Abstract
BackgroundKelp Gulls Larus dominicanus are one of the most abundant gulls in the Southern Hemisphere and can play an important role in their ecosystem. Understanding their foraging ecology is therefore important, especially in the context of anthropogenic changes of the environment. Over 35,000 Kelp Gulls breed in South Africa but little is known about their habitat use. It has been hypothesised that foraging mainly occurs in natural habitats while provisioning chicks to ensure high quality food, but knowledge on their foraging ecology during the incubation period remains poor.MethodsWe tracked incubating Kelp Gulls from six colonies distributed along the coast of South Africa, varying in their distance to urban areas and landfills, and compared foraging trip patterns and habitat selection between colonies.ResultsGulls from west coast colonies, generally located further from landfills than the other studied colonies, travelled farther from their breeding sites (11.7 ± 9.9–17.8 ± 21.7 km, n = 3 colonies) than birds from Cape Town and south and east coast colonies (1.7 ± 0.8–3.1 ± 3.7 km, n = 3) with birds travelling farthest when foraging at sea. Gulls from all colonies spent more time foraging in marine, coastal, and natural terrestrial environments than scavenging in strongly modified habitats while incubating.ConclusionsOur results suggest that Kelp Gulls in South Africa are able to exploit various resources from different foraging habitats, regardless of colony location and seem to rely less on anthropogenic habitats than expected.
Highlights
Kelp Gulls Larus dominicanus are one of the most abundant gulls in the Southern Hemisphere and can play an important role in their ecosystem
We showed that like other Larus gulls, this opportunistic seabird is capable of foraging in various habitats, regardless of the proximity of their colony to urban areas or landfills
Additional information on Kelp Gull diet from stomach and pellet samples would be necessary to understand the energetic consequence of feeding in different habitats
Summary
Kelp Gulls Larus dominicanus are one of the most abundant gulls in the Southern Hemisphere and can play an important role in their ecosystem. More specialised species with more sensitive requirements tend to be limited in their capacities to adapt to Seabirds are threatened by global changes with 28% of seabirds being categorised as either critically endangered, endangered or vulnerable [5]. As seabirds use both marine and terrestrial habitats ([5, 6]), threats include overfishing inducing depletion of their prey, bycatch in fisheries, pollution, introduced species in their breeding sites, anthropogenic disturbance, and habitat loss [5]. Opportunistic and scavenging species are generally advantaged and some of their populations are growing exponentially in several parts of the world (2020) 8:36
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