Fwd: Struggling seabirds

[Arthur H. Kopelman, Ph.D.]

Date: Wed, 04 Apr 2007 18:09:42 -0700
From: Adina Abeles <abe...@stanford.edu>
Subject: Fwd: Struggling seabirds
To: kope...@optonline.net
X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.752.2)
Original-recipient: rfc822;kope...@optonline.net



Begin forwarded message:

From: "Connie Murtagh" <sea...@seaweb.org>
Date: April 3, 2007 4:36:25 AM PDT
To: <alls...@seaweb.org >
Subject: Struggling seabirds

Copyright 2007 San Francisco Chronicle
All Rights Reserved
THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE (California)

April 3, 2007 Tuesday
FINAL Edition

SECTION: BAY AREA; Pg. D1

LENGTH: 961 words

HEADLINE: CALIFORNIA;
Struggling seabirds;
Dead murres, auklets washing ashore with little in their stomachs

BYLINE: Glen Martin, Chronicle Environment Writer

BODY:

West Coast seabirds are dying, apparently from a lack of food -- and some
researchers think the phenomenon may be linked to global climate change.

This is the third year that scientists have found unusually large numbers of
marine birds -- mainly common murres, but also rhinoceros auklets and tufted
puffins -- washed up on beaches in California, Oregon and Washington. In 2005,
the first year of the phenomenon, large numbers of Cassin's auklets also died.

Hannah Nevins, the coordinator for Moss Landing Marine Laboratories beach
survey program, said 253 dead murres were recovered on 11 Monterey Bay beaches
during the first week of March. During the past nine years, an average of nine
dead birds were collected on the same beaches during the same week, she said.

About 180,000 breeding murres live along the West Coast, so it is unlikely
the recent spate of deaths is enough to drastically harm the overall population.

"But if this continues for multiple years, then we could have real problems,"
Nevins said.

Most of the casualties were young birds that had just gone through their
first winter.

"They were all in poor condition, and generally had empty stomachs," she
said. "Either they were not finding food, or they were unable to capture the
food they did find."

Bill Sydeman, the director of marine ecology at PRBO Conservation Science, a
Bay Area group that specializes in avian research, said the deaths are worrisome
because it now appears they are not isolated events. In the two past years, the
winter deaths were followed by less successful breeding at the Farallon Islands,
one of the West Coast's most productive seabird rookeries, he said.

"I would not be surprised to see the same thing this year," Sydeman said.

Sydeman said the trend appears to be linked to changes in the California
Current -- a vast oceanic stream that delivers cold, nutrient-rich water from
the Gulf of Alaska to the continental West Coast. Plankton thrives in this
water, forming the basis of a food web that sustains everything from small fish
to whales.

Fluctuations in the current in recent years appear to have resulted in
regions of warmer water that support less plankton, Sydeman said. That can also
reduce upwelling, a seasonal phenomenon that results in the replacement of
warmer water along the Pacific Coast with cold, nutrient-laden offshore water.

Yet Howard Freeland, a research scientist with the Institute of Ocean
Sciences in Sidney, British Columbia, said the California Current generally has
remained strong during the past two years, though he said there have been some
fluctuations.

But Julia Parrish, an associate professor in the school of aquatic and
fisheries science at the University of Washington, said the North Pacific Ocean
appears to be in major flux. During the past two years, she said, offshore
upwelling did not begin off the continental Pacific Coast until summer, two
months later than usual.

That was bad news for the birds because the warm water provided them little
food during the height of the breeding season, Parrish said.

The once generally predictable North Pacific currents, she said, are
"swinging like a pendulum." For example, in summer 2006, an unexpected "super
upwelling" happened off the Oregon coast, sucking in vast quantities of abyssal
water that was so low in oxygen that a temporary dead zone formed along the
coast.

In typical years, said Parrish, very few horned puffins -- a bird that breeds
in Alaska and winters offshore as far south as California -- are found dead on
West Coast beaches.

"But during the last three years, we have found tens of them each season,"
she said. "That may not seem like a lot, but it is very significant, considering
past statistics. More of them may be dying, or the currents may be shifting so
that more are washed up on the beach instead of sinking. We don't know - but we
do know things are changing, and that there are casualties."

Sydeman said the anomalies could be linked to global climate change.

"What's clear is that during the past decade, there's much more variability
out there than there was during the preceding 40 years," he said.

"That probably causes some disability in the ecosystem to recover from
human-caused impacts such as pollution, coastal development and fishing," he
said.

------------------

Affected populations

For the third year in a row, large numbers of seabirds are dying off the
California coast --

probably due to starvation. Scientists think fluctuating currents in the
North Pacific are delaying or weakening the influx of cold, nutrient-rich water
to the coastal areas of the western continental United States, resulting in less
zooplankton and fewer small fish, the staple of marine birds.

Common murre: Duck-size, penguin-like birds that nest on rocky ledges along
the California coast. They consume small fish and krill, and have suffered from
population declines even before the recent die-offs.

Cassin's auklet: A small seabird that feeds heavily on krill and nests in
burrows or crevices. They breed from Alaska to Baja, including the Farallones.
Although these birds had a large die-off in 2005, scientists are also worried
about them this year.

Rhinoceros auklet: Larger than the Cassin's auklet and smaller than the
common murre, this bird is distinctive for a small "horn" on its bill. It eats
krill and small fish and breeds largely in Alaska and northern British Columbia,
though some are found year-round in Washington, Oregon and California.

Horned puffin: A distinctively marked bird that generally stays out to sea,
the horned puffin subsists on small fish. Dead puffins seldom wash up on
beaches; recent discoveries of horned puffin carcasses in Oregon have led to
worries that mortality for the species may be increasing.

Source: Chronicle research

GRAPHIC: PHOTO (3)
(1) Common murres have been washing ashore along the West Coast recently; 253
were recovered on 11 Monterey Bay beaches during the first week of March, while
the average for the week for the past nine years has been nine. / Lance Iversen
/ The Chronicle, (2) Tufted puffins such as this one are among the birds that
have been found dead recently. / Roy W. Lowe / Oregon Coast National Wildlife
Refuge Complex, 1982, (3) Field biology intern Heather Lapin holds a rhinoceros
auklet at the Farallones National Wildlife Refuge. / Kat Wade / The Chronicle,
2005

LOAD-DATE: April 3, 2007

Arthur H. Kopelman, Ph. D.
kope...@optonline.net
(all e-mails scanned for viruses before sending)

"When the last individual of a race of living things breathes no more,
another heaven and another earth must pass before such a one be again."
                                            William Beebe

[Les Chibana]

This is one of the very few times that I've seen or heard reference
to the recent dead zone formations off the Oregon coast. I don't
recall where I first saw it mentioned (maybe on a forum like this),
but I do recall that it was written up in an issue of National
Geographic, if memory serves, between 2000-2004. The reasons for the
event were not known at the time. Is the explanation given by Julia
Parrish in the posted article the current conventional wisdom?
(Pardon the pun). I suppose there's no way to know if this is part of
a broad cycle?

Les Chibana
Volcano, HI

On Apr 5, 2007, at 2:12 AM, Arthur H. Kopelman, Ph.D. wrote:

>> Date: Wed, 04 Apr 2007 18:09:42 -0700
>> From: Adina Abeles <abe...@stanford.edu>
>> Subject: Fwd: Struggling seabirds
>>>

>>> Copyright 2007 San Francisco Chronicle
>>> All Rights Reserved
>>> THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE (California)
>>>
>>> April 3, 2007 Tuesday

[snip]

>>> But Julia Parrish, an associate professor in the school of
>>> aquatic and
>>> fisheries science at the University of Washington, said the North
>>> Pacific Ocean
>>> appears to be in major flux. During the past two years, she said,
>>> offshore
>>> upwelling did not begin off the continental Pacific Coast until
>>> summer, two
>>> months later than usual.
>>>
>>> That was bad news for the birds because the warm water provided
>>> them little
>>> food during the height of the breeding season, Parrish said.
>>>
>>> The once generally predictable North Pacific currents, she said, are
>>> "swinging like a pendulum." For example, in summer 2006, an
>>> unexpected "super
>>> upwelling" happened off the Oregon coast, sucking in vast
>>> quantities of abyssal
>>> water that was so low in oxygen that a temporary dead zone formed
>>> along the
>>> coast.

[snip]