Tracing pollution in the lives of Arctic seabirds

"High up in the Arctic Circle, Olivier Chastel begins his working day by scanning the horizon for polar bears, rifle at the ready. "In 25 years I've never had to use it, but you can't be too careful," he explains. There can't be many conservationists who go birdwatching while armed, but the danger to life from bears in Svalbard - the largest island of the Norwegian polar archipelago - is so high that it's a legal requirement."

"For 25 summers, Chastel, a biologist, has returned to the same spot to monitor these migratory seabirds, which travel 4,000-5,000 kilometres each year, from the Canadian Arctic to Svalbard's western Kongsfjorden coastline, to breed. Since 2000, Chastel has been studying the impact of synthetic contaminants as well as mercury on the birds' physiology, a project supported by the French Polar Institute in Plouzané as part of a long-term partnership with the Norwegian Polar Institute in Tromsø."

"Angelier (pictured with Chastel, below), who works alongside Chastel at the Centre for Biological Studies of Chizé in Villiers-en-Bois, part of the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), comes to the site to study how contaminants affect the telomeres at the ends of the birds' chromosomes, a biomarker of health. The two researchers have been close friends and colleagues since 2001, when Angelier became Chastel's first PhD student."

Olivier Chastel and Frédéric Angelier conduct seasonal fieldwork at the Krykkjefjellet kittiwake colony on Svalbard, visiting daily by dinghy between mid-May and early July to monitor about 400 nesting pairs. Chastel scans for polar bears and carries a rifle because bear encounters pose a serious legal and safety concern. Since 2000 the pair have measured impacts of synthetic contaminants and mercury on seabird physiology, supported by the French Polar Institute and the Norwegian Polar Institute. Angelier focuses on telomere length as a biomarker of health. The researchers have collaborated since 2001.

Read at Nature