| Awards and Outreach | -> | ABS Keynote/Fellow Lecutres 2000 |
For nearly two decades Dr. Boersma has worked on ecological issues surrounding the conservation of Magellanic penguins. Most of these problems require a thorough understanding of the breeding biology and ecology of the species. The marine environment where sea-birds feed is often temporally and spatially patchy, and the terrestrial environment where they must breed has a variety of predators and thermal conditions which causes high variability in reproductive success. Dr. Boersma is interested in how seabirds balance these different selective forces and respond to environmental variability. Seabirds are often appropriate tools for conservation, since they can be used as reflectors of environmental change.
Since Dr. Boersma's interests are in ecology and conservation biology, most of her students choose problems that have both theoretical and applied aspects, and all are field-oriented. Several of her students are working on Magellanic penguins, examining aspects of habitat use, hormones, mate selection, diving patterns, and tourism impacts. Currently, she is using satellite telemetry to determine the foraging area of Magellanic and Rockhopper penguins in Argentina and the Falkland Islands, to identify places of particular importance for the protection of these birds, and to determine differences among years. After banding over 50,000 penguins, the study includes several hundred known-age birds, which make this system an attractive one for research. Dr. Boersma is also interested in how science influences political decision making, and its role in species conservation.
Dr. Boersma's presentation is sponsored by the ABS Conservation Committee, which was formed to assist society members who want to apply their professional skills to solve conservation problems. Animal behaviorists approach the study of behavior from many different angles, each of which may provide insight to effectively managing animal populations, including threatened or endangered species. In fact, animal behavior studies have supplied valuable information to wildlife management and conservation efforts for decades. Details of mating systems have determined acceptable harvest seasons and limits, migration and dispersal patterns have directed the locations and sizes of preserves, and mechanisms of imprinting related to mate and kin recognition, and to food and habitat selection have aided captive breeding and reintroduction programs. As a researcher active in conservation, the executive editor of a new publication called Conservation Biology in Practice, and as a past president for the Society for Conservation Biology, Dr. Boersma is an excellent example of an animal behaviorist applying her talents to conservation biology. Her work epitomizes the type of research that the Conservation Committee is encouraging and enabling among the Animal Behavior Society members.