I investigated the evolutionary ecology of the Heron Island shearwater colony and their ability to adapt to rapid changes in their food supplies through a food supplementation experiment. The study examined the important and hotly debated topic of adaptation to resources and environment.

Specifically, I studied how adaptable seabirds are to changes in their marine food resources - the kind of deleterious changes that are expected under various climate-change scenarios.

I managed the field research logistics, equipment, organization, bird handling, monitoring, measuring and banding, tissue sampling and daily food supplementation of chicks.

I found that chicks on Heron Island assimilated food in a different way to chicks on Lord Howe Island when their provisioned meals were augmented. They demonstrated a maximum potential growth rate, potentially limited by adaptation to the poorer resource environment of the tropics or perhaps a result of genetic drift. This work is published in Marine Ecology Progress Series.