***** Watch a short video on the loss of East Island here *****

When Hurricane Walaka worked its way across the northern Pacific Ocean in the first few days of October this year it swept over the USA’s French Frigate Shoals (FFS) in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, part of the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument.  No-one was on the island group at the time, following a pre-storm evacuation of seven researchers,  but a satellite photograph taken after theCategory-5 (at its height)  hurricane showed that a storm surge had all but completely washed away East Island, one of the small ( 4.5 ha) sandy islets on the western edge of the shoals – and in the face of the storm.

East Island, French Frigate Shoals, before and after Hurricane Walaka

Both Black-footed Phoebastria nigripes and Laysan P. immutabilis Albatrosses breed (or bred) on East Island.  According to counts made annually from 1997 to 2011 in the French Frigate Shoals by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service rounded averages of c. 1700 Black-footed and c. 300 Laysan pairs bred.  These totals represent roughly 40% of the FFS’s Black-footed Albatross breeding population and about 13% of its Laysan Albatrosses.  The FFS research station closed after being destroyed in a severe storm in December 2012 so there have been no complete albatross nest counts on the FFS in winter since then.

A Black-footed Albatross chick on East Island, photograph courtesy of the United States Fish & Wildlife Service

Nearby Trig Island on the FFS had previously disappeared this year due to high wave activity not attributed to a specific storm (and Whale-Skate Island was lost to erosion during the 1990s). Trig also supported breeding albatross populations but in lower numbers than did East.  The largest island in the FFS, Tern Island, is considered to have lost approximately one third of its surface area during the hurricane, with its vegetation replaced by sand.  The effect on its albatross populations will need assessment once breeding commences.  A post-hurricane visit by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists over 25/26 October to the FFS to collect marine debris and conduct "Rapid Ecological Assessments" reports:

"At Tern Island, storm surge deposited sand and debris across the island, swept away vegetation, caused erosion, and changed habitat conditions. Portions of the island were completely overwashed or inundated by the ocean. Plants such as beach heliotrope (heliotropium foertherianum) were uprooted, burrows of nesting seabirds were flooded, and infrastructure left behind from the island’s days as a U.S. Navy airfield in World War II and a U.S. Coast Guard Long Range Navigation radio station were significantly damaged or destroyed.  Unfortunately, some seabirds were also killed and turtle nests washed away by the storm" (click here).

Fortunately when Walaka hit the FFS no albatrosses had as yet returned to commence their 2018/19 breeding season.  However, this month they have been returning and several thousand birds will find their breeding site has gone.  Future censuses may give an indication whether they have been able to move elsewhere in the French Frigate Shoals.

“This event is confronting biologists with what the future could look like.  With global warming and rising sea levels, atolls around the world will struggle to persist.  The scientific community has long warned that anthropogenic climate change influences extreme weather events.  The loss of this important island is another very real example of that.”

East Island, that was second largest islet in the French Frigate Shoals, was also an important refuge for pupping Hawaiian Monk Seals Neomonachus schauinslandi and egg-laying Green Turtles Chelonia mydas.  A few seals could still be seen on a tiny sandy remnant of the islet visible on the post-hurricane satellite photo.

Read more via the following links:

https://www.papahanaumokuakea.gov/new-news/2018/10/23/ffs-bulletin/?fbclid=IwAR30bprofScew5wterQGOfW4oNpCpOi02VJmNNRqpLMhK_Q1ccGlChqqRgo

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/oct/24/hawaiian-island-erased-by-powerful-hurricane

https://www.civilbeat.org/2018/10/this-remote-hawaiian-island-just-vanished/?fbclid=IwAR2WdqGN86CwhQrGFDIKcB3lGQYI9BpexJVhFmxG660qTQL1tUdWHh15XQg

https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/news/108093462/storm-wipes-hawaiian-island-off-map?fbclid=IwAR18Hc9dWcGgV8poM2ywCQ261uylM8wkWIEYh3k3XNaat5XATreiggYCZv4

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hawaii-east-island-lost-to-hurricane-walaka-french-frigate-shoals-climate-change_us_5bcf2a8ee4b055bc9484e803

With thanks to the United States Fish and Wildlife Service field crews who braved difficult winter boating conditions to count albatrosses each year and to Beth Flint and Ridge Souza, Marine National Monuments of the Pacific, USFWS, Honolulu, Hawaii.

References:

Amerson, A.B. 2012.  The Coral Carrier. French Frigate Shoals, Northwestern Hawaiian Islands: a History.  Dallas: Binion Amerson Books.  262 pp.

 Arata, J.A., Sievert, P.R. & Naughton, M.B. 2009.  Status assessment of Laysan and Black-footed Albatrosses, North Pacific Ocean, 1923-2005.  U.S. Geological Survey Scientific Investigations Report 2009-5131.  80 pp.

John Cooper, ACAP information Officer, 23 November 2018, updated 27 November 2018

“George” and “Geraldine”, a pair of globally Vulnerable Short-tailed Albatrosses Phoebastria albatrus, returned to Sand Island in the USA’s Midway Atoll in the north Pacific on October 24 and October 25 this year, respectively, thereafter reported as spending time together on the island.

Short-tailed Albatross pair (George is on the right) on Midway Atoll, October 2018; photograph by Madalyn Riley, USFWS Volunteer

George is a male who has been visiting Midway Atoll since November 2006.  He hatched from the colony on Japan’s Torishima in 2003 and was banded there as a chick.

“George's partner (Geraldine) has not been positively identified by band number since the two birds first appeared together [on Midway] in November 2016, but it is suspected to be an individual that was banded at Torishima in April 2008 and was first observed on Sand Island in early 2012.  For several years, the subadult was observed on its own in town and elsewhere on the north side of the island. In late 2016 and early 2017, the two birds spent time together in the male’s traditional neighbourhood, where they appeared together last year and again this week.”

Last year, the two birds courted and appeared to start nesting activity but then suddenly appeared on an egg a few meters away. When the egg hatched, we confirmed our suspicions that the pair had usurped a neighboring Black-footed albatross [P. nigripes] nest and then had a young black-footed albatross chick, which they successfully cared for until it fledged in mid-June. Geraldine’s gender has not been confirmed and remains in question until the pair produce[s] an egg of [its] own”.

Read more here and here.

Previously, a pair of Short-tailed Albatrosses has bred successfully three times in four years on Midway's Eastern Island within the atoll, fledging several chicks (click here).

Related news is that the long-standing female-female pair of Short-tailed Albatrosses is back on Kure Atoll – presumably still awaiting a passing male (click here).

Kure Atoll's female-female pair in 2013

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 22 November 2018

During this year’s meeting of the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR XXXVII) ACAP renewed its MoU with CCAMLR.  Outgoing Executive Secretary Marco Favero signed the MoU with the CCAMLR’s Executive Secretary, Dr David Agnew.  The new MoU replaces earlier versions first signed in March 2013.

Drs David Agnew, CCAMLR Executive Secretary and Marco Favero, ACAP Executive Secretary, sign the new MoU between the two organizations on 1 November in CCAMLR's offices

Photograph by the CCAMLR Secretariat

The objective of the MoU is to facilitate cooperation between CCAMLR and ACAP with a view to supporting efforts to minimise the incidental by-catch of albatrosses and petrels listed in Annex 1 of ACAP within the CAMLR Convention Area. In terms of the MoU the two bodies may consult, cooperate and collaborate on areas of common responsibilities that are relevant to the conservation, including the protection and management, of albatrosses and petrels, including:

(i) exchange of experience in the development of systems for collecting and analysing data, and exchanging information concerning the by-catch of albatrosses and petrels in the CAMLR Convention Area;

(ii) exchange of information regarding management approaches relevant to the conservation of albatrosses and petrels;

(iii) implementation of education and awareness programs for fishers who operate in areas where albatrosses and petrels may be encountered;

(iv) exchange of information on the design, testing and implementation of albatross and petrel by-catch mitigation measures relevant to fishing operations in the CAMLR Convention Area;

(v) examining the need for, and development of, training programs on conservation techniques and measures in order to mitigate threats affecting albatrosses and petrels;

(vi) sharing of expertise, techniques and knowledge relevant to the conservation of albatrosses and petrels in the CAMLR Convention Area; [and]

(vii) reciprocal participation with observer status at relevant meetings of the ACAP Parties and CCAMLR, consistent with the requirements of CCAMLR and ACAP concerning observer status.

The new MoU with CCAMLR will remain in place for three years, after which it may be renewed or amended.

ACAP has MoUs or equivalent documents with a total of nine other bodies, five of which are Regional Fishery Management Organizations that work to manage tuna stocks on the High Seas outside national jurisdictions (tRFMOs).  ACAP works closely with these tRFMOs, attending many of their meetings and offering advice on reducing seabird bycatch in the fisheries they manage (click here to access these MoUs).

Regions covered by the five tuna Regional Fishery Management Organizations:

ACAP has a Memorandum of Understanding with all five, as well as with CCAMLR

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 21 November 2018

As in previous years, members of the ACAP Secretariat last month attended as observers annual meetings of the Commission on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) and its Scientific Committee, held last month in Hobart, Australia.

CCAMLR was established by international convention in 1982 with the objective of conserving Antarctic marine life.  This was in response to increasing commercial interest in Antarctic krill resources, a keystone component of the Antarctic ecosystem and a history of over-exploitation of several other marine resources in the Southern Ocean (click here).

A paper presented to the 18th Meeting of the Scientific Committee’s Working Group on Fish Stock Assessment (WG-FSA) by the CCAMLR Secretariat (WG-FSA-18/13 Rev. 1), which met immediately prior to the Scientific Committee, noted that seabird bycatch levels registered during the last season were the lowest on record, a fact welcomed by the ACAP Observer.  This is attributed in part to a significant decrease over the last decade in seabird bycatch observed within France’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) around its sub-Antarctic islands in the southern Indian Ocean.

Dr Marco Favero, ACAP Executive Secretary, presented a paper to the 37th Meeting of the Scientific Committee (SC-CCAMLR-XXXVII) that gave an update on the conservation status, distribution and priorities for albatrosses and petrels within the CCAMLR area.

The paper’s abstract follows:

“Thirteen ACAP species (out of 31 currently listed) are currently showing overall population declines. The population trends of a large proportion of 16 ACAP species with significant distribution in the CCAMLR area are still uncertain or showed declines during the last two decades, and two thirds of the total is listed by the IUCN as threatened. The greatest threat to the ACAP species is incidental mortality in longline and trawl fisheries. CCAMLR has achieved outstanding success in reducing seabird bycatch in the area under its jurisdiction to negligible levels. However, the species distributed in the Convention Area are highly migratory and largely extend their distribution in neighbouring waters, where bycatch is still occurring, both in jurisdictional waters as well as those administrated by RFMOs. Addressing the pervasive threat of fisheries bycatch for species as wide-ranging as albatrosses and petrels requires concerted and collaborative management actions covering both national and international waters. Bycatch of seabirds in adjacent regions may undermine the success that CCAMLR has achieved to date, and the conservation status of those species that breed or forage in the Convention Area is dependent on efforts to minimise bycatch both within the CCAMLR area, and importantly outside of it, both in jurisdictional waters and the high seas.”

In its preliminary report* the Scientific Committee noted ACAP’s paper and stated that it welcomed its ongoing collaboration with the Agreement.  It also thanked the outgoing ACAP Executive Secretary, noting it was his last year in the position.  Ms Christine Bogel, from New Zealand, takes up the role at month end (click here).

References**:

ACAP Secretariat 2018.  Update on the conservation status, distribution and priorities for albatrosses and petrels in the CCAMLR area.  SC-CAMLR-XXXVII/BG/010.  6 pp.

CCAMLR Secretariat 2018.  Summary of incidental mortality associated with fishing activities collected in scientific observer and vessel data during the 2018 season.  WG-FSA-18/13 Rev. 1.  8 pp.

*Reports of CCAMLR Scientific Committee annual meetings are made publicly available online once the text has been adopted by Parties inter-sessionally (click here).

**Papers submitted to CCAMLR meetings, including those to its Scientific Committee and working groups, are password-protected and are thus not publicly available.

John Cooper, ACAP Information Officer, 20 November 2018