Pink-Footed Shearwater

Puffinus creatopus

Pink-Footed Shearwaters are members of the “Tube Nose” group. These pelagic (sea) birds are deep divers and only found on land during nesting, where they use borrows and stay in colonies.

They range in the eastern Pacific Ocean from Alaska to South America. But their only known breeding colonies are on a few islands at the southern end of their range off the coast of central Chile. From December to February, they will lay a single large egg inside burrows about six feet deep. The chicks fledge in April and May.

Conservationists consider the Pink-Footed Shearwater as vulnerable. There is a lot of pressure in their breeding colonies from humans harvesting chicks (3000 to 5000 per year). They are also threatened by other mammalian predators such as coatimundis (Nasua nasua), and introduced rats and cats.

Taxonomists regard these birds as monotypic (i.e. there are no known subspecies).

I have been lucky enough to meet Pink-Footed Shearwaters off the coast of San Diego a few times. I have also found them off the central coast of Baja California (Mexico) while on a science expedition to the Revillagigedo Islands in February 2017.