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Recent weekly newsletters from Australia's Macquarie Island (click here) reveal that the island's population of Northern Giant Petrels Macronectes halli has been counted this year by a team of four staff, led by rangers of the Tasmanian Parks & Wildlife Service, the first census undertaken in three years.

"It is pleasing to report that the number of breeding pairs is nearly the same as that recorded at the last census three years ago, suggesting that no significant impact on these spectacular birds resulted from the pest eradication program activities through the winter, despite some birds having died through eating poisoned rabbits." 

The global population of the Northern Giant Petrel has been estimated as c. 11 800 annually breeding pairs (click here to access  the ACAP species' account).  Macquarie supported 1793 breeding pairs in 2008, or 15.2% of the global total.

Information on the Macquarie pest eradication programme can be found by searching on "Macquarie Island" for earlier news items posted to this web site

 John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 25 September 2010