SOOTY SHEAKWATER 551 



DESCRIPTIVE CHARACTERS. 



PLUMAGE. Adult male nuptial. Head and back of neck, 

 ash-brown ; neck, white, interspersed with a few spots of 

 light brown ; back, scapulars, and wings, ash-brown, the 

 edges of the feathers being paler ; upper tail-coverts, spotted 

 brown and white ; primaries and tail-feathers, chiefly 

 blackish-brown ; breast, white ; abdomen, white, with 

 brownish feathers interspersed about its middle and on the 

 thighs ; under tail-coverts, sooty-brown. 



Adult female nuptial. Similar to the male plumage. 



Adult winter, male and female. Similar to the nuptial 

 plumage. 



Immature, male and female. Resembles the adult 

 plumage. 



BEAK. Dark brown. 



FEET. Pinkish-white. 



IRIDES. Dark brown. 



AVERAGE MEASUREMENTS. 



TOTAL LENGTH 19'2 in. 



WING 12-7 



BEAK 2 



TARSO-METATARSUS 2'25 , 



Allied Species and Representative Forms. P. kuhli, 

 identical with P. borealis of Cory, is a closely allied species 

 which is resident on many of the islands off the west coast 

 of Africa. It visits the western coast of France and Spain, 

 and is plentiful in the Mediterranean. The back and wings 

 are much paler than in Puffinus gravis ; the beak is yellow 

 in colour and deeper in shape (Saunders). 



S03TY SHEARWATER. Puffinus griseus (J. F. Gmelin). 



Coloured Figure*. Dresser, ' Birds of Europe,' vol. viii, pi. 616, 

 tig. 1 ; Lilford, Coloured Figures,' vol. vi, pi. 59. 



The Sooty Shearwater is a rarer visitor to British seas 

 than the last species, from which it may readily be distin- 

 guished by its uniformly dark colour and smaller size. 

 Formerly it was regarded by some observers as the 

 immature or a dark form of that bird. 



In England it has been obtained off the coasts of the 



