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The crested auklet (Aethia cristatella) is a small seabird of the family Alcidae, distributed throughout the northern Pacific and the Bering Sea. The species feeds by diving in deep waters, eating krill and a variety of small marine animals. It nests in dense colonies of up to 1 million individuals in the Bering Sea and the Sea of Okhotsk.
The first seabirds evolved in the Cretaceous period, while modern seabird families emerged in the Paleogene. Seabirds generally live longer, breed later and have fewer young than other birds, but they invest a great deal of time in their young. Most species nest in colonies, varying in size from a few
In most seabird colonies several different species will nest on the same colony, often exhibiting some niche separation. Seabirds can nest in trees (if any are available), on the ground (with or without nests), on cliffs, in burrows under the ground and in rocky crevices. Colony size is a major aspect of the social environment of colonial birds.
However, the booby's habit of breeding on remote islands may be an adaptation to avoid predation; [13] on the Galápagos Islands, the red-footed booby does not nest on any islands inhabited by the Galapagos hawk, even when they have suitable conditions, and has been observed colonizing islands soon after the hawk is extirpated on them. [21]
Frigatebirds are referred to as kleptoparasites as they occasionally rob other seabirds for food, and are known to snatch seabird chicks from the nest. Seasonally monogamous, frigatebirds nest colonially. A rough nest is constructed in low trees or on the ground on remote islands. A single egg is laid each breeding season.
The genus Sula was introduced by the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson in 1760. [3] The type species is the brown booby. [4] The name is derived from súla, the Old Norse and Icelandic word for the other member of the family Sulidae, the gannet.
Cory's shearwater (Calonectris borealis) is a large shearwater in the seabird family Procellariidae. It breeds colonially on the archipelago of the Azores in the eastern Atlantic. Outside the breeding season it ranges widely in the Atlantic. It was formerly considered to be conspecific with Scopoli's shearwater.
Some of the larger petrels have to nest on windswept locations as they require wind to take off and forage for food. [27] Within the colonies, pairs defend usually small territories (the giant petrels and some albatrosses can have very large territories) which is the small area around either the nest or a burrow. Competition between pairs can ...