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Land and sea-based observations and first satellite tracking results support a New Ireland breeding site for the Critically Endangered Beck’s Petrel Pseudobulweria beckii

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 May 2019

MATT J. RAYNER ,
KAREN A. BAIRD ,
JEREMY BIRD ,
STEVE CRANWELL ,
ANDRĒ F. RAINE ,
BERNARD MAUL ,
JULY KURI ,
JINGJING ZHANG  and
CHRIS P. GASKIN
MATT J. RAYNER*
Affiliation:
Auckland Museum, Private Bag 92018, Auckland 1141, New Zealand, and School of Biological Sciences, University of Auckland, 3A Symonds Street, Auckland, PB92019, New Zealand.
KAREN A. BAIRD
Affiliation:
Royal Forest & Bird Protection Society of New Zealand, 205 Victoria Street, Wellington, New Zealand.
JEREMY BIRD
Affiliation:
Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Science, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland4072, Australia.
STEVE CRANWELL
Affiliation:
BirdLife International, Pacific Secretariat, 10 MacGregor Road, GPO Box18332, Suva. Fiji.
ANDRĒ F. RAINE
Affiliation:
Kaua’i Endangered Seabird Recovery Project, PO Box 81, Hanapepe96716, HI, USA.
BERNARD MAUL
Affiliation:
Wildlife Conservation Society. Kavieng, New Ireland Province, Papua New Guinea.
JULY KURI
Affiliation:
Wildlife Conservation Society. Kavieng, New Ireland Province, Papua New Guinea.
JINGJING ZHANG
Affiliation:
National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, Wellington, New Zealand.
CHRIS P. GASKIN
Affiliation:
Northern New Zealand Seabird Charitable Trust, 400 Leigh Road, RD5, Warkworth0985, New Zealand.
*
*Author for correspondence; e-mail: mrayner@aucklandmuseum.com
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Summary

The Beck’s Petrel Pseudobulweria beckii is a ‘Critically Endangered’ seabird whose breeding sites remain unknown. Historic observations suggest the species’ distribution is concentrated in the Bismarck Archipelago and particularly southern New Ireland. Over the course of two research expeditions in 2016 and 2017 we used on-land and at-sea observations, local interviews and satellite telemetry to understand the distribution of the species, its at-sea movements and potential breeding locations. Land-based and at-sea observations indicated that the area of Silur Bay in southern New Ireland was a significant site for Beck’s Petrel with numbers of birds increasing near shore prior to dusk and birds observed in spotlights over land. A local population is estimated to be in the low thousands. In 2017 a single Beck’s was captured at sea, fitted with a satellite transmitter and tracked for eight months. This bird maintained a core distribution off the south-east coast of New Ireland and north of Bougainville for 122 days. During the tracking period, the bird was located over land at night seven times; predominantly over southern New Ireland, where the signal was also lost for extended periods suggesting occupancy of an underground burrow. In August the bird migrated 1,400 km to a core pelagic habitat north of West Papua before the signal was eventually lost. Our combination of land- and sea-based observations and analysis of behaviour from satellite tracking supports the conclusion that a breeding site for Beck’s Petrel lies in the inland mountains of southern New Ireland and most likely in the high-altitude zone (> 2000 m) of the Hans Meyer Range. Further investigations are required to determine the exact location of breeding colonies in the mountains of southern New Ireland and the importance of a potential west Papuan non-breeding pelagic habitat for the species.

Type
Research Article
Information
Bird Conservation International , Volume 30 , Issue 1 , March 2020 , pp. 58 - 74
Copyright
Copyright © BirdLife International 2019 

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