Seabird rediscovered in the western Pacific

A bird not recorded for 79 years has been rediscovered in the western Pacific Ocean. A voyage last summer into the Bismarck Archipelago, northeast of Papua New Guinea, successfully managed to photograph more than 30 Beck's Petrels (Pseudobulweria becki). Sightings included recently fledged juveniles, including the one pictured at right.

The rediscovery is described in a paper published today in the Bulletin of the British Ornithologists' Club.

The species was known only from two specimens collected from the region in 1928 and '29 by Rollo Beck, an ornithologist and collector of museum specimens. The bird is just over 11 inches long, is dark above, has a dark head and throat, white breast and belly, and a white bar on the undersides of the wings.

Hadoram Shirihai, a leading expert on seabirds, Antarctic wildlife, and the birds of the Middle East, made the rediscovery. He first visited the Bismarck Archipelago in 2003, when he observed “possible Beck’s Petrels.”

Hopes were raised again in November 2005 in Australia when a petrel was reported in the Coral Sea off Queensland. The Birds Australia Rarities Committee did not accept the sighting as a Beck's Petrel, partly because it occurred more than 700 nautical miles from the area where Beck collected his specimens.

After consulting with the rarities committee on the 2005 sighting, Shirihai decided to return to Papua New Guinea last year. “I was eager to know about these amazing petrels,” he said in a statement provided by BirdLife International, “and to understand better how we may conserve them.”

He chartered a boat and from July 27 to August 8 sailed for approximately 870 miles (1,400 km) in search of the bird. His journey is shown on the map at left. A hotspot for sightings was near Cape St. George, on the southern tip of New Ireland.

Confirming the existence of Beck’s Petrel was difficult for three reasons: It is similar to Tahiti Petrel (P. rostrata), few people have looked for it at sea, and it may be nocturnal on the breeding grounds. “There are numerous atolls and islands where it may breed,” said Stuart Butchart, BirdLife's global species programme coordinator. “However, the remaining population may be small.”

Despite almost eight decades without a sighting, BirdLife and the World Conservation Union classified Beck’s Petrel as critically endangered, not extinct, on the Red List of Threatened Species. The 2000 book Threatened Birds of the World speculated that its population numbered less than 50 birds.

Unfortunately, many other seabirds share Beck's Petrel's shaky hold on existence. Approximately 79 species of petrels and shearwaters make up the family Procellaridae, and they occur throughout the earth's oceans. Despite the abundance of such birds as Northern Fulmar and Sooty Shearwater, "as many as 20 [species] worldwide may be in danger," according to The Sibley Guide to Bird Life and Behavior. The genus that Beck's belongs to, Pseudobulweria, includes four other species: St. Helena Petrel, which went extinct in the 16th century, Fiji and Mascarene Petrel, both of which are critically endangered, and Tahiti Petrel, which is listed as near threatened.

To turn the tide in favor of the most threatened birds, BirdLife recently launched its Preventing Extinctions initiative. It aims to save the 189 species listed as critically endangered — a daunting task, to be sure. Today's announcement is a small but significant step toward that goal because to save birds, we have to know where they are. — M.M

Read our review of Rare Birds Yearbook 2008, a directory of the world's most threatened birds.