Sea-Birds introduces us to the sea-birds of the North Atlantic, an ocean in which about half the world sea-bird species have been seen at one time or another. This edition is exclusive to newnaturalists.comFew of the higher animals have successfully invaded the polar regions and the sea; but those that have – the whales, seals and sea-birds – have made a wonderful success of it. There are only about 250 true sea-birds in the world (there are over thirty times as many others); yet among this select 250 are some of the most numerous and well-adapted of living species, ranging from the magnificent albatrosses, with their powers of sail-planing, to the curious diving petrels; from the penguins to the auks; from the cormorants to the gulls and terns.The arctic tern makes the longest migratory journey of any known bird, travelling 20,000 miles between the two polar regions in the course of a year. Some sea-birds species probably spend the first seven or eight years of their lives without ever touching land; and one, the emperor penguin, never touches land in its life, for it incubates its egg on the Antarctic ice!This book introduces the reader to the sea-birds of the North Atlantic, an ocean in which about half the world sea-bird species have been seen at one time or another. Sea-birds are generally more cosmopolitan and widespread than most land birds; and it is no surprise to the ornithologist to find that the communities on the American and European sides of the Atlantic are very similar, most of their member-species being common to both.The authors of this book have spent most of their active lives in research on sea-birds, Lockley specialising in Life-histories, Fisher in distribution and numbers. Each has a long record of exploration of the remotest parts of the Atlantic coast and islands. Their felicitous collaboration brings home for the first time to the general bird-watcher and sea-going naturalist what enormous strides have been recently made in our knowledge of sea-birds. We now know the world population of several soecies, and can follow with accuracy the changes in the numbers of many.
Оглавление
James Fisher. Sea-Birds
Sea-Birds
Editors:
Table of Contents
EDITORS’ PREFACE
AUTHORS’ PREFACE
CHAPTER 1 THE NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN ITS STRUCTURE AND ITS SEA-BIRDS
A NOTE ON NON-BREEDERS AND CASUAL WANDERERS
CHAPTER 2 EVOLUTION AND THE NORTH ATLANTIC SEA-BIRDS
CHAPTER 3 SEA-BIRD NUMBERS AND MAN
SOME CENSUSES
CHAPTER 4 WHAT CONTROLS THE NUMBERS OF SEA-BIRDS?
CHAPTER 5 SEA-BIRD MOVEMENTS
CHAPTER 6 NAVIGATION BY SEA-BIRDS
CHAPTER 7 SOCIAL AND SEXUAL BEHAVIOUR
CHAPTER 8 THE TUBENOSES
CHAPTER 9 THE PELICANS
CHAPTER 10 THE SKUAS
CHAPTER 11 THE GULLS
CHAPTER 12 TERNS AND SKIMMERS
CHAPTER 13 THE AUKS
APPENDIX LIST OF SEA-BIRDS OF THE NORTH ATLANTIC AND THEIR DISTRIBUTION
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX
INDEX TO VERTEBRATE SPECIES IN A SYSTEMATIC ORDER
MAMMALS
BIRDS
INDEX TO AUTHORITIES
Plates in Black and White
Colour Plates
Copyright
About the Publisher
Отрывок из книги
Collins New Naturalist Library
James Fisher and R. M. Lockler
.....
From the Gulf of St. Lawrence, via Newfoundland, Labrador, Greenland and the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, we find a gradual disappearance of the temperate, sub-arctic and some low arctic species as we progress towards the shores where the sea is still near-freezing in July—the true High Arctic. In Newfoundland we reach the limit for breeding gannets, ring-billed gulls and common terns, and perhaps also Caspian terns. The Leach’s petrels breed as far as Newfoundland Labrador, but no farther, and it is doubtful whether the double-crested cormorant now breeds as far. South-west Greenland is less ‘arctic’ than opposite parts of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago at the same latitude; and it is not surprising that some species extend beyond Labrador to West Greenland, though not to Baffin Island and the other Canadian islands. Such species are the razorbill and common guillemot, the latter having only one small colony in West Greenland. The European cormorant extends to West Greenland and previously had a small outpost in Baffin Island, from which it has now disappeared, and it is also extinct in Newfoundland Labrador, after much human persecution. The puffin does not breed in the Canadian Arctic but goes far north in Greenland where it is of a distinctive, large arctic race.
Species which extend in breeding-range all the way from Newfoundland to Arctic Greenland and Canada are the herring-gull, great black-back, kittiwake, arctic tern and black guillemot. All these except the blackback reach the High Arctic, if we regard the Iceland gull Larus argentatus glaucoides, as a herring-gull, as we think we should.
