E&E Seminar Series: Where seabirds go and why: following animals through a changing ocean

ABSTRACT

Seabirds spend much of their lives moving through vast and dynamic marine environments, making movement ecology a powerful framework through which to understand how animals respond to environmental change. In this seminar, I will explore how bio-logging, spatial modelling and environmental data can reveal patterns of movement, behaviour and habitat use across the annual cycle. I will draw on examples from different studies, and will particularly focus on Adélie penguins in Antarctica. I will discuss how understanding where and when seabirds depend on particular marine habitats can inform conservation and marine spatial planning. Finally, I will reflect on how open science, data sharing and collaborative approaches can make ecological research more reproducible, accessible and impactful.

BIOGRAPHY

Dr Zuzana Zajková is a movement ecologist investigating how seabird tracking can inform conservation in rapidly changing oceans. She is a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Marine Sciences in Barcelona, Spain, where she contributes to the SHIFT project integrating seabird tracking data with species distribution modelling. Her research spans multiple species and ecosystems, from tropical shearwaters to Antarctic penguins, with a shared goal of understanding at-sea behaviour, habitat use, and environmental drivers across the annual cycle. By applying quantitative methods and analytical approaches to bio-logging data, she translates complex data into insights relevant for seabird conservation, marine spatial planning and evidence-based management. Zuzana is currently a visiting researcher at the Sequeira Lab.