Egg of ''Puffinus boydi''
(coll. MHNT) Boyd's shearwater (''Puffinus boydi''), also known as the Cape Verde little shearwater, is a small

shearwater Shearwaters are medium-sized long-winged seabirds in the petrel family Procellariidae. They have a global marine distribution, but are most common in temperate and cold waters, and are pelagic outside the breeding season. Description These t ...

which breeds in the

Cape Verde , national_anthem = () , official_languages = Portuguese , national_languages = Cape Verdean Creole , capital = Praia , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , demonym ...

archipelago of the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the "Old World" of Afr ...

some 570 km off the coast of

West Africa West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Mali, Mau ...

. The

epithet An epithet (, ), also byname, is a descriptive term (word or phrase) known for accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, di ...

commemorates British

ornithologist Ornithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the "methodological study and consequent knowledge of birds with all that relates to them." Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and th ...

Arnold Boyd Arnold Whitworth Boyd MC, MA, FZS, FRES, MBOU (20 January 1885 – 16 October 1959) was an ornithologist and naturalist from Altrincham, Cheshire, England. Boyd was born on 20 January 1885. He was a long-time contributor to ''The Guardian'' ...

Taxonomy

Boyd's shearwater is sometimes considered a subspecies of either the

little shearwater The little shearwater (''Puffinus assimilis'') is a small shearwater in the petrel family Procellariidae. Despite the generic name, it is unrelated to the puffins, which are auks, the only similarity being that they are both burrow-nesting ...

Audubon's shearwater Audubon's shearwater (''Puffinus lherminieri'') is a common Tropics, tropical seabird in the Procellariidae, petrel family (biology), family. Sometimes known as the dusky-backed shearwater,Carboneras (1992) the specific epithet (zoology), specifi ...

or Macaronesian shearwater. It has also been shown to be synonymous with the extinct ''Puffinus parvus'' Shufeldt of

Bermuda ) , anthem = " God Save the King" , song_type = National song , song = "Hail to Bermuda" , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , mapsize2 = , map_caption2 = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = , ...

References

* * Puffinus Birds of Cape Verde Birds described in 1912 {{Procellariiformes-stub