"Down
the years, in some parts of the world, albatrosses and people have had
a hard time living together. Albatrosses have been shot and clubbed to
near-extinction for feathers and meat, they've been fire-bombed and
bulldozed to make way for airfields and the waters they feed from have
been so polluted by industrial waste that vast numbers of chicks have
died from junk fed to them by their parents.
That they've survived at all is a credit to their powers of
regeneration, but the newest threat - death by drowning in long-line
fisheries - is relentless and outcomes could be different if mortality
rates remain unchecked."
Dr Graham Robertson,
Senior Research Scientist, Australian Antarctic Division, excerpt from
"Trying to Get Albatrosses off the Hook", Geo Australia, Volume 23,
Number 2, June to August 2001.
Many species of
albatross and petrels are declining at an alarming rate and long-line
fishing is almost certainly the cause. The problem is very serious.
For example:
• Every year from Falkland Islands colonies an estimated 17,000
black-browed albatrosses - about two birds per hour - die at sea, most
likely while interacting with long-line fisheries.
•
Since the 1960s wandering albatrosses have decreased at about 1% each
year and since the 1970s grey-headed albatrosses have decreased at
about 2% per year and black-browed albatrosses at about 4%.
• In the last 15 years on South Georgia, black-browed and grey-headed albatrosses have decreased by about 30%.
This mortality rate is totally unsustainable.
Mortality is not evenly spread across genders and age groups. It is
usually females and juveniles that are most affected. This skews sex
ratios, reduces the capacity for populations to replace lost birds and
slows population recovery.
In addition, albatrosses
breed slowly. A wandering albatross matures at around 12 years of age
and mates for life. They lay only a single egg at each breeding
attempt. Grey-headed albatross only breed every second year.
It's not hard to see that urgent action is needed if the albatross is to survive even the next 20 years.