Stable isotope evidence of diverse species-specific and individual wintering strategies in seabirds

• Published in: Biology Letters
• Main Authors: Cherel, Yves, Phillips, Richard A., Hobson, Keith A., Mc Gill, Rona
• Other Authors: Centre d'Études Biologiques de Chizé (CEBC), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), British Antarctic Survey (BAS), Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), Environment and Climate Change Canada, Scottish Universities Environmental Research Centre (SUERC), University of Glasgow-University of Edinburgh
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2006
• Subjects: moulting period; individual specialization; procellariiform seabird; Southern Ocean; Antarctica; [SDE.BE]Environmental Sciences/Biodiversity and Ecology; [SDE.ES]Environmental Sciences/Environmental and Society; Antarctic; Kerguelen; Antarc*; Pachyptila desolata
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-00184875; https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2006.0445

3 pages International audience Although there is increasing evidence that climatic variations during the non-breeding season shape population dynamics of seabirds, most aspects of their winter distribution and ecology remain essentially unknown. We used stable isotope signatures in feathers to infer and compare the moulting (wintering) habitat of subantarctic petrels breeding at two distant localities (South Georgia and Kerguelen). Petrels showed species-specific wintering habitat preferences, with a similar pattern of latitudinal segregation for all but one taxon. At both localities, d13C values indicated that blue petrels (Halobaena caerulea) moult in Antarctic waters, South Georgian diving petrels (Pelecanoides georgicus) in the vicinity of the archipelagos and/or in the Polar Frontal Zone and Antarctic prions (Pachyptila desolata) in warmer waters. In contrast, common diving petrels (Pelecanoides urinatrix) showed divergent strategies, with low and high intrapopulation variation at South Georgia and Kerguelen, respectively. Birds from Kerguelen dispersed over a much wider range of habitats, from coastal to oceanic waters and from Antarctica to the subtropics, whereas those from South Georgia wintered mainly in waters around the archipelago. This study is the first to show such striking between-population heterogeneity in individual wintering strategies, which could have important implications for likely demographic responses to environmental perturbation.