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Macronesian
Shearwater¹
Puffinus baroli |

Macronesian Shearwater photographed on August
25,2007 BBC Extreme Pelagic by Jeremiah Trimble. All photos on this page remain the exclusive
property of the photographers who have graciously shared
them with New England Seabirds. Please respect their
rights.
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First Confirmed
Sighting of Macronesian Shearwater in North American
Waters
On August 25, 2007, a Macronesian
Shearwater was spotted from the BBC Extreme Pelagic.
This bird was very cooperative and many picture were
taken. To view these photographs go to this
web site.
http://www.scottspangenberg.com/
To read more about the pelagic trip see
Reports 2007- BBC Extreme Pelagic.
What is a Macronesian
Shearwater and why isn't it in my bird book?
Once again the taxonomists have been working. The
Macronesian Shearwater used to be considered a subspecies of
the Little Shearwater Puffinus assimilis. Then
again some authors considered it to be a subspecies of Audubon's
Shearwater Puffinus lherminieri. Onley and Scoffield (
2007) have a plate for the
Little and Audubon's Shearwater Complex and elevate P.baroli
to full species status following the decision of the British
Ornithological Union in 2005. See below for more on this change.
Your suspicions will be aroused if you go back to Harrison
(1983) and read the opening
sentence of the description for Little Shearwater "Fragmented
distribution in all three major oceans, range overlaps with
Audubon's and Manx Shearwater".
Shearwaters like
many seabirds tend to return to their natal colonies to breed.
This leads to differences between populations and eventually to
different species. That is not to imply that the
shearwaters have suddenly evolved into different species.
Rather it means that intensive study has recently shown the
birds to be a separate species. Science marches on.
The present
status of this shearwater on the America side of the Atlantic is
still under discussion and lumped with Little Shearwater. That
is where you will find it in the latest edition of Clements
Checklist of the Birds of the World.
It has not in the past made much difference since the Macronesian Shearwater was not thought to be in our waters until
the historic pelagic of August 25, 2007.
How
can I see it?
Go on many many
offshore pelagics and get very lucky. The only photographic
documented sighting on the American side of the Atlantic
of Macronesian Shearwater was on the
August 27, 2007 BBC Extreme
Pelagic.
A more sure bet is to take a
trip to Macronesia.
Where is Macronesia?

From Wikipedia ²
Macaronesia is a modern collective name for
several groups of
islands in the
North Atlantic Ocean near
Europe and
North Africa belonging to three countries:
Portugal,
Spain, and
Cape Verde. The name comes from the
Greek for " fortunate
islands", a term used by
Ancient Greek
geographers for islands to the west of the
Straits of Gibraltar.
Identification
Most closely resembles a Manx or
Audubon's Shearwater. See
Onley
and Scofield 2007 for a complete description of
what they call the Manx Type Shearwaters and
the Little/Audubons Complex.

Macronesian Shearwater photographed on 8/25/2007 Extreme
Pelagic by Scott Spangenberger. |
I can do no better than to quote
directly Blair Nikula's description from his web page:
http://www.capecodbirds.org/Hydrographer/MacronesianShearwater0807.htm
and illustrated
in these two photographs.
"...
the extensively white
face with eye completely surrounded by white;
the rounded head;
small bill;
white undertail coverts;
extensively white underwing with relatively narrow
dark border;
blackish dorsal coloration;
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pale grayish panel on the upper surface of the wing;
white "tabs" wrapping well around up onto the top
sides of the rump;
and white tips on the secondary coverts forming two
white bars on the inner wing."
Also observe that the legs
do not extend beyond the tail. |

Micronesian Shearwater
photographed by Jeremiah Trimble on August
25,2007. |
Notes
on Taxonomy from the British Ornithological Union Webpage³
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"Little Shearwater Puffinus assimilis
The three forms breeding in the
tropical and subtropical parts of the Atlantic Ocean (
P. l. lherminieri, P. a. baroli, P. a. boydi )
that were included in this study formed a monophyletic
group which is not closely related to the other forms of
the complex (including nominate P. a. assimilis
).
The three tropical and subtropical
Atlantic taxa are best treated as two species:
- Macaronesian Shearwater P.
baroli (polytypic, with subspecies baroli
and boydi )
- Audubon's Shearwater P.
lherminieri (monotypic)
Macaronesian Shearwater P. b. baroli is on
Category A of the British List (replacing Little
Shearwater P. assimilis ).
The taxonomic status of P. b.
boydi remains under consideration pending study of
recently collected sound recordings of that taxon. "
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¹ Onley and Scofield 2007
Albatrosses, Petrels & Shearwaters of the World
²
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia -
Cite This Source
³
http://www.bou.org.uk/recnews05.html |