Staff, Students & Associates

Masters Students (Dissertation)

Mia Cerfonteyn BSc (Hons) (University of Stellenbosch) John Day Building: 2.11 Fax: +27 (0)21 650 3295 Email: mia.cerfonteyn@uct.ac.za

About Mia

I started my BSc in Biodiversity and Ecology at the University of Stellenbosch in 2006 and went on to complete my Honours in Zoology in 2009. For my Honours’ project I studied the growth forms of the Subantarctic cushion plant Azorella selago on Marion Island using molecular techniques.

During my month-long stay on Marion Island in 2009, I was intrigued by the astonishing bird life and vowed to return to the island to work with them. I applied for the Percy Fitzpatrick Institute field assistant position to continue the monitoring of albatrosses and petrels, and returned to the cold and windy island to overwinter for the 67th expedition from 2010 to 2011.

My opportunity to stay on Marion Island was used to collect data for my MSc project on the Subantarctic skuas Catharacta antarctica lönnbergi, to see whether their breeding population on the island has recovered after the invasive cat eradication. My project on these notoriously feisty birds required me to monitor nests for breeding success and diet, and most importantly; swiftly duck the dive bombs of angry parents.

Thesis

The population status of the Subantarctic Skua Catharacta antarctica lönnbergi two decades after the Feral Cat Felis catus eradication on Marion Island (Supervisor: Prof. P. Ryan).

Recent peer-reviewed publications

Cerfonteyn M.E., Le Roux P.C., Jansen van Vuuren B., Born C. 2011 Cryptic spatial aggregation of the cushion plant Azorella selago (Apiaceae) revealed by a multilocus molecular approach suggests frequent intraspecific faciliation under sub-Antarctic conditions. American Journal of Botany 98:909-914. doi:10.3732/ajb.1000460.