Biology:Persian shearwater

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Short description: Species of bird

Persian shearwater
PuffinusPersicusSmith.png
Puffinus persicus
Joseph Smit
Scientific classification edit
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Procellariiformes
Family: Procellariidae
Genus: Puffinus
Species:
P. persicus
Binomial name
Puffinus persicus
Hume, 1872

The Persian shearwater (Puffinus persicus) is a seabird in the family Procellariidae formerly lumped in with Audubon's shearwater (Puffinus lherminieri).[2]

Subspecies

There are two listed subspecies of the Persian shearwater:[2]

  • P. p. persicus(Hume, 1872): breeds in the Khuriya Muriya Islands, (Oman) & Socotra.
  • P. p. temptator(Louette & Herremans, 1985): breeds in the Comoros.

Range

Persian shearwater taking flight off Goa Coast

After breeding, the northern subspecies ranges from the southern Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden and the Somali coast across the south of the Arabian Peninsula to the Gulf of Oman, Pakistan and western India .[3] The southern subspecies stays in the area around the Comoros and the Tanzanian and northern Mozambican coast.[4]

Population

The nominate subspecies is thought to number in the thousands of pairs on the Khuriya Muriya Islands off Oman and Socotra, Yemen, while P. p. temptator has been estimated to number fewer than 500 pairs on Moheli Island in the Comoros (reviewed by Brooke 2004). It is thought likely that more breeding colonies lie undiscovered elsewhere in the northern Indian Ocean (Onley and Scofield 2007), thus the total population probably includes more than 10,000 mature individuals. The population trend is believed to be downwards.[1]

References

Wikidata ☰ Q10416539 entry