Chapter 3 North Carolina Species
of pelagic seabirds that have higher susceptibility to plastic ingestion based on their feeding behaviors (contact dipping and surface-seizing) (Mejia et al. 2024, Adams et al. 2020) .
3.11.4 Management Concerns Management of pelagic birds in the United States falls under the jurisdiction of the USFWS. To address concerns about negative interactions with marine fisheries, the NOAA Fisheries Unit (hereafter NOAA Fisheries) works with the USFWS, regional fisheries management councils and coastal states through the Interagency Seabird Working Group. As a part of this Working Group’s effort, in 2001, NOAA Fisheries (also National Marine Fisheries Service, NMFS) began implementing the National Plan of Action for Reducing the Incidental Catch of Seabirds in Longline Fisheries (Conant et al. 2000) . An Executive Order established that every federal agency whose actions are likely to impact migratory bird populations negatively must enter into a Memorandum of Understanding with the USFWS (USFWS and NMFS 2012) . The Ecosystem and Bycatch Working Group of the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) has recommended a Seabird Action Plan to assess current scientific data for effective seabird conservation and management. (Hutchinson et al. 2025) . Two specific issues relevant to North Carolina include bird bycatch in gillnets (especially for Red-throated Loon, Common Loon, and Northern Gannet) (Hunter 2004a) and pelagic longline bycatch (especially for Black-capped Petrel, Bermuda Petrel, and Audubon’s Shearwater) (Hunter 2004b) . 3.11.5 Threats and Problems Chapter 5 describes 11 categories of threats the Taxa Teams considered during the evaluation and ranking process to identify SGCN; however, the list of pelagic seabird SGCN was developed based on species listed by other organizations for concern. The 2025 SWAP Taxa Teams did not evaluate pelagic seabirds so there are no evaluation results for Metric 9 scope and severity assessments. Based on a literature review, major issues facing pelagic seabirds are incidental catch (i.e., bycatch) in fisheries (anthropogenic-induced mortality) from longline and gillnet fisheries (Hutchinson et al. 2025) and nest depredation at breeding sites by invasive species, problematic native species, human disturbance, and development (Croxall et al. 2012) . Threats in offshore and nearshore waters include conflicts with fisheries, oil and hazardous materials, and debris ingestion and entanglement. Recent investigations into the effect of microplastic ingestion suggest that some seabirds with higher levels of microplastics can have increased energetic demands, higher levels of dehydration, and lower body conditions (e.g., lighter body weights) than normal (Mejia et al. 2024) . Major habitat issues for all species include loss and degradation of habitat and impacts from global climate change. Information about threats that require management action is provided in the following paragraphs and in Chapter 5 (Threats).
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2025 NC Wildlife Action Plan
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