There Once Was a Puffin

Oh, there once was a Puffin
Just the shape of a muffin,
And he lived on an island
In the bright blue sea!

He ate little fishes,
That were most delicious,
And he had them for supper
And he had them for tea.

But this poor little Puffin,
He couldn’t play nothin’,
For he hadn’t anybody
To play with at all.

So he sat on his island,
And he cried for awhile, and
He felt very lonely,
And he felt very small.

Then along came the fishes,
And they said, “If you wishes,
You can have us for playmates,
Instead of for tea!”

So they now play together,
In all sorts of weather,
And the Puffin eats pancakes,
Like you and like me.

by Florence Page Jaques

It is all too simple to recognize the puffin, right? Distinct in shape and colorful beak.

Let’s look beyond the colorful beak and try to identify the puffin as a member of the Auk family. Auks are chubby little seabirds with the white and black patterns we have come to love and recognize in our puffins. Each species in the Auk family has its very own distinct black and white pattern.

When the auks are in the water you often cannot see their entire bodies. Often you cannot even see their beak very well with them diving and plunging so far from the shore. Let’s pay attention to the different patterns in the black and white on the Auks and learn to recognize the Puffin within some common Auks.

• The Black Guillemot is mostly black with a little white streak—it has a completely black head and beak.
• The Atlantic Puffin is black around the neck and in a slight cap with a white face and a colorful beak.
• The Razorbill is black on the back except one line of white in the wings and white in the front like the puffin but it has a completely black face except one white streak along its beak—going down its bill from its eye and a white ring around the bill.
• The Ancient Murrelet has a dark grayish black back and a mostly black head but the white comes up higher onto its neck and the tip of its dark beak is light.

Now, maybe we can help others identify the puffins, a few auks and we’ve learned something new.

OK! Now you have an assignment—do a google image search and identify the Auks. =) Write (in the form below) and tell me what you learned or thought.

References

Podulka, Sandy, Ronald W. Rohrbaugh, Jr., and Rick Bonney, Editors. Handbook of Bird Biology. 2nd edition. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Lab of Ornithology, 2004.

Beaks, bills, bird noses—whatever you wish to call them—they are important to every bird.¹ They are full of live tissues, regenerating after billing (a puffin’s form of kissing / affection where they rub bills together), bill-wiping (to clean their bills—typically on rocks or hard surfaces), eating, and defending their young.  The tips of bird beaks grow constantly due to continual wear and tear. Some bird’s beaks even grow longer according to the season. The beak of the Puffin is one example of seasonal change. While it does not change in size, it changes in color. Puffins molt the the colorful outer sheath of their bills after breeding (seasonally).  Their beaks brighten or fade in color when the old skin is worn down and the new layers are revealed depending on which season it happens to be. Maybe they do not need the extra attention they receive with their bright colorful beaks after they have wooed their loves and mated for the season. Perhaps it becomes a liability—making them more susceptible to predators.

Nares (nostrils) are often on the upper part of the beak. These can vary depending on the bird and its needs. For example, some birds have a protective flap, the operculum, covering part of the nostrils. This is helpful in keeping debris out.² To each bird their own beak.

Most birds have black beaks and bills. There are some birds who have colorful beaks such as the Common Merganser, the Ruddy Duck or the choughs from the Corvid Family of birds. Besides the Toucan, no other birds compare to the magnificently colorful beaked Puffins.

Beak of the Puffin

References

Podulka, Sandy, Ronald W. Rohrbaugh, Jr., and Rick Bonney, Editors. Handbook of Bird Biology. 2nd edition. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Lab of Ornithology, 2004.

1. FYI: The visible portion of the bill is called the rhamphotheca. The bill actually does extend inside the face. [↩]
2. Podulka, Sandy, Ronald W. Rohrbaugh, Jr., and Rick Bonney, Editors. Handbook of Bird Biology. 2nd edition. Ithaca, NY: Cornell Lab of Ornithology, 2004. [↩]

The Puffin family of birds is small. It always has been. But there were more along time ago. Fossils including eggshells, bones of immature birds, and articulated skeletons suggest that nesting colonies of an older puffin once occurred on San Miguel and San Nicolas islands off the coasts of California.

One such puffin, the now extinct Dow’s Puffin (Fratercula dowi), once live in the Channel Islands of California. In October 1986 George L. Kennedy and D.R. Muhs discovered over 5,000 bones and eggs identified to be a new species of puffins, the Dow’s Puffin, on the Island of San Miguel. Once discovered this new species was named after Ronald J. Dow who provided assistance and logistical support to the scientists during their trips to San Nicolas Island.

The smallest bone specimens of the Dow’s Puffin found was dated at aproximately 11,890 +/- 95 years BP (before present — present being set at 1950) having lived during the Early Holocene period. Radiocarbon dating places most of the bones somewhere between less than 38,000 BP and 25,160 +/- 380 years BP. This means they were alive for approximately between 13,270 and 26,110 years.  This is not very long in comparison to other species, even birds. However, other previously unidentified bones found on Santa Rosa Island in the mid to late 1960′s are now thought to belong to the Dow’s Puffin. The interesting part is these bones date back as early as 100,000 years BP and are “at the large end of its size range.”

This would indicate the bird evolved from bigger to smaller until its eventual evolutionary demise. This would also mean the Dow’s Puffin lived a long, long evolutionary life.

The Dow’s Puffin was relative in size to the Rhinoceros Auklet and the

Measurements of bills and mandibles of Fratercula dowi compared to other Puffins

Horned Puffin but its skull was more like the Rhinoceros Auklet and the Tufted Puffin. It is the latter two which are now considered its closest relatives. It is not the size or shape of the bird fossils that distinguish the Dow’s Puffin from other Puffins but rather the “degree of dorsoventral expansion of the bill and mandible.” (See figure 4 — B and C are from the Dow’s Puffin, A is the Rhino Auklet, D is the Tufted Puffin and E is Horned Puffin. The size difference is notable as you can see.

One very well preserved egg thought to be of the egg of a Dow’s Puffin is approximately 2.6 inches (66mm) long and 1.7 inches (43.2mm) around the largest part. It is approximately the size of eggs of the Rhino Auklet and the Horned Puffin but smaller than that of the Tufted Puffin.

While one would not expect puffins to live or breed in Southern California today because it is too warm for them—60,000 to 30,000 years ago the climate was more like the climate found today off the Washington State and Oregon coasts. This is exactly the kind of climate puffins prefer.

All information from this article was extrapolated or taken directly from the following scientific journal publication: A NEW SPECIES OF EXTINCT LATE PLEISTOCENE PUFFIN (AVES: ALCIDAE) FROM THE SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA CHANNEL ISLANDS by Daniel A. Guthrie, Howell W. Thomas and George L. Kennedy.

Another puffin game… Puffin Putt — you play 18 holes of online golf through manicured grass and sand–all as a cute little puffin. Its pretty fun. Here are some screenshots:

Screenshot -- Puffin Putt Online Game

Ok, not bad…

Puffin Putt Online Game

Click HERE to play the Puffin Putt Game online.

Rhinoceros Auklet, Oregon Coast Aquarium, Newport, OR

Originally uploaded by chuqui

This photograph was taken by Chuqui on flickr at the , Oregon Coast Aquarium in Newport, Oregon.

The Rhinoceros Auklet is not very well known but it is considered, by some, to be part of the puffin family. They are debating on whether they should rename it the Rhinoceros Puffin since it is so closely related to the puffin family.

Is a puffin a puffin by any other name?

Apparently. This puffin has many names: Cerorhinca monocerata, the Rhino Auklet, the Horn-billed Puffin or the Unicorn Puffin. (I think I prefer the latter but I’ll try to use all of them to get us accustomed to them all.) This cute little bird gets its name because of the horn-like extension on its beak but they only get this fancy beak when they are ready to breed. And it, like all puffin’s bills, sheds it sheath every year.

The Unicorn Puffin lives in colonies on the ocean shores much like the three other puffins. They prefer the North Pacific Ocean breading all along it from California to the Aleutian Islands in Alaska. They can also be found in Japan, North Korea and Sakhalin Island in Asia. They spend their winters in the water and their summers breeding near the water.

They like to eat small fish, krill and squid. According to Wikipedia,

“they feed inshore during the breeding season in the midwater. To catch their prey, they dive to as deep as 57 meters (187 ft) for as long as 148 seconds.” Interesting swimmer fishing.

The Cerorhincas evolved in the Miocene period, some 23.03 to 5.33 million years ago. That is a long time. This is an old species. There once was at least 3 other varieties of the cerorhincas (the Dubious Auklet — wonder what he was dubious about, perhaps the fishers that made him disappear?, the Cerorhinca minor and the Cerorhinca reai) but they have all disappeared now and only the Rhino Auk are left.

But it still has the other 3 puffins out there. I hope we can ensure they all survive for a very, very, very long time.

Tufted Puffin

Originally uploaded by ap.

The Tufted Puffin has the long eyebrows (really they are feathers but they look like long eyebrows or a slick hairdo). It is found on the West coast of the U.S. and Canada, from California up to B.C. up to Alaska. It can also be found in the Aleutian Islands, Kamchatka, the Kuril Islands and throughout the Sea of Okhotsk.

You can tell the Tufted Puffin from other puffins not only by the long feathers on its head but also by its dark belly.

This is a beautiful bird and happens to live off the coast of my state. However, going to see them is no easy task. They are well protected. This is a good thing for them. =)

You just can’t know how tiny a puffin is until you see one… puffins are approximately ten inches full grown. TEN INCHES! And they weigh about a can of coke. How adorable. I wanted you to see just how big (or small) ten inches. This graphic should be exactly ten inches tall. Feel free to get out your rulers! From the top of the black part to the bottom of the black part… these little cartoon puffins are standing head-to-toe just to show you how tall one little puffin is… Puffins are shorter than a piece of paper!!!

I love to draw and paint and even color. Creating is fun. I have never drawn or painted a puffin before, so I thought I would try today. I ended up trying to paint a puffin with watercolors. I have only done about 4 watercolor paintings so far. This was good practice. What do you think?