Tufted Puffins

The tufted puffin (''Fratercula cirrhata''), also known as crested puffin, is a relatively abundant medium-sized pelagic seabird in the auk family (Alcidae) found throughout the North Pacific Ocean.
It is one of three species of puffin that make up the genus ''Fratercula'' and is easily recognizable by its thick red bill and yellow tufts.

Description

Tufted puffins are around in length with a similar wingspan and weigh about three-quarters of a kilogram (1.6  lbs), making them the largest of all the puffins. Birds from the western Pacific population are somewhat larger than those from the eastern Pacific, and male birds tend to be slightly larger than females.

They are primarily black with a white facial patch, and, typical of other puffin species, feature a very thick bill, primarily red with some yellow and occasionally green markings. Their most distinctive feature and namesake are the yellow tufts () that appear annually on birds of both sexes as the summer reproductive season approaches. Their feet become bright red and their face is also bright white in the summer. During the feeding season, the tufts molt off and the plumage, beak, and legs lose much of their luster.

As among other alcids, the wings are relatively short, adapted for diving, underwater swimming, and capturing prey rather than gliding, of which they are incapable. As a consequence, they have thick, dark myoglobin-rich breast muscles adapted for a fast and aerobically strenuous wing-beat cadence, which they can nonetheless maintain for long periods of time.

Juvenile tufted puffins resemble winter adults, but with a grey-brown breast shading to white on the belly, and a shallow, yellowish-brown bill. Overall, they resemble a horn-less and unmarked rhinoceros auklet (''Cerorhinca monocerata'').

Taxonomy

The tufted puffin was first described in 1769 by German zoologist Peter Simon Pallas. The scientific name ''Fratercula'' comes from the Medieval Latin , friar, a reference to the black and white plumage which resembles monastic robes. The specific name ''cirrhata'' is Latin for "curly-headed", from ''cirrus'', a curl of hair. The vernacular name ''puffin'' – puffed in the sense of swollen – was originally applied to the fatty, salted meat of young birds of the unrelated species, the Manx shearwater (''Puffinus puffinus''), formerly known as the "Manks puffin". It is an Anglo-Norman word (Middle English ''pophyn'' or ''poffin'') used for the cured carcasses. The Atlantic puffin acquired the name at a much later stage, possibly because of its similar nesting habits,Lee, D. S. & Haney, J. C. (1996) "Manx Shearwater (''Puffinus puffinus'')", in: ''The Birds of North America'', No. 257, (Poole, A. & Gill, F. eds). Philadelphia: The Academy of Natural Sciences, and The American Ornithologists' Union, Washington, DC and it was formally applied to that species by Pennant in 1768. It was later extended to include the similar and related Pacific puffins.

Since it may be more closely related to the rhinoceros auklet than the other puffins, it is sometimes placed in the monotypic genus ''Lunda''.

The juveniles, due to their similarity to ''C. monocerata'', were initially mistaken for a distinct species of a monotypic genus, and named ''Sagmatorrhina lathami'' (" Latham's saddle-billed auk", from ''sagmata'' "saddle" and ''rhina'' "nose").

Distribution and habitat

Tufted puffins form dense breeding colonies during the summer reproductive season from Washington state and British Columbia, throughout southeastern Alaska and the Aleutian Islands, Kamchatka, the Kuril Islands and throughout the Sea of Okhotsk. While they share some habitat with horned puffins (''F. corniculata''), the range of the tufted puffin is generally more eastern. They have been known to nest in small numbers as far south as the northern Channel Islands, off the coast of southern California. However, the last confirmed sighting at the Channel Islands occurred in 1997.

Tufted puffins typically select islands or cliffs that are relatively inaccessible to predators, close to productive waters, and high enough that they can take to the air successfully. Ideal habitat is steep but with a relatively soft soil substrate and grass for the creation of burrows.

During the winter feeding season, they spend their time almost exclusively at sea, extending their range throughout the North Pacific and south to Japan and California.

Behavior

Breeding

Breeding takes place on isolated islands: over 25,000 pairs have been recorded in a single colony off the coast of British Columbia. The nest is usually a simple burrow dug with the bill and feet, but sometimes a crevice between rocks is used instead. It is well-lined with vegetation and feathers. Courtship occurs through skypointing, strutting, and billing. A single egg is laid, usually in June, and incubated by both parents for about 45 days. The eggs are pure white or pale buff and are without gloss. They very often have barely perceptible shell markings of dull purplish color. Fledglings leave the nest at between 40 and 55 days.

Tufted puffins may be purely aquatic locomotive animals until they are three, living entirely as marine animals returning to shore only to breed on the nesting cliffs where they hatched. They tend to be well offshore when hatching.

Diet

Tufted puffins feed on a variety of fish and marine invertebrates, which they catch by diving from the surface. However, their diet varies greatly with age and location. Adult puffins largely depend on invertebrates, especially squid and krill. Nestlings at coastal colonies are fed primarily fish such as rockfish and sandlance, while nestlings at colonies closer to pelagic habitats are more dependent on invertebrates. Demersal fish are consumed in some quantity by most nestlings, suggesting that puffins feed to some extent on the ocean bottom.Piatt, J. F. and A. S. Kitaysky (2002). Tufted Puffin (Fratercula cirrhata), version 2.0. In The Birds of North America (A. F. Poole and F. B. Gill, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bna.708

Feeding areas can be located far offshore from the nesting areas. Puffins can store large quantities of small fish in their bills and carry them to their chicks.

Predators and threats

Tufted puffins are preyed upon by various avian raptors such as snowy owls, bald eagles and peregrine falcons, and mammals like the Arctic fox. Foxes seem to prefer the puffin over other birds, making the bird a main target. Choosing inaccessible cliffs and entirely mammal-free islands protects them from terrestrial predators while laying eggs in burrows is effective in protecting them from egg-scavengers like gulls and ravens.

A mass die-off of puffins at St. Paul Island, Alaska between October 2016 and January 2017 has been attributed to ecosystem changes resulting from climate change.

Relationship with humans

The Aleut and Ainu people (who called them ''Etupirka'') of the North Pacific traditionally hunted tufted puffin for food and feathers. Skins were used to make tough parkas worn feather side in and the silky tufts were sewn into ornamental work. Currently, harvesting of tufted puffin is illegal or discouraged throughout its range.

The tufted puffin is a familiar bird on the coasts of the Russian Pacific coast, where it is known as ''toporok'' ( Топорок) – meaning "small axe," a hint to the shape of the bill. ''Toporok'' is the namesake of one of its main breeding sites, ''Kamen Toporkov'' ("Tufted Puffin Rock") or ''Ostrov Toporkov'' ("Tufted Puffin Island"), an islet offshore Bering Island.

The oldest recorded tufted puffin was six years old when discovered in Alaska, the same state where it had been banded.

Conservation status in Puget Sound

Many rules and regulations have been set out to try to conserve fishes and shorebirds in Puget Sound. The Department of Natural Resources (DNR) of Washington State has created aquatic reserves surrounding Smith and Minor Islands.
Over of tidelands and seafloor habitat were included in the proposed aquatic reserve. Not only do these islands provide the necessary habitat for many seabirds such as tufted puffins and marine mammals, but this area also contains the largest kelp beds in all of Puget Sound. In addition, Protection Island reserve has also been off limits to the public to aid marine birds in breeding. Protection Island contains one of the last two nesting colonies of puffins in Puget Sound, and about 70% of the tufted puffin population nests on this island.

References

tufted_puffin_monitoring_study_at_haystack_rock_with_2018_data.pdf (cannon-beach.or.us) Stephensen, S.W. 2018. Tufted Puffin monitoring study at Haystack Rock, Cannon
Beach, Oregon 2010-2017. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Unpublished Report, Oregon Coast
National Wildlife Refuge Complex, Newport, Oregon 97365. 20 pp.

External links

Stirling, Katie. ''ADW: Fratercula cirrhata''. University of Michigan

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Fratercula
Birds of North Asia
Birds of the Aleutian Islands
Native birds of Alaska
Native birds of Western Canada
Native birds of the Northwestern United States
Birds described in 1769
Taxa named by Peter Simon Pallas