Re: Little Penguin deaths

Not an answer as such but the following may be helpful.  This is an abstract of a talk being given at the Aust Bird Study Association Scientific Day to be held Saturday 20 March at Macquarie University, Sydney (see the ABSA website for more details).  A bit far for Frank to travel, perhaps but .....

Foraging ecology of Little Penguins:
where and when they go and what they eat

André Chiaradia

Little Penguins are coastal seabirds, endemic to southern Australia and New Zealand. They are long-living species, faithful to their breeding sites, have bi-parental care and they don't fly! These constraints make them an ideal species for long-term studies. At Phillip Island, the 36 year-old research on Little Penguins is one of the longest seabird study in Australia. As most seabirds, they face environmental problems both on land and at sea. On land, problems are easier to identify and address. At sea, the problems are more difficult to detect and even harder to convince people that there is a problem in the first place – out of the sight out of the mind!

The development and deployment of bio-logging equipment on penguins has provided crucial data on their movements and behaviour at sea. At Phillip Island, we can now reasonably predict where Little Penguins go, when they are likely to go there and more recently which parts of the water column they will visit. We have been conducting a study of the diving behaviour of Little Penguins using time-depth recorders. We found that penguins are using the whole water column when foraging during breeding. This new information contrasts with previous studies on Little Penguins where they were found using only the top layer of the water column. It means that if a prey is present in the foraging area, Little Penguins will be able to feed on them at whatever depth in the shallow waters of Bass Strait.

We are also examining the penguin's food. The diet of Little Penguins have changed dramatically since the massive pilchard mortalities in 1995 and 1998. In the absence of pilchard, a major component in the ecosystem, other species may have increased in abundance, occupying the space (ecological niche) left empty by pilchards. Since then, penguins have been feeding on an alternative prey (red cod, barracouta and warehou) as opposed to the optimum prey (pilchard and anchovy) consumed by penguins previously to the pilchard mortalities. The potential trouble is that the alternative prey is probably one trophic level higher than the optimum prey. As the abundance decreases at power of 10 for each trophic level that goes up, the alternative prey would be less abundance and therefore less reliable than the optimum prey. 

This talk will provide an insight in the interaction between penguins and their food, which can use to help fisheries management and environment conservation, using Phillip Island as a study case.

David Geering
Regent Honeyeater Recovery Coordinator
Department of Environment & Conservation
P.O. Box 2111
Dubbo  NSW  2830
Ph: 02 6883 5335 or Freecall 1800 621 056
Fax: 02 6884 9382



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