Northern fulmar (Fulmarus glacialis), Havhest

Status: Endangered

Thise birds require special attention during oil drilling and production in the Barents Sea.

The Svalbard Population

The northern fulmar is a stocky petrel that has a length of 45–53 cm and a weight of 650–1000 g. It has a short and thick neck and a large head. Air-born it resembles a heavy lift cargo plane. The bill is chunky with round, tube-like nostrils. Fulmars occur in a dark morph, predominant in the Svalbard area, and a light morph common in more southern areas of the North Atlantic. The dark morph has a uniform grey-brown head, neck and belly, with a darker back. In all of its color varieties there is a light patch of feathers on the upper-side of the wings. The sexes look very alike.

Northern fulmars breed within the North Atlantic region, from Newfoundland in the southwest, to Svalbard and Novaya Zemlya in the north, and northern France in the southeast. The species also breeds in the North Pacific region, in Alaska and eastern Russia. It is the only species in the order Procellariiformes that breeds in Svalbard; in loose colonies on narrow ledges on steep, inaccessible cliffs along the coast. Cliffs that are often dominated by other species. Bear Island breeders nest on skerries and in cracks and burrows on slopes. Breeding birds exhibit strong fidelity to their nesting place, which is often visited outside the breeding period. Breeding sites are distributed over most of the Svalbard archipelago, with 125 colonies registered. The single egg is laid during late May in a depression in the ground or directly on rock. The parents share incubating duties for about 50 days. The chick, once hatched, is covered in soft greyish down. During the first two weeks one of the parents always remains close to the nest. After this time, both parents forage, returning intermittently to feed and warm the chick. It remains in the nest for about seven weeks before it is fledged. Fulmar chicks (and adults with chicks or eggs) actively defend themselves against intruders, spitting an oily gastric juice on them with remarkable accuracy (front page image bottom left).

Outside the breeding season northern fulmars are pelagic, gliding over large areas of ocean on stiff, straight wings in search for food. They catch pelagic animals near the sea surface; feeding on squid, polychaetes, pteropods, crustaceans and small fish. They float high in the water when swimming and need a pattering run on the water surface in order to take off. Cackling and grunting calls are emitted at the nesting site; in flight fulmars are silent. It arrives in Svalbard in late winter, long before egg-laying commences, and stay until the end of November or early December. Then they leave to spend the winter a little to the south of their breeding areas (even north in the drift-ice of the Arctic Ocean) or far out in the open North Atlantic. Fulmars breeding on Bear Island are known to feed in the central Barents Sea as well as along the coast of Northern Norway during the chick-rearing period. Similar to other petrels, fulmars reach sexual maturity late (8-9 years of age) and have a low reproductive rate. However, the death rate among adults is very low (less than 5 % per year), and as a result northern fulmars can live to a very old age (60+).

Detection and documentation of northern fulmar

For the drilling campaigns in the Barents Sea, as part of the BlueDeal Bird and Mammal monitoring, special attention is to be placed on detection, identification and documentation of northern fulmar. It is a high probability that they might be feeding in the Rogar area during the chick-rearing period in summer, which might coincide with the Aptoil drilling campaign. They could therefore potentially be affected if there is a spill.

Conducting the Bird and Mammal monitoring: What to look for to detect northern fulmar

• Place vessel in a position to cover the down- • Stocky, grey gull-like bird resembling a heavy lift cargo plane in air. It looks like it wind area of the rig. This area is where the is standing still in the air on stiff wings. birds and mammals might be exposed to an • Chunky beak with tube-like nostrils unintended oil spill • Laying high in/on the water • Gather the necessary picture and video • It performs a pattering run on the water to material to document numbers, presence of take off into the air.

young and other relevant information

Aptomar BlueDeal -Birds and Mammals 2