Christmas Shearwater

Puffinus nativitatis Streets, 1877

Christmas Shearwater, Puffinus nativitatis, is a Pacific shearwater that breeds on remote islands in the north-western Hawaiian Islands, the Line, Austral, Marquesas, Gambier, Pitcairn and Easter groups, and on Salas y Gomez. Outside the breeding season it moves through Micronesia and along the western coasts of Mexico to Peru. It was first described by Streets in 1877. The bird belongs to the petrel and shearwater family and is a slender, dark-plumaged species. It is closely linked to the Galápagos shearwater, and its nesting sites are scattered across the tropical Central Pacific.

Order

Procellariiformes

Family

Procellariidae — Petrels, Shearwaters, Diving Petrels

Breeding range

Pacific Ocean: islands of Northwestern Hawaiian Is., Lehua and Ka'ula (n, sw of Ni'hau, w of Kauai), Moku Manu (O'ahu; Hawaiian Is.), Line, Austral, Marquesas, Gambier, Pitcairn, Easter (=Eastern) groups and is. Salas y Gomez (e Polynesia)

Nonbreeding range

to Micronesia (w tropical Pacific) and w coasts of c Mexico to Peru (e tropical Pacific)