Albatross in 2010s: Mice and plastic
[120] [more-albatross-20] In 2010s, the field log for Albatross is headed “Mice and plastic.” The figure kept beside that heading is 3. It is a count or a date from the work, not a rank of the species’ worth. A zoo birthday card does not replace the log. A dedicated international agreement — rare for a bird family.
Dynamic-soaring ocean birds whose metres-long wings and baited longlines now share the same latitudes. How does dynamic soaring let an albatross fly cheaply? The bird climbs and dives through wind-speed gradients above waves, converting shear into airspeed. Heart-rate loggers show travel costs closer to rest than to flapping flight.
A female banded in 1956 by Chandler Robbins at Midway. She has fledged chicks into her seventh decade — a longevity record that made a single band number famous. Why are longlines the central threat? Baited hooks look like squid. One set can kill dozens of birds. Night setting, weighted lines and tori lines cut the kill when fleets actually use them.
What did Coleridge actually do to the bird? The 1798 Rime made killing an albatross a moral crime. The poem outran the biology and still titles newspaper bycatch stories. The northern royal albatross colony near Dunedin is a mainland breeding site with public hides — rare for a family that usually needs remote islands.
Keep 2010s, “Mice and plastic,” and 3 together or the note on Albatross stops being that year’s record.2010s
Figures to keep
- Year of the note
- 2010s
- Figure to keep
- 3
- Species
- Albatross
- Line in the log
- Mice and plastic