Flesh-footed Shearwater

When to see the Flesh-footed Shearwater

One bar for each month. Filled bars are the 9 months with records; pale bars are months with none. The wide bar is September, the month with the most records.

Where to see the Flesh-footed Shearwater

The map shades 20 countries with regular records, and 7 more in a lighter tone where the bird turns up only as a stray. Everything unshaded has no records. Countries are listed below the map.

Recorded as a rare visitor in Canada, Mexico, Yemen, Fiji, New Caledonia, Northern Mariana Islands, Portugal.

About the Flesh-footed Shearwater

The flesh-footed shearwater is a medium-large shearwater that mainly inhabits the Indo-Pacific. Its plumage is black with pale pinkish feet, and a pale bill with a distinct black tip. Together with the equally light-billed pink-footed shearwater, it forms the Hemipuffinus group, a superspecies which may or may not have an Atlantic relative in the great shearwater. These large shearwaters are among those that have been separated into the genus Ardenna. Recent genetic analysis indicates evidence of strong divergence between Pacific colonies relative to those in South and Western Australia, thought to be explained by philopatry and differences in foraging strategies during the breeding season.

Text adapted from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Easily confused with

Buller's ShearwaterArdenna bulleriAdults birds are 46–47 cm (18–19 in) in length, with a 97–99 cm (38–39 in) wingspan, and have been recorded to weigh 342–425 g (12.1–15.0 oz). Short-tailed ShearwaterArdenna tenuirostrisThe short-tailed shearwater or slender-billed shearwater, also called yolla or moonbird, and commonly known as the muttonbird both in early Australia and in New Zealand, is the most abundant seabird species in Australian waters, and is one of the few Australian native birds in which the chicks are commercially harvested. Great ShearwaterArdenna gravisThis shearwater is 43–51 cm (16.9–20.1 in) in length with a 105–122 cm (3.5–4.0 ft) wingspan.