Antipodean Albatrosses are difficult to distinguish from the Wandering Albatross. Adult Wandering Albatrosses are significantly larger, however juvenile Antipodean Albatrosses are very similar to juvenile Wandering Albatrosses. Breeding Antipodean Albatrosses have a mixed white and brownish plumage. Breeding females have chocolate-brown upperparts with white winding, wavy outlines on their back; a white face mask and throat; a white lower breast and belly with brown undertail-coverts; a white underwing with dark tips; and a broad brown breast-band. Breeding males are whiter than females but darker than the Wandering Albatross. Males and females have pink bills. Male Antipodean Albatrosses may be distinguished from other D. exulans subspecies by their darker cap and tail, and less white on their humeral flexure.
Antipodean Albatross |
Diomedea antipodensis
Status: Vulnerable on the EPBC Act list
Government evidence of impact of climate change:
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IUCN Red List Assessment, Diomedea antipodensis
Shifts in the at sea distribution of non breeding females may also be related to changing oceanic conditions driven by climate change; impacting on food resources and potentially increasing the risk from bycatch.
The interaction between climate change and bycatch is a likely explanation for the observed faster decline of the female population relative to the male population (Walker et al. 1995; Walker and Elliot 1999; Elliott et al. 2016).