The Wilson Petrel 



this species, like the Socorro, does not deposit its eggs till June. April is 

 the month of mustering and nest-digging; May is spent chiefly at sea; 

 June sees the honeymoon and the laying of the egg; July is the moon of 

 young birds, and August of weaning and departure. Yet even in August 

 certain couples, delayed or disappointed or dilatory, will dodder over eggs 

 whose ultimate hatching is against the traditions of their kind. 



A later observer, A. B. Howell, says: "The best place to look for 

 nests is under and between good sized boulders. Here a little dirt may 

 be scratched away at the entrance or at the nest cavity. From over a 

 hundred nests examined I have found only a half a dozen occupying true 

 burrows that may have been excavated by the birds themselves, but as 

 these were all in a colony of socorroensis, I prefer to believe that they were 

 originally made by the latter and then preempted by melania. Half a 

 dozen more were in very old burrows of the Cassin's Auklet. 

 This form does not nest in true colonies but is apt to be scattered anywhere 

 about an island. Occasionally where favorable sites occur, several nests 

 will be within a few feet of each other. . . . The young are covered, 

 except for the chin, with a slate-colored down. When the feathers appear 

 this clings to the ends of them and does not come off until after the body 

 feathers at least have made their full growth." 



No. 416 



Wilson's Petrel 



A. O. U. No. 109. Oceanites oceanicus (Kuhl). 



Description. — Adult: "Sooty black, forehead and under surface paler; greater 

 wing-coverts greyish; upper tail-coverts white; under wing-coverts sooty; tail black, 

 shafts of the lateral rectrices towards the base and the portion of the inner web adjoining 

 white; bill black; legs black, inner portion of the webs between the toes yellow. Total 

 length about 6.8 [mm 172.7], wing 6.1 [mm 154.9]; tail, lateral rectrices 2.7 [mm 68.6], 

 central rectrices 2.45 [mm 62.2]; bill 0.7 [mm 17.78]; tarsus 1.37 [mm 34.8]." (Salvin.) 



Recognition Marks. — Sparrow size; much, like resident petrels, but a little 

 smaller. Long legs and yellow webbing of feet distinctive. 



Nesting. — Does not breed in California. Egg: Single, white; placed in crevice 

 of cliff or rock-pile or under stones. Av. size 28.7 x 22.86 (1.13 x .90). Season: Feb- 

 ruary (Kerguelen Id.). 



General Range. — Antarctic seas, breeding in February and ranging north to 

 Labrador and the British Islands, and in the Pacific to Peru. 



Occurrence in California. — Accidental; one record; Monterey Bay, August 

 24, 1910, by R. H. Beck (Grinnell). 



Authorities. — Grinnell {Oceanites oceanicus), Pac. Coast Avifauna, no. 11. 

 1915, p. 29 (Monterey Bay, August 24, 1910, one specimen); Loomis, Proc. Calif. 

 Acad. Sci., ser. 4, vol. ii., pt. 2, no. 12, 1918, p. 180 (Calif, occurrence); C. W. Townsend. 

 in Bent, U. S. Nat. Mus., Bull. no. 121, 1922, p. 165 (life hist.). 



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