Media release

From: The Royal Society

In many socially monogamous species, divorce is a strategy used to correct for sub-optimal partnerships. In this study of black-browed albatrosses, we found, for the first time in a wild bird population, that the environment had a direct impact on divorce. Divorce was more likely in unfavourable years, which are characterised by warm sea surface temperature. Such challenging environmental conditions might affect the mating processes, potentially by entailing higher costs of reproduction or via changes in the individual breeding phenology and physiological stress. Environmentally driven disruptions of pair bonds might therefore represent an overlooked consequence of global changes.