Multi-colony tracking reveals potential threats to little auks wintering in the North Atlantic from marine pollution and shrinking sea-ice cover

• Published in: Diversity and Distributions
• Main Authors: Fort, Jérôme, Moe, Børge, Strøm, Hallvard, Grémillet, David, Welcker, Jorg, Schultner, Jannik, Jerstad, Kurt, Johansen, Kasper, Phillips, Richard A., Mosbech, Anders
• Other Authors: Aarhus University Aarhus, Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA), Norwegian Polar Institute, Centre d’Ecologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive (CEFE), Université Paul-Valéry - Montpellier 3 (UPVM)-Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA)-Centre international d'études supérieures en sciences agronomiques (Montpellier SupAgro)-École Pratique des Hautes Études (EPHE), Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université Paris Sciences et Lettres (PSL)-Université de Montpellier (UM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD France-Sud )-Institut national d’études supérieures agronomiques de Montpellier (Montpellier SupAgro), DST-NRF Centre of Excellence at the Percy FitzPatrick Institute, University of Cape Town, Department of Biology Trondheim (IBI NTNU), Norwegian University of Science and Technology Trondheim (NTNU), Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU)-Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), British Antarctic Survey (BAS), Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), Arctic Research Centre
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2013
• Subjects: Alle alle; conservation biogeography; geolocators; non-breeding distribution; oil pollution; seabird; [SDE.BE]Environmental Sciences/Biodiversity and Ecology; [SDV.BID]Life Sciences [q-bio]/Biodiversity; [SDV.EE]Life Sciences [q-bio]/Ecology; environment; Arctic; Greenland; Greenland Sea; little auk; Newfoundland; North Atlantic; Sea ice
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-01099553; https://hal.science/hal-01099553/document; https://hal.science/hal-01099553/file/Fort%20et%20al.%20DDI%202013.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1111/ddi.12105

International audience Aim. Extensive development of human activities in combination with ocean warming are rapidly modifying marine habitats in the Arctic and North Atlantic regions. In order to understand the potential impacts on marine biodiversity, there is an urgent need to determine distributions and habitat preferences of potentially vulnerable species, and to identify sensitive hotspots that might require particular protection. Our aims were to track one of the most abundant seabirds of the world, the little auk (Alle alle) to provide a large, meta-population scale overview of its non-breeding distribution, and to document potential threats to this species from human activities and other environmental changes.Location. Arctic North Atlantic.Methods. Using light-level geolocators, we investigated the 2010/11 non-breeding distribution of 65 little auks from four major colonies distributed throughout the Arctic North Atlantic. Bird distribution during the moulting, wintering and pre-breeding periods was compared with (1) the extent of the marginal ice zone and (2) the areas covered by the main shipping lanes, and oil and gas activity licences.Results. We identify several hotspots for this species, including two key areas located in the Greenland Sea and off Newfoundland. Crucially, we show that some of these hotspots overlap extensively with areas of intensive human activities, including oil and gas extraction and shipping. As little auks, which spend the major part of their time on the sea surface, are extremely vulnerable to marine pollution, our results emphasize the risk associated with the projected expansion of these activities. Main conclusions. We conclude that management of further human enterprises in the Arctic needs to be based on more thorough risk assessment, requiring a substantial improvement in our knowledge of the distribution of sensitive species.