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June 3rd 2008

Fishermen help protect Indian Ocean albatrosses

This week, the organization responsible for managing tuna in the Indian Ocean, the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission, adopted a measure that will greatly benefit the magnificent seabirds that inhabit the same waters.

All longline vessels fishing for tuna and swordfish in the southern Indian Ocean will now be required to use a combination of measures to reduce the accidental capture of albatrosses and petrels.

Longlining is a fishing method that involves a single line, measuring up to 130 kilometers long and with thousands of baited hooks, being pulled behind a boat. As albatrosses and petrels scavenge in the ocean, they try to eat the bait from the line as it is set behind the boat, but instead swallow the hooks and are dragged under and drowned. This is the greatest threat many seabirds face today, with an albatross dying in this manner once every five minutes.

Measures to reduce the chance of seabird by-catch include boats setting their hooks at night when the birds are less active; using a line of plastic streamers to scare birds away from the hooks; adding weight to lines to make them sink more quickly out of reach of the albatrosses; and dyeing bait blue to make it less visible. It will now be compulsory for longline tuna and swordfish fisheries in the southern Indian Ocean to use at least two of these measures

Some of the birds that will benefit from this new policy include:

image: Amsterdam albatross sitting on nest

The new measures will be incredibly important for the Amsterdam albatross, as very few breeding pairs of this Critically Endangered bird remain. It breeds on a single island in the southern Indian Ocean, where feral cattle are destroying their breeding habitat and they are vulnerable to predation by feral cats.

The shy albatross spends most of its life at sea, soaring on strong winds, resting on the water’s surface, or plucking fish, squid and crustaceans from the ocean. Although less threatened than closely related seabirds, numbers of the shy albatross are still declining as a result of longline fishing.

image: Black-browed albatross displaying.

Albatrosses are amongst the longest-lived birds in the world, and the black-browed albatross can continue to breed until an age of 35 years. Each September, these oceanic birds return to the same spot on an island in the southern oceans to lay a single egg, which will be carefully incubated for two months.

image: Pair of wandering albatross in courtship display, with wings fully extended.

Like all albatrosses, the wandering albatross, which has the largest recorded wingspan of any bird, mates for life. It breeds on a number of islands just north of the Antarctic Circle and both the male and female will feed the chick, which remains on the nest for around nine months after hatching.

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