A switch in the Atlantic Oscillation correlates with inter-annual changes in foraging location and food habits of Macaronesian shearwaters ( Puffinus baroli ) nesting on two islands of the sub-tropical Atlantic Ocean

Ramos, Jaime A.; Fagundes, Ana Isabel; Xavier, José C.; Fidalgo, Vera; Ceia, Filipe R.; Medeiros, Renata; Paiva, Vítor H.

doi:10.1016/j.dsr.2015.07.001

Cited by 21 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 72 publications

(112 reference statements)

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“…The delayed laying season, greater number of deserted eggs, lower hatching success, chicks' lighter body mass and shorter wings in 2011 compared to 2012 could be related to inter-annual fluctuations in food supply, given the poor oceanographic conditions in 2011, and may have been a consequence of changes in water mass driven by climate and stochastic variation in prey abundance and availability (Neves et al, 2012;Paiva et al, 2013a;Ramos et al, 2015). Availability of food to seabird populations is difficult to measure but is clearly influenced by oceanic conditions within the foraging range of the individuals (e.g., Abrams and Underhill, 1986;Ballance, 2007;Elliott et al, 2008).…”

Section: Environmental Factors Influencing Breeding Parametersmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Latitude and longitude were estimated from day (night) length and the time of local mid-day (mid-night), respectively, in relation to Greenwich Meridian Time (Phillips et al, 2004). Full details of the GLS analyses are presented by Ramos et al (2015).…”

Section: At-sea Distribution and Environmental Variabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Two environmental predictors were selected to characterise the marine areas of the North Atlantic used by Macaronesian shearwaters on a local scale (inside the 50% kernel utilisation distribution of birds), including SSTa computed from SST data and Chl a concentration (see Ramos et al, 2015 for analysis description and more details).…”

Section: At-sea Distribution and Environmental Variabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Food availability (determined by oceanographic and climatic features; Ramos et al, 2015) and nest site characteristics (Ramos et al, 1997) are likely to be the two most significant determinants of reproductive performance in burrow-nesting Procellariiformes, but most studies have not examined these two aspects in conjunction.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recently, GLS devices were also used to evaluate the at-sea distribution of the winter-breeding Macaronesian shearwater Puffinus lherminieri baroli (Neves et al, 2012;Ramos et al, 2015. In the North Atlantic, the breeding biology of summer-breeding species such as Cory's shearwater (Ramos et al, 2003 and references therein) has also been well studied, yet there is little information regarding the breeding biology of winter-breeding species such as the Macaronesian shearwater.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Breeding biology of a winter-breeding procellariiform in the North Atlantic, the Macaronesian shearwater Puffinus lherminieri baroli

Fagundes¹,

Ramos

et al. 2016

Zoology

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Breeding biology of a winter-breeding procellariiform in the North Atlantic, the Macaronesian shearwater Puffinus lherminieri baroli.Zoology http://dx.doi.org/10. 1016/j.zool.2016.05.014 This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain.  Climatic stochasticity events have an effect on foraging and breeding success. ABSTRACTThe breeding success of burrow-nesting seabirds may be influenced by both nest site characteristics and oceanographic conditions influencing food availability at sea. In this study we describe the breeding biology of the winter-breeding Macaronesian shearwater (Puffinus lherminieri baroli), including nest site characteristics and interspecific competition. We also evaluate the possible effects of changing oceanographic conditions on breeding phenology and breeding success. The study was carried out over two breeding seasons on two islands in the North Atlantic Ocean, Cima Islet and Selvagem Grande. Oceanographic characteristics differed between years. On a regional scale, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) index was low and negative in 2011, and on a local scale, birds used areas with significantly lower values of chlorophyll a concentration and significantly higher values of sea surface temperature anomalies.Hatching success was higher in 2012 than in 2011. At both colonies, egg cracking was the main cause of hatching failure, but in 2011 several eggs on Selvagem Grande were deserted. In 2012 birds laid earlier and chicks had longer wings and were heavier. At both colonies, nests that were deeper, were sheltered from prevailing winds and had small chambers and a soil substrate had a higher probability of being used successfully by the birds. Nests occupied solely by Macaronesian shearwaters were much deeper and had less volume than nests shared with other species. Our study suggests that the breeding success of Macaronesian shearwaters is strongly related to nest site characteristics and that at-sea environmental conditions exert a strong influence on reproductive parameters, with birds breeding in a poor year (evaluated in terms of lower marine productivity) laying much later and their chicks growing at a slower rate than in a good year. The influence of nest site characteristics and environmental conditions may be very important for understanding the breeding ecology of Procellariiformes and may help explain the negative population trend of Macaronesian shearwaters.

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Section: Environmental Factors Influencing Breeding Parametersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: At-sea Distribution and Environmental Variabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: At-sea Distribution and Environmental Variabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Breeding biology of a winter-breeding procellariiform in the North Atlantic, the Macaronesian shearwater Puffinus lherminieri baroli

Fagundes¹,

Ramos

et al. 2016

Zoology

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Changes in behaviour drive inter-annual variability in the at-sea distribution of northern gannets

et al. 2016

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The at-sea distribution of seabirds primarily depends on the distance from their breeding colony, and the abundance, distribution and predictability of their prey, which are subject to strong spatial and temporal variation. Many seabirds have developed flexible foraging strategies to deal with this variation, such as increasing their foraging effort or switching to more predictable, less energy dense, prey, in poor conditions. These responses may vary both within and between individuals, and understanding this variability is vital to predict the population-level impacts of spatially explicit environmental disturbances, such as offshore windfarms. We conducted a multi-year tracking study in order to investigate the inter-annual variation in the foraging behaviour and location of a population of northern gannets breeding on Alderney in the English Channel. To do so, we investigated the link between individual-level behaviour and population-level behaviour. We found that a sample of gannets tracked in 2015 had longer trip durations, travelled further from the colony and had larger core foraging areas and home range areas than gannets tracked in previous years. This inter-annual variation may be associated with oceanographic conditions indexed by the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). Our findings suggest that this inter-annual variation was driven by individuals visiting larger areas in all of their trips rather than individuals diversifying to visit more, distinct areas. These findings suggest that, for gannets at least, if prey becomes less abundant or more widely distributed, more individuals may be required to forage further from the colony, thus increasing their likelihood of encountering pressures from spatially explicit anthropogenic disturbances.

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The devil is in the detail: small-scale sexual segregation despite large-scale spatial overlap in the wandering albatross

et al. 2018

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Sexual segregation in foraging habitat occurs in many marine predators and is usually attributed to competitive exclusion, different parental roles of each sex or niche specialisation associated with sexual size dimorphism. However, relatively few studies have attempted to understand the patterns and underlying drivers of local-scale sexual segregation in marine predators. We studied habitat use, diet and feeding ecology of female and male wandering albatrosses Diomedea exulans, fitted with GPS and stomach-temperature loggers during the chick-rearing period (austral winter) at South Georgia in 2009. During this period, when oceanographic conditions were anomalous and prey availability was low in waters near the breeding colony, the tracked wandering albatrosses showed high consistency in their foraging areas at a large spatial scale, and both males and females targeted sub-Antarctic and subtropical waters. Despite consistency in large-scale habitat use, males and females showed different foraging behaviours in response to oceanographic conditions at a smaller scale.Males appeared to be more opportunistic, scavenging for offal or non-target fish discarded by fishing vessels in less productive, oceanic waters. They exhibited sinuous movements, feeding mostly on large prey and consuming similar amounts of food during the outbound and return parts of the foraging trip. In contrast, females targeted natural productivity hotspots, and fed on a wide variety of fish and cephalopods. They commuted directly to these areas; most prey were ingested on the outbound part of the trip, and they often started their return after ingesting large prey at the farthest point from the colony. Together, these results indicate that sexual segregation in core foraging areas of wandering albatrosses is driven by sex-specific habitat selection due the low availability of prey in local Antarctic waters. This segregation results in different feeding behaviour at local scales which may be explained by differing breeding roles and degree of parental investment by each sex, with females investing more 3 than males in reproduction. Further investigations are necessary to confirm the existence of this pattern through time under contrasting environmental conditions and to identify the drivers responsible for local-scale sexual segregation in wandering albatrosses.

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A switch in the Atlantic Oscillation correlates with inter-annual changes in foraging location and food habits of Macaronesian shearwaters ( Puffinus baroli ) nesting on two islands of the sub-tropical Atlantic Ocean

Cited by 21 publications

References 72 publications

Breeding biology of a winter-breeding procellariiform in the North Atlantic, the Macaronesian shearwater Puffinus lherminieri baroli

Breeding biology of a winter-breeding procellariiform in the North Atlantic, the Macaronesian shearwater Puffinus lherminieri baroli

Changes in behaviour drive inter-annual variability in the at-sea distribution of northern gannets

The devil is in the detail: small-scale sexual segregation despite large-scale spatial overlap in the wandering albatross

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