{"id":429,"date":"2024-06-11T23:48:58","date_gmt":"2024-06-11T23:48:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/?p=429"},"modified":"2024-06-12T02:41:14","modified_gmt":"2024-06-12T02:41:14","slug":"to-breed-or-not-to-breed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/2024\/06\/11\/to-breed-or-not-to-breed\/","title":{"rendered":"To Breed or Not to Breed"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Yaquina Head Early Season Update, Summer 2024<\/em><\/h1>\n\n\n\n

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It\u2019s the start of another summer on the Oregon Coast and I once again find myself spending most mornings out on rocky headlands for another season of seabird monitoring. Since early May, I\u2019ve been following the breeding activities of murres, cormorants, and gulls at Yaquina Head (Newport) and Pirate Cove (Depoe Bay). As the season begins to take shape, I wanted to share what I’ve been seeing through my spotting scope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Initial signs are mixed, but seemingly point to a year of low to moderate breeding success for most species. Common Murres have been around the two colonies for months by now, yet occupation of nesting sites has so far only been sporadic. I\u2019ve yet again been observing frequent disturbances by up to four bald eagles at a time, which has prevented the murres from regularly settling into the colony and their nest sites (Figure 1). Because of the frequent eagle activity, I\u2019ve rarely had the opportunity to see murres fully occupy all the Yaquina Head subcolonies; my best guess, however, is that the number of murres attending the colony is lower than at this time last year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite regular disturbances, I observed the first few murre eggs at Yaquina Head on June 6th<\/sup>! While these eggs were predated within a few days, this does indicate that murres are willing to attempt breeding and I suspect more eggs will be seen soon. The ability of murres to breed successfully last year, despite heavy eagle disturbance early on, gives me reason to be cautiously hopeful that at least some Yaquina Head murres will manage to fledge chicks this year. Eagle disturbances appears to be fewer and less severe at Pirate Cove, and I’m eager to see how long the first few murre eggs at that colony persist. Despite the challenges imposed by eagles, murres appear motivated to attempt breeding.
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Figure 1. One of several subadult Bald Eagles frequently seen disturbing the seabirds breeding at Yaquina Head, Oregon.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In contrast, Pelagic Cormorants are by and large not attending either the Yaquina Head or Pirate Cove colonies this year. Last summer saw record-high Pelagic Cormorant productivity and each monitored nest fledged an average of 2.8 chicks; however, so far this summer, I\u2019ve only been able to locate a single nest with eggs across our two sites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cormorants, generally \u2013 and Pelagics, in particular \u2013 are known for highly variable reproductive outputs (Figure 2). Some seabirds (e.g., tubenoses) take more of a “low and slow” approach to reproduction that leads to a moderate but fairly consistent output across years, but Pelagic Cormorant reproduction is typified by highly variable, \u201cboom or bust\u201d cycles. Ainley and Boekelheide note in their Seabirds of the Farallon Islands<\/i> (1990) that Pelagic Cormorants experience the most extreme interannual variation in breeding effort and success of all the seabird species that breed there. Cormorants are sensitive to fluctuations in prey populations and may skip breeding when prey is scarce, but they can also lay large clutches to take advantage of highly favorable conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While 2023 was undoubtedly a \u201cboom\u201d year, 2024 is shaping up to be the accompanying \u201cbust\u201d. Initial monitoring of many well-built nests saw birds abandon nest-guarding early on and relatively few Pelagic Cormorants even appear to be attending the colony. Cormorant reproduction in the California Current System is related to sea surface temperature, with low reproductive effort often associated with warm-water, El Ni\u00f1o periods (Schmidt et al. 2015) like we experienced this last winter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 2. Pelagic Cormorant productivity at Yaquina Head from 2008-2023. Reproductive output from this species is highly variable between years.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Brandt\u2019s Cormorants (Figure 3), on the other hand, are attempting to breed this year at both sites. Most are busily incubating three or even four egg clutches now, with the first chicks expected by the end of June. It\u2019s possible that Brandt\u2019s Cormorants finished the winter in better body condition than Pelagics, perhaps because they often exploit different foraging habitats and prey types (Ainley et al. 1981). Brandt\u2019s Cormorant reproduction does tend to be somewhat less variable than that of their cliff-dwelling relatives (Ainley & Boekelheide 1990), but still varies considerably between years in relation to ocean conditions and prey abundance (Schmidt et al. 2015; Ainley et al. 2018). It’s interesting to observe these two congeneric species of seabird respond so differently to these conditions. However, cormorants may also abandon breeding efforts mid-season if prey availability should suddenly decline, so I\u2019ll continue monitoring to see how the Brandt\u2019s manage to do this summer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Figure 3. Brandt’s Cormorant males spend lots of time collecting nesting material. Breeding Brandt’s were frequently seen collecting grasses from the headland at Yaquina Head, as well as stealing material from their neighbors’ nests.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n

As for other species, Western Gulls have been faithfully incubating their two and three egg clutches at both sites for several weeks now – it’s just a matter of time before our first downy chicks of the year are around. The Black Oystercatchers aren\u2019t nesting at easily-visible sites this year, but their raucous calls continue to be a near-constant presence at both colonies. Excitingly, I\u2019ve also observed Tufted Puffins circling the Yaquina Head murre colony on several occasions, and once saw one flying over Pirate Cove! While neither site has much suitable nesting habitat for puffins, the USFWS recently placed puffin decoys and artificial burrows on Gull Rock (located squarely between the Yaquina Head and Pirate Cove colonies) to draw them there. The puffins\u2019 continued interest in these sites continues to raise my hopes that one day soon we\u2019ll have Tufted Puffins nesting again on the Central Coast.\u00a0<\/p>\n

So far, it seems challenging to predict just what kind of year we\u2019ll see on the Oregon Coast. Reduced breeding effort by Pelagic Cormorants and (to a lesser extent) murres, suggests unfavorable conditions. Yet, murres (though perhaps in somewhat lesser numbers) have begun to lay eggs at both sites and Brandt\u2019s are attempting to breed in seemingly typical numbers. I\u2019ll continue to brave the wind and fog to document how this annual drama plays out.<\/p>\n

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References<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ainley & Boekelheide. 1990. Seabirds of the Farallon Islands: Ecology, Structure, and Dynamics of an Upwelling System Community<\/em>. Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, USA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ainley et al. 1981. Feeding ecology of marine cormorants in southwestern North America. The Condor <\/em>83: 130-131. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.2307\/1367418<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ainley et al. 2018. Ecosystem-based management affecting Brandt\u2019s Cormorant resources and populations in the central California Current region. Biological Conservation <\/em>217: 407-418. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1016\/j.biocon.2017.11.021<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Schmidt et al. 2015. Shifting effects of ocean conditions on survival and breeding probability of a long-lived seabird. PloS ONE 10(7): e0132372. https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1371\/journal.pone.0132372<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yaquina Head Early Season Update, Summer 2024 It\u2019s the start of another summer on the Oregon Coast and I once again find myself spending most mornings out on rocky headlands for another season of seabird monitoring. Since early May, I\u2019ve been following the breeding activities of murres, cormorants, and gulls at Yaquina Head (Newport) and … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “To Breed or Not to Breed”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13592,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1380377],"tags":[1380385,1380386,1380383,1380389],"class_list":["post-429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-yaquina-head","tag-common-murres","tag-long-term-monitoring","tag-predation","tag-seabirds"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13592"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=429"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":450,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429\/revisions\/450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seabirdoceanographylab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}