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It’s winter down here for sure now, and winter in Kaikoura , on the coast of South Island north of Christchurch, means one thing, albatrosses! I took a lot of photos but today I’ll just be sharing the ones of the Buller’s Albatross , Thalassarche bulleri , known here as the Buller’s Mollymawk.
You’ll need to find yourself an albatross. Gratuitous Black-browed Albatross photo ( Thalassarche melanophrys ) not engaging in dancing Albatrosses are the longest lived of an already long lived order of birds, the petrels, and are in fact among the longest lived of all birds. Years in fact. So what is going on?
While I often tease Corey about how many albatrosses we have down here in New Zealand, the fact is that the United States has three species of Albatross that breed within its boundaries, albeit one of them only very rarely, and visit the western shores of North America. The dances of the albatrosses are famous.
Ka’ena Point is also a breeding ground for the Federally protected Laysan albatross, where 45 nests were being carefully monitored by the non-profit Pacific Rim Conservation. The oldest Laysan albatross was last seen raising a chick on Midway Atoll in 2016, at age 66. Please write: [link] .
There was a time when albatross taxonomy was quite simple. Actually, I lie, albatross taxonomy has always been a mess, but there was a period of relative calm, from the sixties to the ninties, when there were about 12 species in two genera. This is unambiguously an albatross. Okay, so this is a wandering albatross of some kind.
The important thing is that I get to see albatrosses and he doesn’t. I mean, granted, he does live near the North Atlantic, the one ocean pretty much bereft of albatrosses (it wasn’t always that way, by the way). The Black-footed Albatross. Like all albatrosses Black-footed Albatrosses pair for life, unseen by Corey.
This Sunday I will be off the coast of Kaikoura on South Island for the first time since 2008 checking out the amazing albatrosses they have there. While albatrosses are found year-round on the tours out of Kaikoura, the best season for them is winter and not all species are common year round. Kaikoura dawn at my last visit.
So here’s some Antipodean Albatrosses! The taxonomy of the bigger albatrosses, known as great albatrosses, is tricky. What were three species, Royal Albatross, Wandering Albatross and Amsterdam Albatross , are now seven. The mighty Antipodean Albatross. This is a true Wandering Albatross.
Kaikoura, in New Zealand’s South Island, is arguably the best place in the world to see albatrosses and petrels. And the endemic Hutton’s Shearwater, which only breeds in Kaikoura, will keep you entertained for those few minutes till the albatrosses hit. More Albatrosses, this time a White-capped Albatross !
About half of all breeding Wandering Albatross nest on the Prince Edward Islands. There’s also the Grey-headed Albatross , Sooty Albatross , Blue Petrel , Great-winged Petrel , Black-faced Sheathbill , and so many more that rely on this island. Yellow-nosed Albatross. Wandering Albatross. Mouse-free Marion!
Although the islands are a cramped home to 18 species of seabird, the dominant and most charismatic of these are the two species of albatross, the Black-footed and Laysan Albatrosses. There was one young Black-footed Albatross that was apparently not planning on going quietly into the dark night, however.
The goal of Around the World For Penguins is simple: Describe the 18 species of penguin and their breeding grounds “from the perspective of a traveller.” Plantema gives highly detailed information about the weather, terrain, ownership of and access to the islands and coasts where penguins breed.
Kirtland’s Warbler is a classic niche species; they breed in only very specific conditions, which occur in only a very specific area. This male Short-tailed Albatross has fledged 2 chicks from Eastern Island, Midway Atoll, the only place in the U.S. this species breeds.
Anyone that has read my posts before knows I love Kaikoura and the amazing people at Albatross Encounter. This species is best seen at Kaikoura , but they do disperse after the breeding season, so I didn’t see any when I dropped by at Easter. Salvin’s Albatrosses were nice to add to my year list. Not a bad day!
Buller’s Albatross ( Thalassarche bulleri ) and Cape Petrel ( Daption capense ) at Kaikoura. The focus of today is one of the guys above, but since I have already done a story on Buller’s Albatrosses before it is going to be about the other guy. This post is not about albatrosses!
The length of each bird species account varies, depending on whether the bird is native or a “visitor” (the book’s term for migrant) or vagrant, breeding or non breeding. In addition to the photo below, of a Black-browed Albatross and its young, a full-page photo shows adult and juvenile birds in flight.
Waved Albatross (Phoebastria irrorata). In Costa Rica, the sole tropical breedingalbatross is a rare visitor to pelagic waters of the Pacific. A more surefire way to witness this long-winged bird is by visiting breeding grounds on the Galapago Islands.
They manage this noise not only through individual effort but their habit of breeding in dense, large colonies. After breeding they can spend months at sea without landing before returning to land. The mammoth like thing behind is an albatross chick. Sooty Tern colonies are busy, noisy, crowded places.
The species breeds on an extraordinary number of islands, and has a worldwide population of perhaps over five million birds, and this is in spite of declines to due hunting, persecution and introduced species. Another difference is that the Christmas Shearwater is a surface breeder whereas the Wedgie breeds in burrows.
Here one is close to the scenically impressive Cape of Good Hope National Park as well as the Boulder’s Coastal Park, home to hundreds of breeding African Penguins.
A simple, useful world map in outline shows approximate breeding ranges in yellow and wintering ranges in blue, and for some birds, permanent resident ranges in green. Some birds with populations on different breeding grounds move not to the same winter quarter but to far-distant ones – such as the Red-necked Phalarope.
Christmas Shearwaters Much less common that their larger relatives, but at the same time their habit of surface breeding means they are always around to find in certain spots. Tristam’s Storm-petrel From a tiny petrel to a fairly hefty storm-petrel, this species has a small breeding presence on Tern Island. These guys get around!
These lands support countless birds, either year-round, as migratory stopovers, or as breeding grounds. Many refuges are strategically located along major flyways, allowing ducks and geese to hopscotch their way up the continent to northern breeding grounds and back down again. But what else should birders know?
The Antipodes, one of New Zealand’s subantarctic island possessions, are home to two endemic parrots, a subspecies of the Subantarctic Snipe, and a whole range of breeding seabirds, including albatrosses and penguins. Spread the word and support the project if you can at Million Dollar Mouse !
In particular the South Island destination of Kaikoura is world-renowned for the flocks of albatrosses and giant petrels floating right off the pelagic boat, and the ease of the trip makes it a must-visit for any visiting birder. One birder from Australia even got his lifer Red-crowned Parakeet ! I personally had a great if exhausting day.
I got rather carried away showing all the plumages you can see around a breeding colony, which means I had to split my post on the species into two. They are capable of covering great distances, perhaps like an albatross. Unlike albatrosses, however, frigatebirds are also very manoeuvrable on the wing.
Corey asked that I didn’t post any albatrosses today, which suits me since I didn’t do a pelagic trip and thus didn’t see any. The beach isn’t just a roost, it’s a breeding site. And some jackass sounding calling… Okay, now it’s time to go find some albatross. Boulders Beach.
The species is somewhat unusual in that it is one of the few procellariids that still breeds on the mainland of New Zealand. It’s still certainly threatened, but you can still find them in the woodlands, at least during its winter breeding season (another oddity of this species).
Birds behaviour Borneo breeding hornbills Singapore' Honestly, it amazes me I have any time to bird at all. So this week, should you stop a mistake, or a minor factual inaccuracy, or even a complete bare-faced lie, well, it isn’t my fault. I saw a pair flying near Chiangi Beach, across from Pulau Ubin and near the famous airport.
Others, like the petrels and some of the auks, will lay a single egg per breeding attempt. The investment placed in each clutch bur seabirds is so great that only one breeding attempt can be seen to completion each year. For the larger albatrosses and the frigatebirds it is common to take longer and have rest years between attempts.
About six-and-a-half years ago I had the privilege of watching a young Waved Albatross on the Galapagos island of Española learning how to fly. It’s not often that we have the opportunity to glimpse the home life of albatrosses, nor of any seabird species. Technology to the rescue!
The two main chapters cover Marine Mammals (Orca; Whales; Dolphins and Porpoises; Sea Lions, Fur Seals, and Elephant Seal; Rarer Marine Mammals) and Seabirds (Albatrosses, Shearwaters and Fulmar, Strom-Petrels, Phalaropes, Alcids, Red-billed Tropicbird, Brown Booby, South Polar Skua, Jaegers, Gulls and Terns, Rarer Seabirds).
That’s why I went for an albatross, because it wasn’t my BBOY, but it would at least tweak Corey. I saw one other species of stork on the river, the Lesser Adjutant , a species that can be seen in Borneo but one people aren’t sure even breeds in Borneo anymore. All you need is a boat, or a scope on a windy day.
The Westland Petrel is a large endemic breeding seabird which has entirely black plumage. Clearly it would be much better to watch these species at Kaikoura, where I watched these guys with Albatross Encounter , close to shore and with the birds close to the boat. It also has pretty much entirely black plumage.
At Sea With the Marine Birds of the Raincoast opens with the unexpected appearance of a Laysan Albatross. We are all suckers for an albatross, at least in the United States. The author, conservation biologist Caroline Fox, is observing the albatross’s shadow to the side of the boat. Do I need to say anything more?
The Northwestern Hawaiian Islands are home to some of the largest assemblages of breeding seabirds in the United States. These remote islands, some more than 1,000 miles from Honolulu, are home to huge globally-significant colonies of Laysan and Black-footed Albatross, among many others.
Some birds breed in flocks, at least in part to avoid predation. This is my flock of Laysan Albatross , on Midway Atoll. You may be happy to have a flock of chickadees visit your backyard, but it is difficult to ignore hundreds of American White Pelicans streaming by. Des Lacs National Wildlife Refuge, North Dakota.
Three of the main candidates are Waved Albatross, Peruvian Booby, and Inca Tern. The tendency for migrants to be rarities doesn’t exclude birds that breed in the country, Harpy and Crested Eagles perching at the top of the rare resident target list.
(Creative Commons Attribution Share-alike) Dunedin You don’t have to go very far to see spectacular seabirds in this southern city, the adjoining Otago Peninsula is home to the only mainland colony of albatrosses in the world. Image by Dunedin NZ, Creative Commons.
but I really feel I should nominate an albatross, if only because I love taunting Corey about them. I’ll go for the Black-browed Albatross , in celebration of the fact that conservation efforts have resulted in this species being downgraded from endangered to near threatened this year. He wrote about it in more detail here.
to the ongoing conservation of breeding Lesser Flamingos at Kimberley’s Kamfers Dam to the Albatross Task Force, which works with fishermen to find solutions to seabird bycatch (birds caught in fishermen’s nets). They range from the successful eradication of feral cats from Marion Island (hear that, Corey?)
The clifftop habitats along rocky shores of the North Atlantic (on both sides of the pond) abound in bird biomass during breeding bouts, for instance. When Albatross alight in temporal alignment anything else is swamped out. There are probably other major trends that depend, for example, on latitude and timing.
The maps, which are positioned to the left of the text, are small and indicate primary seasonal status–whether and where the bird is a resident breeding species, seasonal breeding migrant, seasonal nonbreeding migrant, or transient migrant. I love the writing here.
Greater Adjutants are huge birds that were once widespread across much of Southeast Asia; today there are two small breeding populations in India and Cambodia. Finally, deciding that a duck that required 250 acres of land to breed probably did not welcome intruders, we tiptoed out of the swamp. 3) Greater Adjutant. 6) Garganey.
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