Swinhoe's petrel
Swinhoe's storm petrel or Swinhoe's petrel (Hydrobates monorhis ) is a small, all-brown seabird of the storm petrel family Hydrobatidae.
The scientific name is derived from Ancient Greek. Hydrobates is from hydro "water", and bates "walker", and monorhis is from monos "single" and rhinos "nostril". The common name commemorates the British naturalist Robert Swinhoe who first described the species in 1867.
It was formerly defined in the genus Oceanodroma before that genus was synonymized with Hydrobates.
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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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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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starts withSwinhoe's storm petrel is a small bird, 18–21 cm in length with a 45–48 cm wingspan, though distinctly larger than the European storm petrel. It is essentially dark brown in all plumages, and has a fluttering flight, pattering on the water surface as it picks planktonic food items from the ocean surface. Unlike the European storm petrel, it does not follow ships.
In structure it most resembles a Leach's storm petrel with its forked tail, longish wings, and flight behaviour, but does not have a white rump and the call differs. It is difficult to distinguish from other all-dark Hydrobates species, and the first English record had to be DNA-tested to eliminate the possibility that it was a Leach's storm petrel, since populations of north-eastern Pacific Leach's storm petrels contain individuals that show completely dark rumps.
It breeds on islands in the northwest Pacific off the Russian Far East, China, Japan and Korea. It nests in colonies close to the sea in rock crevices and lays a single white egg. It spends the rest of the year at sea, ranging into the Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea.
It breeds on Verkhovsky Island (7,500 pairs), south of Vladivostok, Russia, and Japan (a minimum of 1,000 pairs). There are little-known populations in China, Taiwan, North Korea and South Korea, and records suggest that breeding may also occur in the North Atlantic. In winter, it migrates south and west to the northern Indian Ocean (Brooke 2004). Sato et al. (2010) also estimate the world population at a minimum of 130,000 pairs, confirming that the species has a very large population. However, Birds Korea (2010) state that c. 100,000 pairs nest on Gugeul Islet, implying that possibly over 75% of the global population breed on one very small island. The species nests at six or seven breeding islets in South Korea (Chang-Yong Choi in litt. 2012). There is apparently anecdotal evidence that some colonies are in decline (N. Moores in litt. 2011).
Widespread throughout its large range, the Swinhoe's storm petrel was previously evaluated as least concern on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, but was uplisted to near threatened in 2012. The population is expected to undergo a moderately rapid decline over the next three generations, owing primarily to the impact of introduced species.
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