Every year, thousands of seabirds die as unintended victims of commercial fishing – caught on hooks or becoming tangled in nets as they scavenge for food. An estimated 50,000 to 75,000 are
Every year, thousands of seabirds die as unintended victims of commercial fishing – caught on hooks or becoming tangled in nets as they scavenge for food. An estimated 50,000 to 75,000 are killed by longline fishing fleets annually, with 170 million individuals exposed to bycatch risk worldwide.
In the Southern Hemisphere alone, 40,000 albatrosses and petrels are caught each year, and up to 90% of albatross species are now threatened by fishing activity. The Antipodean albatross, in particular, is at extreme risk. Endemic to New Zealand, the population of roughly 28,000 birds is declining at 6% per year – a devastating rate driven primarily by bycatch from high-seas longline fishing.
With the species being driven toward extinction, researchers needed to understand exactly where and when these fatal encounters are occurring.
As part of new study co-authored by PML alongside University of the Sunshine Coast and other institutes in Australia and New Zealand, and published in Biological Conservation journal, 192 Antipodean albatrosses across all demographics – males and females, juveniles and adults, breeding and non-breeding individuals – were fitted with tiny satellite transmitters. The full scope of the birds’ movements across the vast Southern Ocean was then overlaid with precise fishing
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