A Bird’s Eye View of Discard Reforms: Bird-Borne Cameras Reveal Seabird/Fishery Interactions

Commercial capture fisheries produce huge quantities of offal, as well as undersized and unwanted catch in the form of discards. Declines in global catches and legislation to ban discarding will significantly reduce discards, but this subsidy supports a large scavenger community. Understanding the potential impact of declining discards for scavengers should feature in an eco-system based approach to fisheries management, but requires greater knowledge of scavenger/fishery interactions. Here we use bird-borne cameras, in tandem with GPS loggers, to provide a unique view of seabird/fishery interactions. 20,643 digital images (one min 21) from ten bird-borne cameras deployed on central place northern gannets Morus bassanus revealed that all birds photographed fishing vessels. These were large (>15 m) boats, with no small-scale vessels. Virtually all vessels were trawlers, and gannets were almost always accompanied by other scavenging birds. All individuals exhibited an Area-Restricted Search (ARS) during foraging, but only 42% of ARS were associated with fishing vessels, indicating much 'natural' foraging. The proportion of ARS behaviours associated with fishing boats were higher for males (81%) than females (30%), although the reasons for this are currently unclear. Our study illustrates that fisheries form a very important component of the prey-landscape for foraging gannets and that a discard ban, such as that proposed under reforms of the EU Common Fisheries Policy, may have a significant impact on gannet behaviour, particularly males. However, a continued reliance on 'natural' foraging suggests the ability to switch away from scavenging, but only if there is sufficient food to meet their needs in the absence of a discard subsidy.

Picoeukaryote distribution in relation to nitrate uptake in the oceanic nitracline

We investigated the relationship between picoeukaryote phytoplankton (< 2 mu m) and the deep layer of new production (NO3- uptake) in the nitracline of the eastern subtropical North Atlantic Ocean. Indices of NO3- uptake kinetics obtained within the lower 15 % of the euphotic zone demonstrate that subsurface NO3- uptake maxima are coincident with localised peaks in maximum uptake rates (V-max) and, crucially, with maximum picoeukaryote abundance. The mean rate of NO3- utilization at the nitracline is typically 10-fold higher than in surface waters despite much lower in situ irradiance. These observations confirm a high affinity for NO3-, most likely by the resident picoeukaryote community, and we conservatively estimate mean cellular uptake rates of between 0.27 and 1.96 fmol NO3- cell(-1) h(-1). Greater scrutiny of the taxonomic composition of the picoeukaryote group is required to further understand this deep layer of new production and its importance for nitrogen cycling and export production, given longstanding assumptions that picoplankton do not contribute directly to export fluxes.