Pomarine Jaeger
Stercorarius pomarinus (Temminck, 1815)
Stercorariidae — Skuas
Pomarine Jaeger, Stercorarius pomarinus, breeds across the high Arctic of North America and the Palearctic, from Arctic tundra and islands in Alaska, Canada and Arctic Russia to areas around Greenland and Svalbard. Outside the breeding season it moves to temperate and tropical coasts and offshore waters worldwide. It is a seabird in the skua family, and the breeding adults have two central tail feathers that are much longer than the rest, spoon-shaped and twisted. Identification is made harder by the species’ three plumage forms and its similarity to the parasitic jaeger.
- Order
- Charadriiformes
- Family
- Stercorariidae — Skuas
- Breeding range
- North America, Palearctic: Holarctic high Arctic tundra: erratically off sw Greenland, Svalbard (nesting unconfirmed; n of Norway), nw to ne Arctic Russia (including many high Arctic islands), high Arctic n Alaska and sw Alaska mainland, and Arctic Canada to Baffin I. (ne Canada)
- Nonbreeding range
- to temperate to tropical coasts and offshore waters worldwide
