Shearwater Wreck

The Short-tailed Shearwater [Puffinus tenuirostris ] or mutton bird, has an amazing yearly migration, leaving our shore in autumn and flying to the waters off Siberia and Alaska before return to Australia in spring. Most of those coming along the beach at Venus Bay are returning to rockeries in Phillip Island, but there is also a big colony at Port Fairy. It is not uncommon for many of the birds to die of exhaustion during the migration, which leads to the phenomenon known as a shearwater wreck, where large numbers of dead birds are washed up on the beach.

A CALL FOR INFORMATION
The wreck of Short-tailed Shearwaters appears particularly abundant along the Australian coast this spring. The number of dead shearwaters lining the beaches seems to be higher and more widespread across the Australian coast, but unless we collect data and do this consistently, this is only an observation. With shearwaters representing the most globally abundant avian species, it becomes important to understand just how many die each season and what this means to overall numbers.
We would like to make a start toward greater understanding and to learn more about this year’s wreck in particular. It has been suggested that changes in food availability due to the warming of the oceans is taking its toll on these migratory seabirds.
As regular beach visitors, you can play a role in helping us learn more about this issue. Over time we can learn whether mortality rates vary from year to year and if these trends are consistent, and/or linked with any particular climatic events or food availability.
When you next take a walk on a beach (albeit to look for breeding resident shorebirds!), please record: date, time, beach name, location, distance walked (ideally the latitude and longitude of your starting and finishing point), number of dead and dying shearwaters.
Send this information in an email to: atlas@birdlife.org.au marked ‘shearwater wreck’ in the subject line.
…..  from a email request from Grainne Maguire, Birdlife Australia

First Feathers

There where a lots of black feathers on the beach today, but no mutton bird carcasses. This possibly marks the return of the migrating shearwater (mutton birds). Let’s hope not as many perish this year.

Coastal Walk Report

The "Geology Rocks" coastal walk along Pt. Smythe yesterday was enjoyed by around 20 people who took the chance for a guided tour through the different environments and habitats of the area. We got to see much of the local plant and animal life, including bracket fungi (species unknown), the White Elderberry Sambucus gaudichaudian which are bearing their pale fruits.

We also saw a few dead birds washed up onto the beach. There was a Muttonbird Puffinus sp. ,and an Albatross (possibly a juvenile Royal Albatross Diomedea epomophora). They most likely perished as a result of a storm event out at sea.

Thanks to Norm and Bruce for making the tour engaging, informative and fun!

migration mishap

Now is the time of migration for many of the birds that nest along out coast. The shearwater [Puffinus tenuirostris] (more common knownly as the mutton birds) flies in from as far north as the Siberia, the Aleutian Islands and even the Californian coast. Unfortunately this year something happened and the beaches at Venus Bay are littered by hundreds of dead bird. Stormy weather probably isn’t to blame as most bird appear to have only recently died, a period of mild weather and calm seas and light sea fog. Presumably they died of exhaustion from their trip unable to summon the strength to continue to their nesting sites.

In 1798, Mathew Flinders recorded watching an almost continuous line for several hours of shearwater leaving the waters of northern Tasmanian and heading across bass straight on the start of their migration north.  He estimated that there were at least one hundred million birds within a single flock!