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Behavioural inertia places a top marine predator at risk from environmental change in the Benguela upwelling system

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Abstract

In variable environments, organisms are bound to track environmental changes if they are to survive. Most marine mammals and seabirds are colonial, central-place foragers with long-term breeding-site fidelity. When confronted with environmental change, such species are potentially constrained in their ability to respond to these changes. For example, if environmental conditions deteriorate within their limited foraging range, long-lived species favour adult survival and abandon their current breeding effort, which ultimately influences population dynamics. Should poor conditions persist over several seasons, breeding-site fidelity may force animals to continue breeding in low-quality habitats instead of emigrating towards more profitable grounds. We assessed the behavioural response of a site-faithful central-place forager, the Cape gannet Morus capensis, endemic to the Benguela upwelling system, to a rapid shift in the distribution and abundance of its preferred prey, small pelagic shoaling fish. We studied the distribution and the abundance of prey species, and the diet, foraging distribution, foraging effort, energy requirements, and breeding success of gannets at Malgas Island (South Africa) over four consecutive breeding seasons. Facing a rapid depletion of preferred food within their foraging range, Cape gannets initially increased their foraging effort in search of their natural prey. However, as pelagic fish became progressively scarcer, breeding birds resorted to scavenging readily available discards from a nearby demersal fishery. Their chicks cannot survive on such a diet, and during our 4-year study, numbers of breeding birds at the colony decreased by 40% and breeding success of the remaining birds was very low. Such behavioural inflexibility caused numbers of Cape gannets breeding in Namibia to crash by 95% following over-fishing of pelagic fish in the 1970s. In the context of rapid environmental changes, breeding-site fidelity of long-lived species may increase the risk of local or even global extinction, rendering these species particularly vulnerable to global change.

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Acknowledgments

This study was funded by a studentship of the French Ministry of Research to LP, by the Centre National de la Recherche National via an ACI jeunes chercheuses et jeunes chercheurs to DG and by the DEPE-IPHC-CNRS. We thank South African National Parks for granting access to protected areas and the University of Cape Town for transport and logistic support. Marine and Coastal Management kindly provided logistical support in the field. We warmly thank P·H.R. Hockey, C. Gilbert and M. Enstipp and three anonymous referee for scientific input, and R. Navarro, J.P. Robin, L. Phiegeland, L. Drapeau, T. Fairweather, J. Coetzee, S. Lewis, G. Dell’Omo, S. Sari, J. Fort and R. Mullers for essential help in gathering and analysing the data.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, DEPE-IPHC, 23 rue Becquerel, 67087, Strasbourg, France

    Lorien Pichegru

  2. DST/NRF Centre of Excellence at the Percy FitzPatrick Institute of African Ornithology, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, 7701, South Africa

    Lorien Pichegru, Peter G. Ryan & David Grémillet

  3. Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, Marine and Coastal Management, Private Bag X2, Rogge Bay, 8012, South Africa

    Robert J. M. Crawford

  4. Marine Research Institute, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, 7701, South Africa

    Robert J. M. Crawford

  5. Marine Research Institute, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, 7701, South Africa

    Carl D. van der Lingen

  6. Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, CEFE-UMR 5175, 1919 Route de Mende, 34293, Montpellier cedex 5, France

    David Grémillet

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  1. Lorien Pichegru
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  2. Peter G. Ryan
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  4. Carl D. van der Lingen
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Correspondence to Lorien Pichegru.

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Communicated by S. Garthe.

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Pichegru, L., Ryan, P.G., Crawford, R.J.M. et al. Behavioural inertia places a top marine predator at risk from environmental change in the Benguela upwelling system. Mar Biol 157, 537–544 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00227-009-1339-2

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