There ain't nuffin' like a puffin

[sbisson]

Puffins have started breeding on Lundy again. The first chick since 1972 has been spotted...

The RSPB estimates it will take about 10 to 15 years to get the birds back to big numbers, but it says the sighting of the chick means the first steps of the process have been taken to secure the long-term future of puffins on Lundy.

After a massive population decline, various conservation bodies collaborated to help give one of the few UK breeding sites for the brightly coloured little birds a new future. With predation a major problem - rats were eating the young and the eggs - eradication was the only solution. No rats have been seen for over a year now, and the puffins have started to return - and breed.

Comments

[quercus.livejournal.com]

With predation a major problem

If you believe that rat predation _was_ the problem.

[sbisson.livejournal.com]

Well, there does seem to be some sort of link when you compare similar puffin breeding sites. Certainly rat-free Burhou has a flourishing population, and is in a very similar climatic and habitat situation. Ditto similar islands off Newfoundland.

[quercus.livejournal.com]

Sand eel fisheries are a far more likely problem for puffins than the rats. Look at Scotland's similar decline (fished). The Lundy rat cull was quite poor at finding rats too - as everyone who knew had already told the RSPB, the majority of the rats (the browns) were down at the South around the village and there was barely a handful of black rats (even rarer than puffins) at the North end, around the puffin burrows.

Also I'm not so sure that Burhou is "flourishing", puffin-wise (but it's _so_ small that random wild variations are to be expected).

[marypcb.livejournal.com]

rats and stoats are a big problem for New Zealand birds; shame for the eradicated rats if it wasn't them - and for the puffins too!

[therealdrhyde.livejournal.com]

Puffins are damned tasty.

[moral-vacuum.livejournal.com]

All Puffins look like Penelope Keith.