Manx shearwaters undertake extraordinary migrations from Britain to South America and back, facing welfare challenges from incidental catch, pollution, and light pollution at breeding colonies.
Shearwater welfare across the annual cycle involves multiple hazards: longline bycatch drowns birds during their South Atlantic winter; light pollution disorients fledglings causing them to ground in towns where predation kills many; and climate-driven changes to prey distribution affect foraging success and chick provisioning. The Skomer and Skokholm breeding colonies represent one of the world's most important shearwater populations — their protection combines conservation and welfare imperatives for a long-lived, cognitively sophisticated seabird.