Protect Our Petrels
Research
Take a read of some snippets of research being undertaken at various institutes to help protect, conserve and understand threats to seabirds in he Auckland region.
Why did they die?
Many petrels and shearwaters are brought into BirdCare Aotearoa. Sadly many of them did not survive from their injuries.
Agustina Dominguez, Ariel-Micaiah Heswall and Brian Wijaya researched as to why these seabirds died and if the brain injuries correlated with collisions with buildings due to anthropgenic structures.
Seabird bycatch is correlated with sensory features
Many seabirds are caught in fishing gear every year, yet some seabirds have a higher bycatch number than other seabird species.
Ariel-Micaiah Heswall found that the seabird species with a higher bycatch number also had larger sensory features. Therefore seabirds with greater sensory capability were more likely to be able to detect the sights and smell s of the fishing vessels and become caught.