say the least, that we not only had calls detected, but detected both species across two years."

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Eight Fluffy Baby Birds Helicoptered to Hawaii

The birds, which have shag carpet-like plumage, are endangered Newell's shearwater chicks.

 

Eight fluffy baby football-sized birds were just helicoptered to a scenic Hawaiian wildlife refuge in a conservation effort that was years in the making. 

The birds, which have shag carpet-like plumage, are endangered Newell's shearwater chicks that scientists hope will become healthy reproducing adults and the founders of a new colony on the Hawaiian island of Kauai.

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Cameras reveal secret lives of Kauai's endangered birds

LIHUE, KAUAI (HawaiiNewsNow) - 

High tech cameras placed at remote breeding sites are providing insight into the secret lives of Kauai's endangered seabirds. As part of the Kauai Endangered Seabird Recovery Project (KESRP), which is a state and federally funded project under the state Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR) Division of Forestry and Wildlife, the 14 cameras were placed on Newell's Shearwater and Hawaiian Petrel burrows during the breeding season last year to collect data on everything from the arrival of adults to the fledging of chicks. 

Newell's shearwater

"These cameras have provided us with a window into a side of the birds that we simply never see," explained Dr. André Raine, KESRP coordinator. "Watching the birds returning to their burrows after a winter out at sea, preening each other at the burrow entrance or interacting with their chicks at night is really pretty special, but the cameras are also providing critical data to help save the birds from extinction." 

The cameras are set on a trigger mechanism to take photos when something passes in front of the burrow entrance. Once the cameras are triggered, they take a rapid series of photos and only stop when the movement has ceased. This means that the cameras record birds entering or leaving their nest sites, or chicks exercising in front of the burrows throughout the breeding season. As the birds only come into their colonies at night, cameras are fitted with infrared flashes so that the birds are not disturbed. 

"We've recorded birds from the moment they arrive on Kauai in March to the time their chicks depart in October to December," Dr. Raine continued. "The cameras are a great way to collect data on a whole range of behaviors, such as when the chicks fledge and how often adults come to the burrows to feed their offspring. In this way we are increasing our understanding of exactly what these birds are up to while they are on our island." 

The cameras have also highlighted the threat of invasive species to these endangered seabirds, a problem that is facing Hawaii's endemic wildlife throughout the archipelago. Cameras have filmed burrows being visited by both feral cats and rats throughout the study period, and have even captured the gruesome moment when a chick was eaten alive by a large rat. 

Continued: http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/story/22091631/part