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Newfoundland and Labrador
Jaegar, Fulmar & Gannet
Plmarine Jaeger (Stercorarius pomarinus) (Sea Hens) length: 56 cm wing-span: 105 cm bill: 4 cm
Three members of the jaeger family occur here, the long tailed and the parasitic, but the pomarine is the most common. A hawk-like bird with a dark-sooty colour, the pomarine may have white on the neck and belly. It is larger than the other two, its central tail feathers are longer, twisted and rounded at the ends. Young birds of all three jaegers are brown and difficult to tell apart. A good spot to observe them in summer is in the St. Bride's area where we saw eight of them flying together. Jaegers are pirates of the ocean airways, pursuing gulls and terns to rob them of their food. Look for them in the fall around the Northern Peninsula especially in the Strait of Belle Isle. The jaegers winter in the Southern Hemisphere around Australia.
Northern Fulmar (Fulmarus glacialis) (Noddy) length: 48 cm wing-span: 107 cm bill: 3.8 cm
The most common offshore bird in the North Atlantic gets its local name from the habit of nodding its head. Gull-like in colour, and often confused with the smaller gulls, fulmars glide over the water while other gulls seem to work much harder at flying. Skimming over the water these birds often seem to appear from nowhere. Fulmars have thicker necks, a bigger head and a stouter beak than do the gulls. The back, wings and tail are grey while the rest of the fulmar is white. There is also a darker, slate grey phase. This seabird can be seen at numerous places inshore, but particularly on the ferry run from North Sydney to Port aux Basques and Argentia.
Northern Gannet (Sula bassanus) length: 96 cm wing-span: 167.6 cm bill: 10 cm
The awesome beauty of Cape St. Mary's, whose cliffs resound with the bawls of thousands of nesting seabirds, is indeed one of our greatest treasures. Bird Rock, with about 6,000 nesting pairs of gannets, appears almost jumping distance from the mainland and is the second largest gannetry in North America. The gannet is Newfoundland's largest seabird. Dazzling white with coal black wingtips, a yellowish head and a black ring around its eyes, give it the appearance of wearing glasses. Watching gannets fish from their colony at the Cape is spell-binding. With folded wings they drop, with incredible speed, singly or in groups into the water from a soaring position hundreds of feet up. Baccalieu Island and the Funks also have large nesting colonies.
Other Newfoundland Flyers
Web Site Developer Susan Guerrero
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