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ID-FRONTIERS for June 25-30, 2000
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Subject: Obtaining 'Wild Birds of Japan'
From: Nick Lethaby <Nick.Lethaby(AT)ARCCORES.COM>
Date: 26 Jun 2000 10:27am
All:
For those of you with an interest in East Asian birds, there has an excellent
photographic guide around for time. It has been reviewed by Jon King for
Biriding World and I think someone reviewed for it for Winging it/Birding
World. Although the text is in Japanese, the selection of photos is excellent.
However, obtaining it is not so easy. I have yet to see any bird book vendor
who carries it.
I was able to obtain a copy through through a Japanese book company that
operates in the US. Go to www.kinokuniya.com. The price is $45.00. The title
and authors are:
Wild Birds of Japan by Takuya Kanouchi, Naoya Abe, Hideo Ueda. 1998. Yama-kei
Publishers.
You will need to call one of their offices and have it special ordered. It
takes abotut 4-6 weeks. I think once it arrives, you can have them mail it to
you. I simply picked mine up at the local store, but this will only be an
option in a few major cities.
Nick Lethaby
Product Manager, ARC Cores Inc.
Tel: 408 360 2131
e-mail: Nick.Lethaby@arccores
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: re. Obtaining 'Wild Birds of Japan'
From: Millington/BIS <sales(AT)birdingworld.co.uk>
Date: 26 Jun 2000 1:56pm
Hi
In case of any difficulty,
Books for Birders (Birding World) can supply
'Wild Birds of Japan by Takuya Kanouchi, Naoya Abe, Hideo Ueda. 1998'
for $60 inc. airmail postage and packing and insurance.
There are plenty in stock for immediate dispatch...
cheers
Richard
sales(AT)birdingworld.co.uk
(Birding World, Books for Birders & Birdline)
Bird Information Service, Stonerunner, Coast Road,
Cley next the Sea, Holt, Norfolk, NR25 7RZ, UK
(VAT Reg 676 8589 56)
Tel. 44 (0) 1263 741139 Fax. 741173
Website www.birdingworld.co.uk
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Re: Obtaining 'Wild Birds of Japan'
From: norman van swelm <Norman.vanswelm(AT)WXS.NL>
Date: 26 Jun 2000 7:12pm
Indeed an excellent book and so easy to get via Birding World' s Book shop!
Norman
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: long version/NEXT ABA Atlantic Pelagic birds
From: Ned Brinkley <Phoebetria(AT)AOL.COM>
Date: 27 Jun 2000 4:17am
Hey folks --
Below is a very long version, not really finished, of the article predicting
the "next" new pelagic species to the ABA Area. Some of the cut bits (as on
skuas) might be useful for someone researching or thinking about those
groups. I would do a zipped attachment, but I know some machines can't
handle those.
Hasta my eggo,
Ned Brinkley
Cape Charles, VA USA
The Next New ABA Birds: Atlantic Pelagic Zone
Edward S. Brinkley
A felicitous prefatory note.
As the votes for the next birds for the Atlantic pelagic zone were still
only half-tallied by the present compiler, a marvelous thing occurred: the
two top species predicted by many panelists were seen—both on 8 August
1998—on duelling pelagic trips, and by several of the panel themselves! On
this date, Mary Gustafson, Harry LeGrand, Jr., Paul Guris, and others aboard
the Country Girl off Oregon Inlet, North Carolina, located the first
photographed Bulwer’s Petrel (Bulweria bulwerii) for the western North
Atlantic, and not five hours later, Brian Patteson, Michael O’Brien, Grayson
Pearce, George Armistead, Rick Blom, and crew on the Miss Hatteras located
and photographed a Swinhoe’s Storm-Petrel (Oceanodroma monorhis) off
Hatteras, North Carolina. These records are now under consideration by the
ABA Checklist Committee.
Bulwer’s Petrel, one of four Atlantic pelagic candidate species (of
almost fifty total species) predicted in Don Roberson’s 1988 article, has in
fact been reported on at least four other occasions in the ABA area, though
not until 26 July 1998 off Monterey, California, were the first photographs
for the Area obtained. Bulwer’s Petrel had been well studied and described
on 1 July 1992 off Oregon Inlet, North Carolina, and was subsequently added
to that state’s list (Hass 1996; North Carolina Bird Records Committee 1994).
The other three records for the western North Atlantic north of the Caribbean
were also solo birds: on 15 July 1980 on the Argentia, the ferry between
Newfoundland and North Sydney, Nova Scotia (Bret Whitney and David Wolf), on
1 May 1984 off Florida (Haney and Wainright 1985), and 14 May 1969 between
Key West and the Dry Tortugas, Florida (Taylor 1972). A report of this
species about 80 miles east of Chincoteague NWR on 15 August 1993 (Kain 1995)
is plausible but lacks photographic documentation. Interestingly,
Black-browed Albatross, for which no western North Atlantic specimen or
photograph exists, has a place on the ABA Checklist, whereas Bulwer’s records
have been treated differently, despite its being a remarkably distinctive
species. Swinhoe’s Storm-Petrel was observed well off Oregon Inlet, NC, on
20 August 1993 by a camera-less Brinkley (1995), who has carried a camera
ever since. Though dark-rumped Oceanodroma are have been glimpsed in the
western North Atlantic on occasion, others have not been identified to
species.
The contributors
Contributing their sagacity and speculation to this article were Alan
Brady, P. A. Buckley, Mary Gustafson, Harry LeGrand, Brian Patteson, Butch
Pearce, Mike Tove, Dick Veit, Angus Wilson, and the compiler. All members of
the panel are avid seabirders, with many thousands of hours (in some cases,
many hundreds of days) spent at sea to study and photograph seabirds. The
panel includes five veteran organizers of pelagic trips (the remainder being
long-time leaders), four professors, two seabird biologists, and six Ph. D.s
(all but the compiler being biologists). Everyone on the panel has
published articles and photographs related to the occurrence of seabirds in
the ABA Area, and all have been involved in the documentation of rare and
cryptic species in the western North Atlantic. Most importantly, perhaps,
everyone on the panel has spent a great deal of time over the years thinking
about patterns of vagrancy in the North Atlantic and elsewhere -- and
preparing to identify vagrant seabirds when they do materialize.
In all, the ten members of the panel selected 21 species (plus two
extras) as being possible in the Atlantic Pelagic zone. All of these are
illustrated to some extent in available seabird identification guides
(Harrison 1987, 1997, Enticott and Tipling 1997), but additional materials
are needed for more difficult groups, and these are listed below. Because so
many indices of possible vagrancy into the ABA Area are contained in articles
or books that to most North Americans are obscure, we have referenced the
most detailed (usually the original) sources for various records. Rather
than treat field identification of each species below in brief, which would
not be feasible for most of the species selected, we leave it to the reader
to navigate the literature at leisure. In some cases, taxonomy of several
groups in unsettled and/or heavily debated; fans of the pelagic environment
will want to keep abreast of changes in this forum as well.
One species predicted to occur in the Roberson (1988) article, White
Tern, Gygis alba, also appears below, but the other potentially “pelagic”
picks -- House Crow (Corvus splendens, an inveterate ship-rider) and Ascension
Frigatebird (Fregata aquila, a threatened species of the South Atlantic )
did not make the current cuts. These differences are not necessarily
surprising: the taxonomy of seabirds, particularly the tubenoses, has changed
so greatly in the past ten years that all but two of the panel’s top six
selections were, in 1988, considered subspecies of more familiar North
Atlantic seabirds -- Great Skua, or Cory’s and Manx shearwaters. Several of
these new species are “cryptic,” in the sense of “difficult to distinguish
from similar species,” which will mean new challenges for seagoing birders.
The reckoning
This salty panel had to contend with a number of tough variables in casting
their votes. The Atlantic pelagic area has produced relatively few North
American “firsts” (Table 1) compared to the other six zones analyzed in this
series, and with the documentation of Bulwer’s Petrel and Swinhoe’s
Storm-Petrel in 1998, there are few species that leap to mind as obvious
prospects for occurrence in this zone.
The Ship Assistance Issue had to be wrangled with. How many of the
region’s vagrants had been or might be hitch-hikers on vessels coming into
(or near) the ABA Area at some point? Are apparently anomalous records from
the North Atlantic evidence of vagrancy—or just casualties of the
unintentioned traffic in seabirds that occurs as a result of military and
commercial vessels’ movements? Those in any doubt about the phenomenon of
ship-riding are encouraged to take a day reading accounts from the Royal
Naval Bird Watching Society’s bulletin, the Sea Swallow or articles on
“stowaways” elsewhere in the British press (e. g., Durand 1972, Curtis 1990).
Still more remarkable accounts of ship-riding, restraint of birds aboard
ship, and feeding of birds by mariners remain unpublished. The “bible” for
those interested in coming to grips with vagrancy in tubenoses has long been
W. R. P. Bourne’s “Long-distance vagrancy in the petrels” (1967), which
contains most relevant historical records through the mid-1960s. The
interesting debate about “natural” versus “human-assisted” vagrancy has
occupied the pages of Birding (Roberson 1984) and American Birds (Kaufman
1995) before as well.
Though many European countries have separate categories on their
avifaunal lists for species found dead on beaches or believed to have arrived
with human assistance, Iceland is the only country to have a specific
subcategory on its checklist for birds known to have ridden ships into the
country -- a category currently occupied only by a Black-throated Green
Warbler (Dendroica virens)! The progressive view on “immigration” in some
countries sees ship-riding as a legitimate means for birds to survive and
disperse: ship-riders such as House Crow have been added to the official
ornithological list of countries such as Holland on this basis (a single
Irish record has not been resolved). Currently, even suspicion of
transportation by ship is enough to bar a bird from the ABA Checklist
entirely, so that the present panel was compelled to constrain its balloting
to species we suspected would be considered “legitimate” vagrants if they
were to turn up in the ABA Area. (Second-guessing records committees has its
perils, of course.)
Debates about “origins” of individual seabirds are speculative at best,
as there is usually no evidence to support claims of any sort. With the
abolition of the “Origin Uncertain” category in 1996 (Dunn et al. 1997), gray
areas are no longer permitted on the ABA Checklist, with the result that
records of potentially “natural” vagrants may become invisible to the birding
and ornithological communities: White-chinned Petrel is a salient example
here (DeBenedictis 1994; cf. Bourne’s concluding discussion [1967]).
Light-mantled Sooty Albatross (Phoebetria palpebrata) makes an interesting
case in this regard: the 1996 California record (Howell and Pyle 1995) was
hailed as a first for the northern hemisphere. Who remembered the supposedly
discredited Oregon specimen (Audubon 1839) or the French specimen from
Dunkerque (van Kempen 1889)? Who is to say how any of these birds arrived in
the northern hemisphere? Naturally, though, there are limits to what one can
reasonably consider an unassisted vagrant: the Snow Petrel found dead on an
eastern German harbor beach strains plausibility -- it must surely have come
off the deck of a ship. Bourne (1967) notes many such implausible cases.
On the other hand, there is ample evidence from the recovery of banded
individuals that birds cross the North Atlantic Ocean not infrequently; some
of these species are not likely to have ridden a ship. Recent transatlantic
records of species remind us how routinely we underestimate the movements of
seabirds, e. g. the records of Elegant Tern from Ireland, France, Sicily, and
Spain (Gantlett 1997), or the Little Gull banded in the archipelago of
Holmsund (near Umea, latitude 64° N), Sweden on 7 July 1995 that was found 23
June 1996 near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a distance of 6492 km. Of 8
million birds banded in Sweden, this is the first bird found in America
(Magnergård 1996). In wider global perspective, we find records of Great and
Lesser frigatebirds spanning from New Zealand to Siberia; a Common Tern
banded in Finland reaching the west coast of Australia (the world distance
record for a banding return; Minton 1997); Crested Auklet in western
Greenland and in waters north of Iceland; Ancient Murrelet in England;
Parakeet Auklet and Tufted Puffin in Sweden; Pigeon Guillemot in Norway;
Glaucous-winged Gull on Madeira and in Morocco; Black-footed Albatross at
Sicily; Aleutian Tern in England; a banded British Manx Shearwater reaching
Australia! Surely few if any of these birds were stowaways on ships.
As Robert Cushman Murphy (1936) has argued convincingly, the pattern of
wind currents, as much as the patterns and temperature of seawater currents,
influence where certain species are found, over periods of time both short
and very long. The distribution of seabirds over many millions of years is
beyond the scope of this paper, but suffice it to say that albatrosses were
common breeders (at least four or five species, including Short-tailed!) in
the North Atlantic until about 12,000 years ago. Currently, however, the
North Atlantic has no nesting albatross species, and this dearth has
attributed to the wide band of “doldrums,” or very low wind velocities,
centered on the equatorial Atlantic, a barrier to recolonization, it seems,
and probably a hurdle for seabird groups that rely heavily on wind: certain
tubenoses and frigatebirds in particular.
Many seabirds rely on prevailing winds for aspects of their feeding and
breeding strategies; the abilities to forage and to colonize new breeding
areas are certainly limited by favorable wind currents. Thus, the balloters
had to take into account the counterclockwise patterns of wind and water that
prevail in the North Atlantic. Because numerous Atlantic seabirds do,
despite the risks, make transequatorial migrations (Wilson’s Storm-Petrel,
South Polar Skua, Arctic Tern, Long-tailed Jaeger, Greater and Sooty
shearwaters, and others), balloters also had to consider atmospheric
conditions in the equatorial Atlantic and the South Atlantic.
The panel had to contend with other vagaries of vagrancy in seabirds. As
Michael Patten (1998) has pointed out, we often have very little
understanding of how and why certain seabirds appear out of presumed “normal
range.” Surely, as with the El Niño-Southern Oscillation events of
1997-1998, worldwide weather patterns influence the distribution of seabirds.
Tropical cyclones have been long known to displace seabirds, but such
cyclones do not form in the South Atlantic (with one documented exception:
McAdie and Rappaport [1991]), so that they are unlikely to bring birds “up”
from the southern hemisphere (contra Murphy 1936). Bourne (1967) summarized
the state of thinking well:
[...] ‘normal’ vagrancy appears to occur mainly by dispersal along
coastlines and along the main current and wind systems of the oceans in the
direction of water and air flow. As a result of the latter effect, birds
also tend to move west in high latitudes and the subtropical wind zones, and
east in the belt of temperate westerlies. In closed oceans, they also tend
to move clockwise around the anticyclone stationary in the middle
latitudes in the northern hemisphere but anticlockwise in the south. They
are particularly liable to be blown west and into higher latitudes in the
subtropical zones, and then sometimes back east again, along the paths of
hurricanes and other tropical storms.
The pelagic reaches that bound the ABA Area are, admittedly, mare
incognita to nearly everyone on the panel, and there is a distinct gap in
published pelagic survey data for these areas. Those who have travelled
between North and South Atlantic report few birds over deep, tropical waters,
and many of the species encountered east of the Caribbean Basin are already
known from the ABA Area, either as very uncommon visitors in the extreme
southern areas (Black Noddy, Red-footed Booby) or as regular pelagic visitors
of low density (White-tailed and Red-billed tropicbirds, White-faced
Storm-Petrel). In the eastern Atlantic, there are relatively few species of
seabird that have not already occurred in the western North Atlantic, even if
only very infrequently, as Little Shearwater, and European Storm-Petrel, each
with two records (Dwight 1897, Peters 1924; Finch 1970).
The South Atlantic would therefore seem the most likely source of new
species, and indeed four of the six species selected are from the southern
hemisphere; the two eastern North Atlantic nesters selected are relatively
recent “splits” from the Cory’s and Manx shearwater complexes. Nevertheless,
the recent southern African Atlantic-side records of Indian and Pacific Ocean
species (Jouanin’s Petrel, Streaked and Pink-footed shearwaters) remind us
that these areas cannot be overlooked as potential sources of strays:
oceanographers, after all, often simply refer to a “World Ocean.” Though
none of the panel suggested any Indian (or Pacific) Ocean species as a likely
vagrants, we recall that the Atlantic seaboard of North America has hosted
both Buller’s and Short-tailed shearwaters (Paxton et al. 1985, Iliff 1998),
and Mottled Petrel has reached both upstate New York and the Falkland Islands
(Brewster 1881; Curtis 1995). A gadfly petrel filmed at Hawk Mountain
following Hurricane Gracie in October 1959 (Heintzelman 1961) was debated
for four decades (Hess 1997) before being placed recently on the AOU
Check-list as a Kermadec Petrel (American Ornithologists’ Union 1998).
There is, interestingly, an extant specimen of Kermadec Petrel for England
(Newstead and Coward 1908). These records and others indicate the difficulty
of prediction with wide-ranging birds, such as most seabird families contain.
Often, vagrant seabirds are found because they are ill or injured: is
their vagrancy related to illness, or is it because they are in poor health
that they are found (usually on beaches) in the first place? Possibly a bit
of both, as appears to be the case with cetaceans. Food shortages in their
“normal” ranges certainly stimulate exoduses in search of prey resources, but
could the opposite also cause “vagrancy”? An ephemeral abundance of food in
a certain area is almost certain to concentrate seabirds of some kind, but if
this abundance persists, long enough to sustain a species through a
spectacular nesting season, might not the augmented population be more likely
to provide a wandering juvenile a bit out of “range”? Population trends,
especially expansions, probably do produce “surplus” individuals (which, in
many seabirds, often delay breeding), and these are then likely to be
responsible for some seabirds that prospect and feed in new areas. In truth,
though, the mechanisms behind the comings and goings of seabirds are very
poorly known: their movements at sea have been only crudely studied until
very recently, with the advent of satellite transmitters, through which
researchers have been astonished to document flights of some tens of
thousands of kilometers per month in foraging Wandering Albatrosses
(Weimerskirch et al. 1988, Walker et al. 1995).
In summary, then, the panel worked to weigh the following factors in
choosing and ranking the six species: 1) atmospheric conduits; 2) foraging
opportunities in the Gulf Stream or Labrador Current; 3) population dynamics
in core ranges; 4) previous North Atlantic records outside the ABA Area; 5)
probability of straying based on other extralimital records; 6) likelihood of
transequatorial flight, based on wing dimensions and other physical
considerations. Several balloters also hedged their bets based on
field-identifiability of certain forms to species, which necessitated some
adjustments for Mediterranean Shearwater and the giant-petrels (see below).
As so many of the tubenoses and skuas have unsettled taxonomic rank, the
panel’s choices showed some variation in this respect (also flagged below).
Despite remarkable variety in the voting of the panel, a clear core of
choices emerged among the ten. The ranking of the top six species follows.
Brown Skua 35 points (7 lists)
Catharacta lonnbergi
Skua taxonomy and field identification are in flux. Various authors
recognize between three and six species, but for the purposes of this
article, five are recognized: Great (C. skua ), Southern (C. antarctica),
Brown (C. lonnbergi), South Polar (C. maccormicki), and Chilean (C.
chilensis). The best current information on identification is in the
Handbook of Australian, New Zealand, and Antarctic Birds (sections by D. J.
James; in Higgins and Davies 1996) and Skuas and Jaegers by K. M. Olsen and
H. Larsson (1997), which combines lonnbergi with both forms of antarctica,
the nominate and hamiltoni. Skua taxonomy was most recently considered in
Birding by DeBenedictis (1997), but the most relevant recent identification
discussions are in the British press (Gantlett and Harrap 1992, Newell et al.
1997, Jiguet 1997, Bearhop et al. 1998). For those interested in treading
where angels would not, it will be important to attend to the developing
global dialogue on Catharacta identification, and the various internet
discussion groups are awash in it.
Brown Skua is the largest of its genus and nests on the Antarctic
Continent to 65° S, on the Antarctic Peninsula, on South Georgia, on the
South Shetland, South Sandwich, and South Orkney islands, and elsewhere
outside the South Atlantic. About 7000 pairs of the species are known, and
on the South Shetlands, about ten per cent appear to be either hybrids with
the much smaller South Polar Skua or mixed pairs (Enticott and Tipling 1997).
There is surely much more afoot with southern skuas than our patchy
knowledge suggests. Since 1967, there have been a handful of western North
Atlantic reports of Catharacta that are not readily identifiable as either
Great Skua or South Polar Skua. A few of these are believed to be skuas of
the taxon lonnbergi (Hudson 1968, Brady 1977, Robertson 1977, Buckley et al.
1977, Brinkley 1994) or the group antarctica inclusive of lonnbergi (North Ca
rolina Bird Records Committee 1997).
One of these birds (Hudson 1968) was discovered through a banding return
and is still something of a mystery. Having been banded as an adult on
Deception Island on 27 January 1960 (FIDS band) and again at Gonzales Videla
Base, Graham Land, also in Antarctica, 7 March 1961 (USA band), it was
recovered by a fisherman off this Îles des Saintes, Guadeloupe, on 17 May
1967. This record has led to a confusing set of subsequent references, some
of which appear to imply that the individual was in fact more likely a South
Polar Skua identified by both teams of Antarctic researchers as a “Brown”
(e.g., Furness 1987). Olsen and Larsson (1997) cite the record as though two
banded individuals were involved, once citing Blake (1977), who reprints the
record as a Brown Skua, and next citing Stiles and Skutch (1989), who express
doubt about the identification. The British Trust for Ornithology’s archives
show that no measurements of the bird were made by banders (J. Clark, S. Davie
s, pers. comm.), and the file on this bird at the Bird Banding Laboratory in
Maryland has apparently gone missing. Because skuas were all considered
conspecific as recently as the 1960s, there was no reason for researchers to
distinguish among taxa at that time—and there is now little reason to suspect
that an actual Brown Skua was involved in this record, even though Brown
Skuas do nest at Deception Island.
It was once thought that Great Skua was the only skua in the northern
hemisphere—that is, until Pierre Devillers (1977) demonstrated the presence
in the North Pacific of South Polar Skua, now known to be a regular migrant
and summering bird on both ABA coasts. In fact, despite claims to the
contrary (Raffaele et al. 1998), other taxa of Catharacta have been found in
the northern hemisphere. Specimens of lonnbergi are known from north of the
equator from near the Karamanai River at Poojappura, India on 20 September
1933 (Ali 1969) and from near Malwan, Ratnagiri District, India (5 September
1957; Bombay Natural History Society specimen 20108; pers. review; listed as
5 August 1958 in Ali 1969), as well as from Sri Lanka (de Silva 1991).
Another five records of probable birds are known from Sri Lanka (de Silva
1989, 1991, Ali 1969), and other records of large Catharacta believed to be
this species hail from the United Arab Emirates (Richardson 1998), Oman (Oman
Bird Records Committee 1994), and Somalia (Urban et al. 1986). An extant
lonnbergi specimen listed as having been collected at Monterey Bay,
California, is believed mislabeled (Lee 1993), though at least one photograph
of a lonnbergi-like bird exists for that state (D. J. James, pers. comm.).
Many other records of apparent non-maccormicki exist in the Indian Ocean
basin. There are six records of the genus from Egypt and the Gulf of Suez as
well, and although none have been identified to species (Shirihai 1996),
these are likely to be of a southern taxon. The same is surely true of 16
records of at least 22 individuals in the northern Indian Ocean between 1952
and 1964 (Mörzer Bruyns and Voous 1965) and of records from the Arabian Sea
and Malaysia likewise not conclusively tied to a particular southern taxon
(Olsen and Larsson 1997). Skuas, presumably of which refer to this species,
are noted regularly off the eastern coast of Madagascar, where there is a
banding return of a bird banded on Marion Island (45° 54’ E, 37° 45’ S?),
recaptured at Tolañaro, Madagascar in March 1987 (Langrand 1990). The
distribution of skuas in southern oceans is still largely unknown, and indeed
the extent to which Great Skua might stray far from the North Atlantic is
completely unknown.
Cape Verde Shearwater 26 points (5 lists)
Calonectris edwardsii
This species, a recent split (Hazevoet 1995) from the Cory’s Shearwater
group (C. diomedea), nests only on the Cape Verde Islands off western Africa,
with a population of about 10,000 pairs. It is strikingly different from
both nominate and borealis Cory’s, being much darker above, with a longer
tail, narrow-appearing wings, smaller head, and thinner, grayish bill. If
seen with a group of Cory’s off the East Coast, its dark upperparts and small
size (smaller than Greater Shearwater, Puffinus gravis) would make it obvious
to observers familiar with the much larger borealis Cory’s (Bourne 1955,
Porter et al. 1997).
The extent of its at-sea movements away from the nesting areas is not
well-known, but it disperses between late November and late February, during
which time it appears to frequent waters off Senegal (Porter et al. 1997).
Currently, there is only one North American sight record of a bird believed
to be this species, a single bird in a large flight of Cory’s and other
shearwaters at Cape Point, Buxton, North Carolina, in May 1993 (Davis 1993).
There are several records from Brazil (Bahia and Rio de Janeiro/Sao Paulo; F.
Olmos, pers. comm.). Should it be found in the ABA Area, it is likely to be
given a different common name, as happened with Fea’s Petrel, which was first
dubbed Cape Verde Petrel, then Cape Verde Islands Petrel (to make the
distinction between the mainland African cape and the islands for which they
are named) before being renamed again, this time after its discoverer.
Yelkouan/Balearic (Mediterranean) Shearwater 23 points (5 lists)
Puffinus [y.]yelkouan and/or Puffinus [yelkouan ]mauretanicus
A complex of two similar forms, Mediterranean Shearwater resembles Manx
Shearwater (Puffinus puffinus), to which it is closely related. The eastern
taxon, “Yelkouan” Shearwater, has a total population of several thousand
pairs; it is not believed to leave the Mediterranean Sea. “Balearic”
Shearwater, however, with a population of up to 5000 pairs, disperses out
into the North Atlantic as far as Scotland and Scandinavia but is most common
between Morocco and France, June to October. It appears to be the more
likely of the two to show up in the ABA Area. Identification of this group
can be found in Bourne et al. (1988) and Yésou et al. (1990).
Black-bellied Storm-Petrel 13 points (4 lists)
Fregetta tropica
With a world population of around 150,000 pairs, this species has a
larger population than the related White-bellied Storm-Petrel (see below),
and though Black-bellied is more southerly in its distribution, it has been
recorded with certainty north of the equator in the North Atlantic and Indian
Oceans, as far north as the Gulf of Guinea (doc)?. Black-bellied
Storm-Petrel nests on islands in the South Atlantic including South Georgia,
Tristan da Cunha, Gough, the South Shetlands, South Orkneys, and Elephant
Island, and probably the South Sandwich Islands. Both Atlantic Fregetta are
striking birds, not likely to be confused with other seabirds, though there
is superficial resemblance to White-faced Storm-Petrel (Pelagodroma marina)
and partially leucistic individuals of other species.
Southern Giant-Petrel or Northern Giant-Petrel (or giant-petrel sp.)
Macronectes giganteus/halli 12-13 points (3-4 lists)
As there is still some skepticism that any giant-petrel seen in the North
Atlantic so far has been identified conclusively to species, the votes for
“giant-petrel sp.” were combined with those of both species, as it is likely,
as Angus Wilson notes, that observation from a boat or a seawatch may not
provide close enough views to identify a bird to species. These forms were
considered conspecific until relatively recently. Both species are numerous
in the South Atlantic, but Southern Giant-Petrel actually ranges farther
north than Northern, though it nests farther south than Northern (a situation
reminiscent of North American murre species).
Extralimital records are relatively few. On 2 November 1967, a single
giant-petrel, proabably a dark adult Southern, was seen off Ushant, France
(Meeth l969). Another probable adult, said to have a darker head, was
reported off the Wolf Rock, Cornwall, about two weeks earlier (King l982),
possibly the same bird. Another bird, apparently an immature giant-petrel,
was noted from Islay, Strathclyde, England, 6 June l976 (Verrall l982), and a
similar bird was reported from Flamborough Head, Humberside, England, on 4
July 1988 (Wilson and Slack 1996), also thought to have been a Southern.
There are a few documented occurrences of giant-petrels north of the equator
from the Pacific, the most noteworthy being one from Midway Atoll in 1959,
1961, and 1962 (Fisher 1965). Banding returns in both species indicate a
slight tendency for northward dispersal during prebreeding ages, regularly up
to about 10° S (Marchant and Higgins 1990). Giant-petrels are probably able
to sustain powered (flapping) flight over longer periods than are larger
albatrosses (with their wings’ higher aspect ratios), which would be of great
advantage to a bird crossing the equatorial doldrums.
Gray Petrel Procellaris cinerea 10 points (4 lists)
This robust Procellaria petrel has a relatively small population in the
South Atlantic, with only a few thousand at Gough Island and 50-100 pairs in
the Tristan da Cunha group. It has shown a tendency to wander northward,
with records as far north as Ascension Island, at 8° S, but it suffers
significant mortality annually to the longline fishery (Enticott and Tipling
1997). This species tied for sixth place with the next species.
Subantarctic Skua (=Southern Skua) 10 points (4 lists)
Catharacta antarctica
This is a sticky wicket not likely to be resolved without examination of
a bird in hand. Most researchers identify the Great Skua-like birds nesting
on the Falkland Islands, as well as in coastal Argentina from Chubut to
Tierra del Fuego provinces, as the nominate form of Southern Skua, Catharacta
a. antarctica. Its population is about 3000-5000 pairs. The similar form
Catharacta antarctica hamiltoni, nesting at Tristan (200 pairs) and Gough
(2,500 pairs) islands in the southeastern South Atlantic, may have a total
world population approaching 8000 pairs. The nominate form is known to
hybridize to a limited extent with the distinctive Chilean Skua (C.
chilensis). Both taxa of Southern Skua are difficult to distinguish from from
Great Skua (see Olsen and Larsson 1997).
With difficulties in taxonomy, identification, and with very few data on
“typical” nonbreeding range at sea, this form is scarcely known as a
“vagrant.” Murphy (1936) noted what was probably this form as far north as
Buenos Aires, Argentina. There is apparently a record for United Arab
Emirates (Richardson 1998). One extremely well-documented record from off
New York appeared to several authorities to be C. a. hamiltoni (Brady 1988);
this bird was in heavy molt in May, a time of year when Great Skuas should be
in fresh plumage.
The runners-up
Where terrestrial prognosticators could note that a particular species,
for instance, nests “within 100 miles” of the U. S. border, the pelagic
possibilities—at least as far as “normal” ranges are concerned -- are
measured in thousands of miles in many cases. This difference in scale makes
many of the surmises, especially the “Honorable Mention” list of 13 species
below, subtle speculation indeed, and the confirmation in the ABA Area of any
of the species on this list might be as much a stroke of luck (not to say
ship-assisted luck) as a bit of keen prediction. This list is short, in
descending rank:
Cape Gannet (Morus capensis) 9 points (3 lists)
Soft-plumaged Petrel (Pterodroma mollis) 7 points (2 lists) tied with:
White-bellied Storm-Petrel (Fregetta grallaria) 7 points (2 lists)
Zino’s Petrel (Pterodroma madeira) 6 points (2 lists)
Magellanic Penguin (Spheniscus magellanicus) 6 points (1 list)
Audouin’s Gull (Larus audouni) 5 points (1 list)
Gray-headed Albatross (Thalassarche chrysostoma) 4 points (2 lists) tied
with:
Cape Petrel (Daption capense) 4 points (2 lists)
Atlantic Petrel (Pterodroma incerta) 4 points (1 list)
European Shag (Phalacrocorax aristotelis) 3 points (1 list) tied with:
Antarctic Tern (Sterna vitatta) 3 points (1 list)
Brown-hooded Gull (Larus maculipennis) 2 points (1 list)
White Tern (Gygis alba) 1 point (1 list) tied with:
Jamaican Petrel (Pterodroma caribbaea) 1 point (1 list)
For Cape Gannet, there are several disputed reports from the northeastern
North Atlantic, the most compelling being one from Bass Rock, Shetland,
Scotland (1831; MacGillivray 1837-1852) as well as from Spain and the western
Sahara (Beaman and Madge 1998). Australia has at least two records, including
a bird nesting among Australasian Gannets from 1981 through 1988 (Marchant
and Higgins 1990). Other evidence of vagrancy includes two records off
eastern South America, one record being in the Beagle Channel near Ushuaia,
Argentina (pers. review of photographs), and 14 records in the vicinity of
Amsterdam and St Paul Islands (Marchant and Higgins 1990). Its winter range
overlaps with Northern Gannet’s off western Africa, and its population of
about 80,000 pairs appears to be stable, though it suffered sharp declines
between 1959 and 1980 (Crawford et al. 1983).
Soft-plumaged Petrel breeds in the Tristan da Cunha group and at Gough
Island in the South Atlantic, an area from which Greater Shearwaters travel
to reach the ABA Area. Their population there is not known precisely but is
probably over 2500 pairs (Williams 1984), smaller than in the South Pacific
populations at the Crozets and Prince Edward Islands and elsewhere. Though
recorded north only to 11° S (Bourne and Curtis 1985), their substantial
population provides the raw material for vagrancy. The identification of this
species is covered well in recent literature (e.g., Tove 1997), though there
are pitfall plumages documented, such as Fea’s Petrels with uppertail coverts
and backs the same color (Brinkley and Patteson 1998).
White-bellied Storm-Petrel may already have occurred in the North
Atlantic. There is a report for the Cape Verde Islands (Beaman and Madge
1998) and a nineteenth-century report from the waters off St. Marks, Florida,
of seven birds caught on hook and line that were originally believed to have
been Black-bellied Storm-Petrels (Howell 1932). W. R. P. Bourne (1964),
analyzing measurements of the birds as reported by G. N. Lawrence, determined
that the birds must have been White-bellied Storm-Petrel. As there are no
extant specimens, the species is listed only in the AOU Check-list’s
Appendix C (American Ornithologists’ Union 1998). With a far smaller
population than the similar Black-bellied Storm-Petrel—only a few thousand
pairs on Gough and Tristan da Cunha islands—White-bellied seems perhaps a bit
less likely to stray into the ABA Area. It has been recorded north to 7° S
in the South Atlantic but to 2° N in the North Pacific.
Zino’s Petrel resembles a small version of Fea’s Petrel (Zino and Zino
1986) and is a critically endangered species known only from its breeding
area on the island of Madeira in the eastern North Atlantic. Its field
identification needs further study, but its very shallow bill and small size
would probably—given close studies—make it apparent to observers familiar
with Fea’s Petrel in the field (Tove 1997). The population of Zino’s Petrel
is currently unknown, but accessible, known sites have produced 42 fledged
birds between 1987 and 1998 (F. Zino, pers. comm.). Its small population
would appear to make it an unlikely candidate for appearance in the ABA Area,
but such was thought to be the case with Bermuda Petrel until its population
began to recover in the latter third of the twentieth century. Likewise
clouded by uncertainty about identification, the satisfactory documentation
of Bermuda Petrel in the ABA Area has been a slow process (cf. Wingate et al.
1997; Brinkley and Patteson 1998).
Magellanic Penguin might seem a counterintuitive choice—how would this
one find its way from South America? In the nonbreeding season, this species
ranges north to southern Brazil, with records as far north as Rio de Janeiro.
Still, this is over 20° south of the equator! Stray Magellanic Penguins
have been noted as far from its southern South American home as Australia and
New Zealand (Marchant and Higgins 1990), as well as South Georgia and
possibly Tristan da Cunha (Enticott and Tipling 1997), and these records
probably indicate birds swept along in the the West Wind Drift, the
prevailing easterly currents of the southern South Atlantic and the Southern
Ocean. A bird in the ABA Area would need similar currents to make the
journey. Reaching southern Brazil is no problem for a penguin here, as the
Falkland Current runs northward along the southern cone of the continent.
Toward its northern end, it meets the Brazil Current, which runs southward.
If a penguin could pass beyond the influence of the Brazil Current, it would
then reach the Atlantic-Equatorial Current, which could transport it toward
the Caribbean and North America. With a population of between 4 and 10
million, and a range expansion northward documented in the twentieth century,
the species certainly has an outside chance of producing a vagrant north of
eastern Brazil.
Audouin’s Gull, a relatively rare species of the Mediterranean Sea with
about 17,000 pairs, disperses westward out of the Mediterranean south to the
Canary Island and Senegal in the nonbreeding season. Since 1987, it has
enjoyed both protection at its colonies and even “management” of sorts,
something very few gull species receive! Vagrants have been recorded in
Switzerland, France, the Czech Republic, the Republic of Georgia, Egypt,
Jordan, and Turkey (King and Shirihai 1996), with as many as 17 records from
Israel 1914-1991 (Shirihai 1996). It is conceivable that this species could
be recorded on a pelagic trip, but it seems more likely that a first New
World record would come from the littoral zone or onshore.
Brown-hooded Gull, the South American equivalent of Black-headed Gull,
looks so much like that equivalent in fact that it would probably be passed
off as one virtually anywhere it might occur out of range (likewise, a
Black-headed Gull in South America would probably be passed off as a
Brown-hooded). Though a very common bird in South America, it is thought to
be sedentary in its range, reaching only eastern Brazil on the Atlantic side
of South America (Enticott and Tipling 1997). The first clue to a vagrant
might be feather wear or the stage of plumage: an adult
Black-headed/Brown-hooded type in alternate plumage in the middle of the
northern winter should be studied carefully! But a vagrant is probably less
likely to be an adult, and certainly Black-headed Gulls in alternate plumage
in winter have been recorded. Black-headed Gulls on the southeastern United
States coast, where Brown-hooded may be most likely to appear, are rare
enough that each one should be studied and photographic in detail
(particularly the distribution of white and black in the wing), with an eye
out for this crypto-vagrant.
Gray-headed Albatross has possibly occurred in the North Atlantic: one
specimen was collected in Norway in 1834 or 1837 (Bourne 1967), and there is
a record of a skeleton found in Iceland in about 1844 that may refer to this
species (Cramp and Simmons 1977). Neither record is considered firm (Bourne
1967). Half the world population nests at South Georgia (48,000 pairs), but
longline fisheries have taken a heavy toll on this and other large tubenose
species in recent years (Alexander et al. 1997). Young birds may disperse
northward (Enticott and Tipling 1997), but adults apparently do not (Bourne
1967).
Cape Petrel has a checkered history in the North Atlantic and North
Pacific. Of some dozen reports north of the equator, there are five European
records confirmed by specimen (Cramp and Simmons 1974) and one North American
record in the Atlantic, a bird shot at Harpswell, Maine, in June 1873 (Norton
1922). Reports from the Pacific come from California and Mexico (American
Ornithologists’ Union 1998), and Lucas (1887) documents a bird following a
ship in the Pacific north to 16° N. The most recent North American sight
record was made by a knowledgeable boat captain off North Carolina from July
1985 (Lee 1986). None of these records enjoys credibility at the moment, for
a host of reasons, among them the loose practices of specimen-labelling in
the early days of collecting (see Bourne 1964). As avid ship-followers, Cape
Petrels often collide with ships’ structures or come aboard during inclement
or foggy weather; one marked Cape Petrel even followed a ship for about 5000
miles (King 1839). Their abundance in the southern hemisphere (where
probably several million pairs nest), coupled with their frequent presence
aboard ships—and the paucity of at-sea records north of 25° S in the North
Atlantic—means that the species, even if well-documented at sea in the
future, may never receive the imprimatur of a faunal records committee.
Nevertheless, the species ranges to the equator in the Pacific and into the
Benguela Current off western South Africa, so it may be a bonafide vagrant
when found in the North Atlantic.
Atlantic Petrel may be a “sleeper” candidate, one that appears in the
North Atlantic before many of the others above. It has strayed as far north
as Eilat, Israel, 31 May 1982 (Shirihai 1987) and 18-24 April 1983 (Van der
Schot 1989), and to Djibouti, in the Gulf of Aden, 3 November 1985 (Welch and
Welch 1986). There is an astonishing record for the European interior at
Zelinki or Dolinki, Zips, [Czech Republic or Slovakia??] (Godman 1910).
Given the species’ relatively small population, four firm records suggest a
strong propensity to wander (Bourne 1992a).
White Tern is a pantropical species nesting in the South Atlantic at
Ascension, Fernando Noronha, Trinidade, Martin Vas, and St. Helena (the
nominate subspecies), and a total Atlantic population of several thousand
pairs. It is not clear how this species disperses in the nonbreeding season
over most of its world range, but at least one bird has moved a great
distance: Bermuda has a record of White Tern of a Pacific subspecies
(candida, itself a candidate for status as a separate species)—a flight of at
least 9000 miles (Amos 1991)!
European Shag nests as close to the ABA Area as Iceland, and some young
birds from the northern populations apparently do disperse southward
(Enticott and Tipling 1997). There are no records for Greenland.
Long-distance vagrancy would seem unlikely, at least as far as North America,
but it might show up along the coast—obviously any slender-necked shag should
be studied carefully in the East!
Antarctic Tern is possibly the most esoteric selection of the bunch.
Owing to confusion with other tern species, its whereabouts in the
nonbreeding season, January through May, are not fully known, though southern
South America and southern Africa both hold numbers. The species nests on
most of the subantarctic islands of the South Atlantic mentioned for other
species on these lists, with subspecific rank accorded many of these
colonies.
Jamaican Petrel, once thought to be a dark morph of Black-capped Petrel,
nested in the Blue Mountains of Jamaica until the end of the nineteenth
century, when the last specimens were taken and the last reports exist (Imber
1991). It is a striking species not likely to be confused with other dark
gadfly petrels, with deep chocolate plumage and pearly uppertail coverts (see
Plate 83, Raffaele et al. 1998). The single vote tendered for this species
may be wishful thinking, but searches for a remnant population are ongoing in
Jamaica (Douglas 1997) and may yet bear fruit.
Other species offered as lagniappe by the panel of contributors included
Royal Albatross (Diomedea epomophora complex) and Kerguelen Petrel (Lugensa
brevipes).
The one record of Royal Albatross from anywhere near the North Atlantic
hails from Morocco, a skull picked up on the coast in about 1885 (Heim de
Balsac and Mayaud 1962)—not much precedent to go on and not universally
accepted. Wandering Albatross has similar proportions to Royal and has
already been recorded with certainty from California (1967), Panama (1937),
off Portugal (1963), and at off Sicily (1957), with “possible” occurrences in
Florida (pre-1884; 1885), Oregon (1813), France (1758, 1830), Belgium (1833,
1887), Norway (1764), the Canary Islands (eighteenth century), England
(1909), and off the Faroes (1894; see Bourne 1992b, 1967). Royal Albatross
is present in the nonbreeding season in large numbers in the southwestern
South Atlantic and is not unthinkable in the western North Atlantic. The
loss of hundreds of both of these graceful giants to long-line fishermen’s
hooks in the southern hemisphere every year makes the appearance of any of
the great albatrosses in the northern hemisphere an increasingly remote
possibility (Alexander et al. 1997).
Kerguelen Petrel is a very small gadfly petrel-like tubenose that nests
at Tristan da Cunha, where several hundred thousand birds are estimated. It
has been detected quite far north in the Indian Ocean—to Somalia and the Red
Sea (Enticott and Tipling 1997). The species appears to have light
wing-loading, which is probably a factor in its regular wrecks in Australia
and New Zealand, and may indicate that it is a likely prospect for North
Atlantic records.
Though the chance of seeing any of these birds on a pelagic trip on the
East Coast may seem remote -- perchance once in a lifetime—who would have
dared predict the simultaneous appearance of Swinhoe’s Storm-Petrel and
Bulwer’s Petrel off North Carolina one balmy August day in 1998?
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Dr. Pamela Rasmussen of the Smithsonian Institution for providing
video footage and measurements of Indian Catharacta specimens and to P. A.
Buckley, who labored over the minutiae of the manuscript and much improved
the text.
Table 1 First ABA Records for Nine Species in the Region (All Code 3-5
species first recorded from the Atlantic Pelagic Zone, including Code 3-5
pelagic species first detected in the adjacent Littoral Zone)
At-sea records
Swinhoe’s Storm-Petrel August 1993/August 1998 off Hatteras, NC
White-faced Storm-Petrel September 1885 off Nantucket, MA
Fea’s Petrel May 1981/May 1992 off Hatteras, NC
Bermuda Petrel April 1983/May 1996 off Hatteras, NC
White-tailed Eagle November 1914 off Nantucket, MA
Red-billed Tropicbird August 1876 Newfoundland Banks
Shoreline island records of pelagic species
Little Shearwater August 1883 Sullivan’s Island, SC
European Storm-Petrel August 1970 Sable Island, NS
Lesser Frigatebird July 1960 Deer Isle, ME
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[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Dunlin/Curlew Sandpiper
From: Angus Wilson <wilsoa02(AT)ENDEAVOR.MED.NYU.EDU>
Date: 27 Jun 2000 9:06am
I have continued to recieve comments on Brian Small's interesting sandpiper
that he photographed in Texas during April a couple of years ago. No clear
consensus has been reached with respect to identification. Some 50% of
respondents identified the bird as a Dunlin (Calidris alpina), while 43%
opted for Curlew Sandpiper (Calidris ferruginea). Others hinted that it
might be hybrid or aberrant individual. Opinions ranged from categorical to
very circumspect. Currently, my own opinion is that the bird should remain
unidentified because there are niggling details that seem incorrect for
either species. Whilst the possibility of a hybrid cannot be discounted,
there simply isn't enough information in the literature to identify it as
such.
Hopefully this dialogue has raised awareness to the overt similarities
between the long-billed forms of Dunlin (pacifica, hudsonia and sakhalin)
and Curlew Sandpiper outside of alternate-plumage. The photo also
hightlights the difficulty of identifying shorebirds from a single
excellent-quality photograph, a phenomenon already well known to gull
fanatics.
Many thanks to everyone who has contributed so far.
In case you haven't seen it yet, the photo and summary of comments are at:
http://www.best.com/~petrel/BSmallSHorebird.html
Additional input is very welcome.
Angus Wilson
***********************************
New York City
tel: (212) 263-0206
Fax: (212) 263-8276
E-mail: wilsoa02(AT)popmail.med.nyu.edu
Bird ID Web Site: http://www.best.com/~petrel/index.html
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Correction/Atlantic article
From: Ned Brinkley <Phoebetria(AT)AOL.COM>
Date: 27 Jun 2000 12:02pm
Apologies for an oversight in the article circulated earlier this morning --
Alf Tore Mjös points out that a record of Pigeon Guillemot from Norway has
not been accepted by the Norwegian Rarities Committee (NSKF), of which he is
Secretary. The bird is believed to have been an aberrant Black Guillemot.
Ned Brinkley
Cape Charles, Virginia, USA
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Greater Shearwater near WA
From: ian paulsen <ipaulsen(AT)LINKNET.KITSAP.LIB.WA.US>
Date: 29 Jun 2000 3:24pm
HI Bird Frontiers:
I just got word that a Greater Shearwater was seen near WA in Canadian
waters last week and I was wondering how many records there are for the
North Pacific of this species?
Sincerely
Ian "Birdbooker" Paulsen
Bainbridge Is., WA, USA
ipaulsen(AT)linknet.kitsap.lib.wa.us
"Rallidae all the way"
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Re: Greater Shearwater near WA
From: Nick Lethaby <Nick.Lethaby(AT)ARCCORES.COM>
Date: 29 Jun 2000 3:30pm
There is one well-documented record in early October for Monterey Bay a few
years ago that was present for a couple of days.
There is another older sight record I believe for February in Monterey. I
don't who saw it but I think it may have been accepted and then rejected or
something similar.
Nick Lethaby
Product Manager, ARC Cores Inc.
Tel: 408 360 2131
e-mail: Nick.Lethaby@arccores
[ << | >> | ^^ ]
Subject: Re: Greater Shearwater near WA
From: Don Roberson and/or Rita Carratello <creagrus(AT)MONTEREYBAY.COM>
Date: 29 Jun 2000 5:46pm
Nicky Lethaby's response to Ian Paulsen's question is substantially correct,
but lacks details. Since both prior north Pacific records of Greater
Shearwater are from Monterey County, here is my text from the upcoming
revision to "Monterey Birds" (1985) -- I hope to have the 2d ed. out by this
time next year. -- Don Roberson
GREATER SHEARWATER
Puffinus gravis
Exceptional vagrant.
Two records: 24 Feb 1979 on Monterey Bay about 10 miles w. of Moss
Landing
(J. Dunn, K. Garrett, S. Saphir +) and another 1-2 Oct 1994 about 2 mi N of
Pt. Pinos (D. L. Shearwater, G. McChesney, T. McGrath +). A common species in
the Atlantic, these are the only records for the north Pacific.
Neither record was without controversy. The first was an mid-winter
sight
record; it was thus of a bird in both the wrong ocean and the wrong
hemisphere. Although supported by good field notes, the bird was not
immediately identified on the boat and some details were missed. The record
was initially accepted by the CBRC (Luther et al. 1983) but doubts continued
to linger given the exceptional mid-winter nature of the unique record and in
1993 the CBRC voted to revoke their initial acceptance (Erickson & Terrill
1996). Ironically, while publication of that decision was pending, the second
bird appeared. It was initially seen very briefly in dense fog and could not
be refound. Again, important details were missed and the 1 Oct 1994
observation, standing alone, would have been inadequate to support such a
spectacular vagrant. Fortunately, fog kept all the shearwaters grounded
through the night. The Greater Shearwater was refound the next day and
photographed at close range. [It is my view that the photographed bird renders
the prior record less unique and retroactively acceptable.]
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