The Davoren Lab @ The World Twitter Seabird Conference (3/3)

Our final presenter from the Davoren Lab at the World Twitter Seabird Conference this year was M.Sc. student Lauren Lescure. Read below to see the results of her work investigating how capelin biomass impacts razorbills during the breeding season.

#WSTC7 #ForSesh3 1/4 During the #RAZO breeding season, capelin, an important prey🐟for marine predators, migrates into coastal #NL to spawn, ⬆️food abundance. Due to changing ocean conditions the timing and amount of this food resource has become highly variable @DavorenLab

#WSTC7 #ForSesh3 2/4 We explored how changes in prey biomass, measured through hydroacoustic surveys, influenced RAZO adult/chick body condition from morphometrics, and foraging effort from GPS and TDR deployments, across 3 years with varying capelin biomass #fieldwork

#WSTC7 #ForSesh3 3/4 Capelin biomass was much lower in 2020 than 2017/2019. Once capelin arrived in the study area, foraging trip characteristics were lower in 2017/2019 than 2020. As was also the case in # of dives between 2017/2020. ⬇️in prey⬆️in foraging effort #moveVis

#WSTC7 #ForSesh3 4/4 With⬇️capelin biomass, #RAZO in 2020 had lower adult/chick body condition. Continued variability in prey🐟due to natural and non-natural changes may lead to⬆️foraging effort and⬇️body condition in #seabirds, leading to potential long-term population effects