HORNED PUFFIN 101 



or old would scramble forward and thrust their great beaks into the first 

 crevice which offered, although not an inch wide, and then they would push 

 and struggle desperately to force their way through until taken in hand. Even 

 when they managed to escape after being dragged out they would frequently 

 scramble back to the same place again. It was a common occurrence for them 

 to strike among the rocks with a thud as they tumbled off their perches toward 

 the water, and then scramble over the rocks with laughable haste and finally 

 plunge under water and make off, or go flapping desperately along the surface 

 until exhausted. Overhead circled hundreds of the birds, nearly all of which 

 carried fishes in their beaks for their young. These fishes were sticklebacks 

 and sand lances. Some of the birds carried from three to five small fishes at 

 once; the latter were all placed side by side crosswise in the bird's bill. 



Mr. Turner (1886) gives us another chapter in the story, as 

 follows: 



The young leave the nest before being able to fly. The parent assists them to 

 the water; and, should they have been reared on the face of a high bluff, the 

 old bird catches the young one by the wing and they flutter at a long angle 

 to the water. The old bird endeavors to keep under the young one. I have 

 seen them drop their young accidentally and cause great consternation of the 

 parent, which could not check her flight immediately, but returned and showed 

 great solicitude by turning the young one over and over in the water to see if 

 it was injured. During severe storms the young are taken to the lee of some 

 reef or islet until the waves become quiet. 



Plumages. The downy young of the horned puffin is practically 

 indistinguishable from that, of the common puffin; the central belly 

 portion is white, sometimes tinged with yellowish or light gray; the 

 upper parts, the throat and the crissum are light "seal brown" 

 with "drab" shadings; in some specimens the upper parts are 

 "Prout's brown" or "Vandyke brown." The progress of the molts 

 and plumages is the same as in the eastern species except that in the 

 first winter plumage, which follows the natal down, the loral and 

 orbital dusky space is darker than in arctica and nearly as dark as 

 the crown; the black throat of corniculata is also acquired with the 

 first plumage. Young birds can be distinguished from adults dur- 

 ing the first year by the much smaller and slenderer bill, which does 

 not reach its full development until the second spring. After the 

 first postnuptial molt, when the young bird is about 13 or 14 months 

 old, it assumes the adult winter plumage. 



The adult has a complete postnuptial molt in August or September 

 and probably a partial prenuptial molt in the spring. The dark 

 face is characteristic of the winter plumage, but the most striking 

 change is in the bill, which molts as in the common puffin. Mr. 

 Nelson (1887) describes this molt, which takes place in September, 

 as follows: 



At this time the bill molt was just commencing. The first evidence of this 

 process is shown by the wearing away of the lower mandible on the under 

 surface at the angle. This wearing appears to be brought about by the fric- 

 tion of this point on the rocks, as the birds use the projecting angle as a hook 



