Scientists discover one of world's oldest bird species at Waipara, New Zealand

SEPTEMBER 17, 2019

by Canterbury Museum

The ancestor of some of the largest flying birds ever has been found in Waipara, North Canterbury.

Bony-toothed birds (Pelagornithids), an ancient family of huge seafaring birds, were thought to have evolved in the Northern Hemisphere—but that theory has been upended by the discovery of the family's oldest, but smallest member in New Zealand.

At 62 million-years-old, the newly-discovered Protodontopteryx ruthae, is one of the oldest named bird species in the world. It lived in New Zealand soon after the dinosaurs died out.

While its descendants were some of the biggest flying birds ever, with wingspans of more than 5 meters, Protodontopteryx ruthae was only the size of an average gull. Like other members of its family, the seabird had bony, tooth-like projections on the edge of its beak.

The seabird fossil was identified by the same team that recently announced the discovery of a 1.6 meter-high giant penguin from the same site.

Amateur paleontologist Leigh Love found the partial Protodontopteryx skeleton last year at the Waipara Greensand fossil site. The bird was named Protodontopteryx ruthae after Love's wife Ruth. Love wanted to thank her for tolerating his decades-long passion for paleontology.

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Record seabird numbers in Aussie island state baffle animal watchers

Source: Xinhua   2018-07-21 13:45:37

SYDNEY, July 21 (Xinhua) -- Seagulls have hit record numbers in Australia's Tasmania island state, baffling ornithologists and animal watchers who also highlighted the birds' changing food supply and nesting areas, latest conservation group figures showed.

All major gull species in the southern state's southeast area have increased significantly, with a nearly 200 percent rise in Pacific gulls from last year's numbers to surpass 1,000 birds, according to bird conservation group Birdlife Tasmania's annual winter gull count reported late this week.

Silver gulls recorded the second-highest population in more than three decades, at about 16,000 birds, the group's Eric Woehler told local media.

The exact cause of the record number of seabirds, some of which can live for 30 years, was not known, said Woehler.

"Every year the gulls surprise us ... The different species respond differently to the environment," the ABC radio channel in state capital Hobart quoted him as saying.

The seabirds were also shifting away from dwindling food sources scavenged from rubbish dumps to feed in other spots including fish farms in water channels, said Woehler.

Seagull nesting areas were similarly changing amid their rising numbers.

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Bad breeding year for Cumbria sea birds

Cumbria Wildlife Trust has reported that seabird chicks are in decline in the county.

After analysing the breeding success of several species across three of its coastal nature reserves, the charity found that the numbers of birds to have fledged over the summer has seen a dramatic decline in some instances.

At South Walney Nature Reserve on Walney Island, the number of breeding Herrings and Lesser Black-backed Gulls was estimated at 4,500 breeding pairs in spring 2014, compared to 6,000 the previous year.

Lesser Black-backed Gulls are on the Amber list of conservation concern, as the UK is home to 40 per cent of the European population, and more than half of these are found at less than 10 sites across the country.

Herring Gulls are also found at fewer than 10 sites in the UK, and are in a slightly more worrying situation on the Red list. They have experienced a moderate decline in their numbers over the past 25 years.

Cumbria Wildlife Trust protected the breeding colonies from predators by erecting electric fencing, and believes that had this not been done then the decline in the population of both bird species would have potentially been much worse.

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