Print Page - Albatross Is a Mother at 60

By LESLIE KAUFMAN
Article in NY Times

Wisdom, the oldest known wild bird in the United States, is a new mother, the United States Geological Survey and Fish and Wildlife Service announced on Tuesday.

Wisdom, a Laysan albatross who lives in the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge in the Pacific northwest of the main Hawaiian island, is 60 years old. Among birds, albatrosses are believed to be the species that lives longest.

So far the oldest known wild bird was a Northern Royal albatross, which is native only to the Southern Hemisphere. Grandma, as she was known, lived 61½ years before researchers lost sight of her a few years back; she is presumed dead.

But the miracle of Wisdom is not only that she is alive, but that she is breeding. Birds that live that long often (but not always) have years without reproduction, said Bruce Peterjohn, the chief of the geological survey’s North American bird banding program. But Wisdom not only does not look her age, he said, she has produced another healthy chick.

Albatrosses lay only one egg a year, and it takes much of the year to incubate the egg and raise the chick. After a year in which they have successfully raised and fledged a chick, the geological survey said, the parents may take the occasional next year off from parenting.

But John Klavitter, a Fish and Wildlife Service biologist and the deputy manager of the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge, said that Wisdom also nested in 2008, 2009 and 2010. Officials said she probably has raised 30 to 35 babies in her lifetime.

Dr. Peterjohn said the news was not only a nice surprise in and of itself but also showed that “the conservation of the adult albatross is very important.”

Important because while Laysan albatrosses are not currently listed as endangered, 19 of 21 species of albatross are threatened with extinction, according to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

The geological survey said that present threats to the birds on Midway include the lead poisoning of chicks from paint used in earlier decades; pollution, especially from garbage floating in the ocean; and longline fishing in which the birds are hooked and drowned. Conservation groups have joined with fishermen and sharply reduced the number of deaths from fishing, however.

The birds ingest large amounts of marine debris — by some estimates, the survey said, five tons of plastic are unknowingly fed to chicks each year by their parents. Although the plastic may not kill the chicks directly, it reduces their food intake, which leads to dehydration and is believed to lessen their chance of survival.

The albatross is also threatened by invasive species like rats and by wild cats, which prey on chicks, nesting adults and eggs. The albatross evolved on islands where there were no land mammals, so they have no defenses against them, officials said..

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