Seabirds face a wide variety of threats

09.03.2012 [15:44]
Print
A⁺ A^-

Baku, March 9 (AZERTAC). Seabirds, particularly albatrosses, are becoming increasingly threatened and at a faster rate globally than all other species-groups of birds; they face a wide variety of threats.

Many declines are closely linked to the expansion of commercial longline fisheries in seabird feeding areas, combined with the impacts of invasive alien species at nesting colonies.

The world’s oceans are open and dynamic systems that pose few physical barriers to the dispersal and migration of many seabirds: seas are not separated as are the continents. Seabird conservation issues need therefore to be addressed globally, which led BirdLife International to establish a Global Seabird Conservation Programme in 1997.

Dying at a rate of around one every five minutes, the albatross family is becoming threatened faster than any other family of birds. Eighteen of the 22 species of albatross are globally threatened with extinction, an increase from just seven in 1994.

Albatrosses are being killed in such vast numbers that they can't breed fast enough to keep up, putting them in real danger of extinction.

Without help, losses could become so great that recovery may never be possible for these majestic ocean wanderers.

Seabirds face a wide variety of threats

FEEDBACK

Other news in this section