Slender-billed shearwater, Yolla, Moonbird, Muttonbird
The short-tailed shearwater or slender-billed shearwater (Ardenna tenuirostris ; formerly Puffinus tenuirostris ), also called yolla or moonbird, and commonly known as the muttonbird in Australia, 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. It is a migratory species that breeds mainly on small islands in Bass Strait and Tasmania and migrates to the Northern Hemisphere for the boreal summer.
A piscivore is a carnivorous animal that eats primarily fish. Piscivorous is equivalent to the Greek-derived word ichthyophagous. Fish were the die...
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TerrestrialTerrestrial animals are animals that live predominantly or entirely on land (e.g., cats, ants, snails), as compared with aquatic animals, which liv...
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CongregatoryCongregatory animals tend to gather in large numbers in specific areas as breeding colonies, for feeding, or for resting.
Oviparous animals are female animals that lay their eggs, with little or no other embryonic development within the mother. This is the reproductive...
Precocial species are those in which the young are relatively mature and mobile from the moment of birth or hatching. Precocial species are normall...
A burrow is a hole or tunnel excavated into the ground by an animal to create a space suitable for habitation, temporary refuge, or as a byproduct ...
Soaring birds can maintain flight without wing flapping, using rising air currents. Many gliding birds are able to "lock" their extended wings by m...
Seabirds (also known as marine birds) are birds that are adapted to life within the marine environment. While seabirds vary greatly in lifestyle, b...
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MigratingAnimal migration is the relatively long-distance movement of individual animals, usually on a seasonal basis. It is the most common form of migrati...
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Each austral winter, the shearwaters migrate to the seas off the Aleutian Islands and Kamchatka. In the austral spring, they travel down the coast of California before crossing the Pacific back to Australia.
ir parents. In Tasmania, and especially on the muttonbird islands of the Furneaux Group, the chicks are harvested at this time for food and oil. The largest population in the world (2.8 million pairs - about 12% of the species) seems to be located on Babel Island. Adult birds foraging for food on the open ocean mistake plastic debris for food and then feed it to their chicks. This ingested plastic, as well as other factors, likely contribute to contamination of chicks.Thousands of Short-tailed shearwater fledglings are attracted to artificial lights during their maiden flights from nests to the open ocean. Fledglings are vulnerable to injury or death by collisions with human infrastructure and once grounded, to predation or becoming road casualties.
Each austral winter, the shearwaters migrate to the seas off the Aleutian Islands and Kamchatka. In the austral spring, they travel down the coast of California before crossing the Pacific back to Australia.
In 2020, a long distance vagrant was found in Ireland. This marked the first confirmed sighting of the species in the Western Palearctic. It was taken to a rehabilitation center and subsequently died; it is now deposited at the Natural History Museum of Ireland.
Social animals are those animals that interact highly with other animals, usually of their own species (conspecifics), to the point of having a rec...