As if climate change weren’t causing enough problems, a new study has found it may also be interfering in the matrimonial bliss of albatrosses.
While the seafaring birds normally mate for life – with just one to four per cent splitting up with their partners after choosing them – research from the University of Lisbon, which studied 15,500 breeding pairs over a 15-year span in the Falkland Islands, showed that up to eight per cent of albatross couples “divorce” in years with higher water temperatures.
The study suggests a number of factors may be responsible: albatrosses who have to hunt further afield for food in warming oceans could miss breeding season, leaving their mates to choose new partners; or, the harsher environment could cause stress, resulting in failure to breed – grounds for divorce in the albatross world.
So next time you and your partner have a tiff, spare a thought for the poor albatrosses who couldn’t make their marriages work… not even for the sake of the chicks.
