Seabird colony attendance during their breeding seasons is driven by reproductive obligations of incubation and chick rearing, resulting in relatively predictable attendance patterns near breeding sites. Less is understood about patterns and function of activity ashore at colony sites outside the breeding season. We attempted to quantify year-round activity of crevice-nesting Crested Auklets (Aethia cristatella) at Gareloi Island, Alaska, site of some of their largest colonies. In June and July 2013 and 2014, 94 Crested Auklets (92 adults and 2 subadults) were fitted with uniquely coded 1.0 g VHF radio-tags (0.6% of body mass) at two inland study plots in the southeast colony. Radio receiver-loggers remotely detected and recorded individuals present on the nearby colony site surface 24 h/day from date of tagging through autumn, winter, spring and summer 2013 – 2015. Notably, we found Crested Auklets present in all months of the year, with half of our radio-tagged auklets (n = 47, 29 females, 10 males, 8 unknown sex) detected inland at the colony site during non-breeding months (September – March). Visit duration for these individuals comprised about 0.4% of their total annual colony site activity, this is the first evidence of year-round Crested Auklet colony attendance that may be unique to Gareloi. Other findings included extreme individual variability and intersexual differences in colony attendance frequency, differences in attendance between breeding and non-breeding birds, a lapse in surface activity prior to laying in May, and frequent nocturnal activity on the colony surface. Enhanced circannual patterns of Crested Auklet colony attendance at this island may relate to defense of nesting site and other social advantages, permitted by a nearby highly productive sea area with year-round foraging opportunities.

Wails, C. N., H. L. Major, and I. L. Jones. 2020. Patterns of year-round colony attendance by VHF radio-tagged Crested Auklets (Aethia cristatella) at their prototypical Aleutian breeding site. The Wilson Journal of Ornithology 132 (2): 327–342. doi: 10.1676/1559-4491-132.2.327

Prebreeding, subadult seabirds have been documented prospecting or visiting multiple sites throughout the breeding season to gather information on colony reproductive success, identify suitable habitat, evaluate prey abundance, and locate potential partners; however, many aspects of prospector biology remain unknown. We explored prospector behaviour as a means of furthering our understanding of postnatal seabird dispersal and colony attendance using Least Auklets (Aethia pusilla (Pallas, 1811)) and Crested Auklets (Aethia cristatella (Pallas, 1769)) breeding at Gareloi Island, Alaska, in 2014 and 2015. We recorded age class, length of time spent on the colony, and behaviour for individuals attending a study plot over the course of two breeding seasons. Although prospectors typically spent more time on the colony surface than adults, prospectors rarely socialized with conspecifics during their visits to the colony, possibly due to the absence of a citrus-like feather odour used in olfactory communication. Additionally, we found substantial differences between observed and predicted data between years, demonstrating that other factors (likely prey abundance or quality) influenced behaviour in 2015. Our results suggest that the collective knowledge of seabird prospecting behaviour is not necessarily transferable between taxa and there may be a range of strategies employed by prospectors when assessing colonies.

Wails, C. N. and H. L. Major. 2017. Fitting in with the crowd: the role of prospecting in seabird behavioural trends. Canadian Journal of Zoology 95(4):247-257. doi: 10.1139/cjz-2016-0166

We examined the fluorescence of ornaments among three auklet species: Least Auklets (Aethia pusilla), Crested Auklets (Aethia cristatella), and Parakeet Auklets (Aethia psittacula) on Gareloi Island, Alaska during the 2015 breeding season. We found that the ornamental bill plates of Crested Auklets fluoresced, but bill ornaments of Least Auklets and bills of Parakeet Auklets did not. We also found that none of the feathers in these three species exhibited fluorescence. We suggest that differences in ornamentation and fluorescence may be related to life-history strategies associated with sexual selection and predator avoidance.

Wails, C. N., E. D. Gruber, E. Slattery, L. Smith, and H. L. Major. Glowing in the light: fluorescence of bill plates in the Crested Auklet (Aethia cristatella). The Wilson Journal of Ornithology 129(1):155-158. doi: 10.1676/1559-4491-129.1.155