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Conservation biology

Cats, rats and seabirds

Nature volume 451, pages 134–135 (2008)Cite this article

Cats kill birds, and therefore eradicating cats from an island would seem to be a good strategy for protecting the native population of seabirds. But that thinking does not take account of ecological complications.

When alien species colonize islands, some of the native inhabitants usually suffer. Seabirds are commonly the victims in these sad cases, because they or their chicks or eggs are especially prone to becoming the prey of introduced mammals. Over the past 20 years, conservation workers in different parts of the world have expended much time and effort to eradicate predators such as cats and rats from selected islands1. The upshot has often been an improvement in the status of the species under threat.

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Figure 1: Cook's petrel, Pterodroma cookii.

P. REESE/NATUREPL.COM

Figure 2: Petrels in peril.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Matthieu Le Corre is in the Laboratoire Ecomar, Université de La Réunion, F-97715 Saint Denis de La Réunion, France. lecorre@univ-reunion.fr ,

    Matthieu Le Corre

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  1. Matthieu Le Corre
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Le Corre, M. Cats, rats and seabirds. Nature 451, 134–135 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/451134a

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