Yesterday I received from Ismail MacCrae 6 images of a black-and-white
shearwater photographed in mid-November on the ground at night on North
Keeling Island. Ismail requested I identify the bird. Unfortunately, the
images are mainly similar shots of the head and breast with nothing showing
the underparts.
In part, my response was as follows.
Thanks Ismail, this is an exciting find. The bird is clearly one of the
small black-and-white Shearwaters, Puffinus sp. The taxonomy of this group
is unsettled and controversial so it is difficult to be absolutely sure
about its identity but I fancy that it is what these days would be called a
Tropical Shearwater Puffinus bailloni. Being old fashioned I'd prefer to
call it an Audubon's Shearwater P. lherminhieri and unless you have very
modern books this is what your available literature would call it. There are
no records of either from Cocos-Keeling or anywhere in the eastern Indian
Ocean as far as I'm aware.
This is particularly exciting because it may not be just a casual vagrant.
This species breeds on Chagos and the Maldives, the same areas which also
have Saunders's Terns now known to be regular at Cocos. Being on the ground
at night could mean that it is nesting or at least prospecting for a nest
site. If you find it again, try to determine 1) leg colour, said to be blue
but birds I've seen were pink, 2) whether undertail coverts are black or
white and 3) extent of white on sides of rump as viewed from above.
A birding group led by Peter Barrand is on Cocos now or will be shortly. You
should tell them and please ask them to advise me of their sightings
Richard Baxter and his group will be there next week and will be going to
North Keeling. You should try to show him the bird if it is at the entrance
to a burrow. They are solitary nesters but may nest on the edge of a
Wedge-tailed Shearwater colony. Unlike Wedge-taileds burrows, their burrows
are too narrow to put ones hand in and usually very long so don't attempt to
extract a bird. When I visited, Wedge-taileds were nesting but I think I
heard they no longer do so.
Mike Carter
30 Canadian Bay Road
Mount Eliza VIC 3930
Tel (03) 9787 7136
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