Fine-scale spatial segregation in a pelagic seabird driven by differential use of tidewater glacier fronts

• Published in: Scientific Reports
• Main Authors: Philip Bertrand, Joël Bêty, Nigel G. Yoccoz, Marie-Josée Fortin, Hallvard Strøm, Harald Steen, Jack Kohler, Stephanie M. Harris, Samantha C. Patrick, Olivier Chastel, P. Blévin, Haakon Hop, Geir Moholdt, Joséphine Maton, Sébastien Descamps
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Nature Portfolio 2021
• Subjects: Medicine; R; Science; Q; Arctic; rissa tridactyla; Tidewater
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-01404-1; https://doaj.org/article/2d8f5bd29a11463cacdb9c81a0e14229

Abstract In colonially breeding marine predators, individual movements and colonial segregation are influenced by seascape characteristics. Tidewater glacier fronts are important features of the Arctic seascape and are often described as foraging hotspots. Albeit their documented importance for wildlife, little is known about their structuring effect on Arctic predator movements and space use. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that tidewater glacier fronts can influence marine bird foraging patterns and drive spatial segregation among adjacent colonies. We analysed movements of black-legged kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla) in a glacial fjord by tracking breeding individuals from five colonies. Although breeding kittiwakes were observed to travel up to ca. 280 km from the colony, individuals were more likely to use glacier fronts located closer to their colony and rarely used glacier fronts located farther away than 18 km. Such variation in the use of glacier fronts created fine-scale spatial segregation among the four closest (ca. 7 km distance on average) kittiwake colonies. Overall, our results support the hypothesis that spatially predictable foraging patches like glacier fronts can have strong structuring effects on predator movements and can modulate the magnitude of intercolonial spatial segregation in central-place foragers.