What are we doing to help?

The Save the Albatross campaign is already working hard to stop these amazing birds becoming extinct. The RSPB and BirdLife International are working to create an international team of people called The Albatross Task Force to work directly with fishermen on land and at sea to educate fishermen.

The problem is that fishermen in the southern ocean attach thousands of baited hooks to their fishing lines. Some lines can be an incredible 80 miles long and carry up to 10,000 hooks. These are towed at depth behind fishing vessels so they can catch vast numbers of large fish like southern bluefin tuna and Patagonian toothfish.

Unfortunately, because some of the hooks are still visible near the sea’s surface, foraging birds spot them and try to grab the bait before it sinks. They are hooked, dragged under, and drowned.

The Albatross Task Force will talk to fisherman about how the albatross population is in trouble and show them simple things to do that can help them stop catching albatrosses. For example, they could:

• Scare the seabirds with streamers. They don't like the bright colours flapping about in the breeze and fly off!
• Use tubes to send the fishing lines underwater immediately, so that the albatrosses don't see the bait.
• Dye the bait blue so that it's harder for the birds to see them underwater.
• Set the fishing lines at night - most albatrosses will be asleep then!
• Use heavier weights on the lines so that the hooks and bait sink more quickly.

If would like to find out what you can do to help, please visit the links on the right.