Seabirds around fishing vessels

Common diving petrel

Pelecanoides urinatrix

The common diving-petrel has a wide circumpolar distribution. In the New Zealand region, it breeds on many islands around North Island, and in Cook Strait and Foveaux Strait. It also breeds on Chatham, Snares, Antipodes and Auckland islands. The New Zealand population is large, with the breeding population thought to be between 300,000 and 2 million pairs. The common diving petrel is almost impossible to distinguish at sea from the South Georgia diving petrel. Consequently, records of common diving petrels might include both species.

Pelecanoides urinatrix
CC-BY, Dragonfly Science

Mean number of common diving petrel recorded around fishing vessels during counts carried out by government observers, binned to 0.4 degree of longitude and latitude. The size of the circle indicates the number of observations, whereas the colour indicates the mean number of birds recorded during counts. Empty circles indicate that no birds were observed. The grey areas indicate water depths of less than 1000 m.

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