Seabirds as monitors of the marine environment

Many studies have shown that seabirds are sensitive to changes in food supply, and therefore have potential as monitors of fish stocks. For most seabird species breeding parameters suitable for biomonitoring have yet to be measured over a wide range of prey densities. However, it is clear that responses vary among species and care must be taken when interpreting seabird data as a proxy for fish abundance. For many years seabirds have also been...