Abstract
We censused three colonies of Northern Fulmars (Fulmarus glacialis) along eastern Baffin Island, Canada, that were estimated to support 155 000 breeding pairs in 1973, but had not been adequately counted since then. The colonies were surveyed in July and August 2018 using photographs taken from a helicopter or a drone. The combined estimated colony sizes were 36 500 pairs, much smaller than historical estimates. Although the 1973 estimates were coarse, this difference represents an apparent 3+% annual decline in numbers at each colony over approximately four decades or more than 87% over three generations (66 years). Several factors may be contributing to these declines, including changes in winter food supplies and the susceptibility of fulmars to fisheries bycatch. We recommend efforts to survey the remaining major fulmar colonies in Arctic Canada to assess the overall population size and trends, and allow for further analyses of potential population drivers.
Highlights
The Canadian Arctic supports millions of breeding seabirds annually (Gaston et al, 2012); most birds are found principally near a few, typically large colonies during the summer months (Mallory et al, 2019)
From one fulmar monitoring study reported in Gaston et al (2006), breeding pairs were calculated as 0.66 of total individuals, so here we report a range of estimated breeding pairs, calculated as 0.5 times the total count, up to 0.66 times our seasonally corrected counts of birds
Consistent with our expectation of overall reduced populations based on anecdotal information from communities and researchers, fulmar numbers at Buchan Gulf and Scott Inlet were markedly lower than published previously (Table 1)
Summary
The Canadian Arctic supports millions of breeding seabirds annually (Gaston et al, 2012); most birds are found principally near a few, typically large colonies during the summer months (Mallory et al, 2019). Assessing responses of seabird populations to environmental stressors typically requires that we determine changes in breeding numbers (Gaston et al, 2009; Paleczny et al, 2015). Counting the numbers of Arctic-nesting seabirds in Canada has been challenging (Gaston et al, 2012), primarily because of the remote locations, limited infrastructure, and inherent high costs of accessing sites (Mallory et al, 2018). The result is that some large colonies have only been counted once or twice, which precludes any reliable assessment of trends
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