Dennis:

Having spent alot of time offshore (mostly commercial fishing) I can attest
to the phenomenon of night-flying by seabirds. In the Bering Sea on
trawlers, I usually found the nightflight to be less pronounced of course
than the daytime presence (when, if the boat was processing product, tens of
thousands of N. Fulmars and a sprinkling of other species would gather right
behind the vessel, to as far as the eye could see); still, many birds would
continue to follow vessels throughout the night. The night crew was usually
more restricted to the real hardcore offal-fans, the fulmars and gulls,
whereas at daytime the mix of species was much greater (this was perhaps
partly due to being unable to see only the birs that got closest to the
stern). Some fulmars (during snowfall) unfortunately would be confused by
mast lights and would fly into the gantry and other overhead obstructions.
By morning, dozens of new "crew" might result, sitting about the deck, all
of whom would be tossed overboard (still alive but stunned).

FT Storm-Petrels (which are well-known as night-flyers in the Bering Sea)
were also attracted to mast night lights, although they had no interest in
following the vessel for offal, and tended to occur singly, coming alongside
for a couple passes and then heading out.


Scott Atkinson
Lake Stevens
mail to: scottratkinson at hotmail.com






>From: Dennis Paulson <dpaulson at ups.edu>
>Reply-To: dpaulson at ups.edu
>To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
>Subject: Re: frigatebird facts
>Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2003 11:17:25 -0800
>
>Robert Cleland pointed out to me in a note that in the book "The Wandering
>Albatross" by Robert Cushman Murphy, the author says that one bird stayed
>with his aircraft carrier for over two days as it steamed upwind. He
>concluded that albatroses can and do stay flying all night. I now recall
>having read this about albatrosses, so they are another bird like swifts
>and frigatebirds that treat night as day. I wouldn't be surprised if
>numerous other seabirds do the same, actually, as I know that Black
>Skimmers feed at night, and I've seen gulls flying around at night. My
>statement was right out of the frigatebird paper, and I should have thought
>more critically. The authors of that paper probably hadn't attempted to
>find out about all the other bird groups.
>
>Happy night flying,
>Dennis
>--
>Dennis Paulson, Director phone 253-879-3798
>Slater Museum of Natural History fax 253-879-3352
>University of Puget Sound e-mail dpaulson at ups.edu
>1500 N. Warner, #1088
>Tacoma, WA 98416-1088
>http://www.ups.edu/biology/museum/museum.html


_________________________________________________________________
The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE*
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail