PEARL Paleoecological Environmental Assessment and Research Laboratory

PEARL

P

aleoecological

E

nvironmental

A

ssessment and

R

esearch

L

aboratory
Queen's University

Biovectors Studies

Birds and other organisms such as bats, often form large breeding colonies or roosts where they can number in the tens or even hundreds of thousands. Because many species feed almost exclusively offshore but nest on land, seabirds can act as potent biological vectors of nutrients from marine or aquatic ecosystems to terrestrial ecosystems. The wastes released from seabird colonies provide critical nutrient subsidies for many coastal ecosystems, often creating thriving biological communities that would not exist otherwise. An unfortunate irony is that this transport pathway also concentrates contaminants that are biomagnified and bioaccumulated through the marine or aquatic food webs, thereby threatening the very ecosystems it supports and sustains. The biological transport of contaminants by seabirds is of global concern as they are the dominant form of wildlife along coastlines worldwide.

Lake and pond sediments archive a wealth of information about past seabird population dynamics (a rare commodity in most regions), and can be used to better understand the fate and transport of environmental contaminants because the bird inputs have direct effects on downstream water chemistry, biological communities, and sediment geochemistry. Sediment cores from water bodies  that take drainage from nesting sites can be used to track past seabird inputs over long timescales. They can also potentially be used to monitor for more recent impacts and new contaminants coming from the increased shipping that Arctic ice conditions now permit, for example. These are relatively new applications of paleolimnology, the science that deals with reconstructing past ecological and environmental conditions using physical, chemical, and biological information stored in sediments.

We track seabird inputs through time by analyzing lake and pond sediment cores for: (1) stable isotopes of nitrogen (δ15N), which reflect food web dynamics and trophic structure and can also be used to track marine-derived nutrients; (2) the remains of biological indicators such as algae and aquatic invertebrates, which change in response to past nutrient and/or contaminant inputs; (3) fossil pigment such as chlorophyll a, which reflects past aquatic production; and (4) contaminants, such as persistent organic pollutants (POPs) and metals, which we can link to past seabird inputs.

In some instances, the actual guano deposits can be used as the environmental archive, much in the same way as sediment cores. This is not restricted to seabirds. Guano deposits from any bird or bat species can build up over time at the base of nesting or roosting sites. These deposits create natural archives that can be sampled and analyzed for changes in diet (via insect remains, for example), or contaminants through time.
Chimney swifts are one such species that leave deposits of guano and egested pellets that archive a record of diet and environmental contaminants.

The Paleoecological Environmental Assessment and Research Laboratory (PEARL), in collaboration with colleagues at the University of
Ottawa
(see their page), University of Alberta, Acadia University and the Canadian Wildlife Service of Environment Canada, have been developing and applying some of these approaches to studying bird and bat populations from different regions. Follow the links below for details and publications on each project.

We have published a review of the techniques used and the current state of this field here: Duda MP, Hargan KE,Michelutti N, Blais JM, Grooms C,Gilchrist HG, Mallory ML, Robertson GJ and Smol JP (2021). Reconstructing Long-Term Changes in Avian Populations Using
Lake Sediments: Opening a Window Onto the Past.
Front. Ecol. Evol. 9:698175. doi: 10.3389/fevo.2021.698175

 

Click on each image below to link to a page with publications and descriptions of our various projects.

Cape Vera Project

Cape Vera
Project

Tern Island Project

Tern Island Project

Chimney Swift Project

Chimney Swift Project

Lake Ontario Bird Islands Pond Study

Lake Ontario Bird Islands Project

Common Eider Project

Common Eider Project

Grand Colombier Seabird Project

Grand Colombier Island Seabird Project

Bat Cave Deposit Study

Bat Guano Project

Baccalieu Island Seabird Project

Baccalieu Island Seabird Project

Digges Island Seabird Project

Digges Island Seabird Project

Andean Condor Project

Andean Condor Project

Northern Gannet Project photo by Morus Bassanus

Northern Gannet Project


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