Visionneuse

Date_TXT

Boca Raton : CRC press, cop. 2002

Cote

598.072 SCH

Auteur

Schreiber, E. A.

Sujet

Oiseaux de mer

Type de document

Livre

Description :

Biology of marine birds provides the only complete summary of information about marine birds ever published. It both summarizes and analyzes their breeding biology, ecology, taxonomy, evolution, fossil history, physiology, energetic, and conservation. The book covers four orders of marine birds: penguins (sphenisciformes); albatross, shearwaters, petrels (procellariiformes); pelicans, boobies, frigatebirds, tropicbirds, cormorants (pelecaniformes); and gulls, terns, guillemots, auks (charadriiformes - families laridae and alcidae). Two summary chapters address the biology of shorebirds and wading birds and their lives in the marine environment.
This comprehensive book contains numerous summary tables that give you exhaustive information on various aspects of their life histories, breeding biology, physiology and energetic, and demography. It also discusses research techniques and future research needed, providing a guide to ornithologists and students for research projects.
Written by acknowledged experts in this field, Biology of Marine Birds is the ideal resource. The authors not only present known information, but provide new analyses and insights into marine bird biology. You will find no other book that covers all the major seabird groups and all the major topics with this depth of detail. Whether you are studying, researching, or managing marine environments, you will find yourself reaching for this resource repeatedly.
Early chapters deal with the seabird fossil record and systematic. You can find the discussion of how the fossil record has played in understanding current seabird community structure especially interesting. This combines an excellent demonstration of how we can use the evolutionary history of animals to understand present day traits, with some exciting reconstructions of long-extinct species.
It would be hard to argue that most of this book contains information that turtle biologists would find relevant. Most of the discussions, particularly those covering colonial breeding, mate choice, communication and chick development, are not surprisingly set in a seabird context. However there are a number of chapters (some more than others) that may provide some interesting reading and perhaps indicate some potential avenues for research. Chapter 7, Climate and weather effects on seabirds, eventually looks at some large-scale weather/oceanographic events including El Nino and Enso and how these effect prey populations and seabird movements. Chapters 12 and 14 cover reproductive energetics and salt balance, again these are topics that could provide some relevant information, such as how egg composition and water loss varies according to feeding and incubation ecology or osmoregulatory mechanisms used by animals living in a hypertonic environment.
The areas that marine turtle newsletter readers are likely to find most interesting are covered in four main chapters. Chapter 5 investigates how seabird demography relates to the marine environment. There are discussions on factors that may lead to differences in demographic traits both within and among species. It is of interest that, because of their longevity (a trait shared with many turtle species) an understanding of demography can only be achieved by long-term studies. Moreover, there is still very little information on the survival and recruitment of young, a fundamental component of any population model. This must be a concern to turtle biologists since studies of seabird biology have are generally far easier to conduct than those of marine turtles.
Chapters 15 to 17 deal with, in turn, the effects of pollution, interactions with fisheries and conservation, topics that concern most marine vertebrates. There have been exhaustive studies of pollutant levels and effects on seabirds and chapter 15 is a comprehensive review of this subject. Chapter 16 covers the interactions, both positive and negative, between seabirds and fisheries, the most pertinent sections dealing with fishing gear entrapment and disturbance. The chapter on seabird conservation covers a many themes that all marine biologists will find depressingly familiar. Harvesting of eggs and adults, human disturbance (including scientists), climate change, introduced predators, the list goes on. It closes with a review of current legislation, outlining research priorities and the need for increased public awareness. In this latter section the authors point out that the legislation to reduce the bycatch of US long-lining vessels in the south Atlantic was strongly influenced by both scientific and public opinion. There is hope.
In short a very useful book, a must for anyone working with or interested in seabirds. From the point of view of a turtle biologist, some chapters could provide interesting ideas and approaches, but it may be slightly expensive as a personal purchase.