Surfbirds News

The Gough bunting and Tristan albatross are both restricted to Gough Island in the South Atlantic and now face a very high chance of extinction in the wild following predation by introduced house mice and, in the case of the albatross, long-line fishing too. The island also supports another five bird species facing a high or very high risk of global extinction.

Gough Island, which is smaller than Guernsey and a UK World Heritage Site, is part of the Tristan da Cunha group, a UK Overseas Territory. The house mice, which were accidentally released on the island in the nineteenth century, are predators on both the buntings and the albatross’s chicks and literally eat them alive. The rodents also compete with the buntings for food.

Dr Geoff Hilton is an RSPB scientist who has been researching conservation problems on the UK Overseas Territories for some time. He said: “In the presence of house mice, the albatross and the bunting have no chance of survival. Things are getting worse and the only hope for these threatened birds is complete eradication of the mice.”

The Overseas Territories Environment Programme – a joint programme of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International Development – has paid for a provisional study which suggests that the mice could be eradicated by dropping poison bait from helicopters. Other governments are already funding full rodent eradication programmes on much larger islands.

Dr Geoff Hilton added: “The feasibility study shows there is a glimmer of light showing that we might be able to fix this problem. The UK government has supported us in discovering the problem, in conducting the feasibility study, and now in finalizing our plan for the mouse eradication.

“The big question is whether they will take their international commitments seriously and do what the governments of New Zealand and Australia have done, and provide the big money needed to actually do the mouse eradication. If they don’t, we won’t be able to give two critically threatened species the lifeline they need.

“The world’s greatest seabird island is being eaten alive, as the mice are likely to be affecting the fortunes of many seabirds on the island. Without help Gough Island will be likely to lose the majority of seabirds, not just those that are confined to the island.”

Gough Island, which has been described as the most important seabird colony in the world, supports millions of pairs of seabird of several species. Apart from the Tristan albatross, the island also supports the entire world population of the rapidly declining Atlantic petrel and a good proportion of the newly-described northern rockhopper penguin, both of these species are listed as Endangered in this year’s Red List revision.

The Gough bunting and the Tristan albatross are among 32 species of globally-threatened bird found on the 14 UK’s Overseas Territories.

Dartford Warbler, Cornwall, UK © Kit Day, from the surfbirds galleries.
Now considered to be near-threatened

Today’s revision of the Red List sees the Tristan albatross move up one category from Endangered and the Gough Bunting move up two categories from Vulnerable.

The announcement follows the revision of the Red List which shows that there are now 1,226 species of bird facing global extinction, and 32 of those occur on Overseas Territories belonging to the UK with more than half of these species occurring nowhere else in the world.
Critically Endangered represents the highest category of threat on the Red List and species at this level are deemed to have a very high chance of extinction in the wild. Today’s revision of the Red List shows there are now 1,226 species of bird facing global extinction and 190 of those are Critically Endangered.

The remaining six species that have become Critically Endangered include: the Spoon-billed sandpiper, of Russia; the Tachira antpitta, of Venezuela; the Reunion cuckooshrike, of Reunion, an overseas department of France; the Mariana crow, of Guam and Northern Mariana Islands, an overseas territories of the United States; the Floreana mockingbird, of the Galapagos Island, Ecuador; and the Akekee, of Hawaii, United States.

Six species have been downgraded from the Critically Endangered list:
Gorgeted wood quail, now Endangered
Marquesan Imperial pigeon, now Endangered
Purple-backed sunbeam, now Endangered
Gurney’s pitta, now Endangered
Rondonia bushbird, now Vulnerable
Somali thrush, now Vulnerable
One species, the Guadelupe junco is no longer recognised as a separate species.

Two more of the UK’s regularly nesting birds are heading towards extinction, following today’s global revision of the Red List.

In the latest revision of the ‘Red List’ by BirdLife International, the curlew and the Dartford warbler have been listed as Near Threatened, only one step below those species facing global extinction. Today’s additions swell the numbers of nesting Near Threatened birds in the UK to five; joining the red kite, corncrake and black-tailed godwit on the list of birds facing potential peril.