COLONY AND POPULATION DYNAMICS OF BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKES IN A HETEROGENEOUS ENVIRONMENT

Black-legged Kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla) nest at 25 distinct colonies located throughout Prince William Sound that range in size from <20 to >7,000 pairs. Dramatic changes have occurred in the distribution of breeding birds among those colonies during the past few decades (1972–1997). Reproductive success data collected since 1985 confirm that individual colonies are habitat patches of varying quality in space and time. Even with such...