Who doesn’t love puffins? Reader Amy called my attention to a PuffinCam, which follows the doings of one Phoebe the Puffin on Seal Island, Maine, a famous birding site. The cam is in her burrow, and she appears to be sitting on one egg. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a baby puffin, so this bears watching.
There are two other cams around the burrow, one on a ledge; they can be seen below the main feed.
Click on the picture below to go to the live cam:
Phoebe’s egg. Apparently a young puffin is called a “puffling”!
And Phoebe:
Things are sad for puffins:
” Unfortunately most of the baby puffins have been dying in recent years because the only fish the parents can catch (due to warming ocean water) are too big for the babies to eat though they try till they are too weak to try – which has made for some heartbreaking bird cam watching for some school children around the country!”
comment from my son who knows more about puffins than I do.
That’s so sad. 🙁
How come the parents don’t eat the fish and then regurgitate it for the babies like most birds do?
Or, tear chunks out of the fish like eagles and hawks do?
The former question I can’t answer. The latter question is fairly simple : their beak isn’t shaped to allow ripping the fish apart. Their eating options are swallow it whole, or not.
Last year I found several dead ones on the beach in Cromer – young ones that starved to death as there were a lot of storms out at sea where they spend winter & the conditions were hard for them. Industrial fishing of sand eels has also had a big impact. (I confess I ate the breast meat – hardly any – before I buried it so I could get its skull.)
🙁 I hope her offspring survives
Boo! The lounge is busy but pixelated:
http://imgur.com/6dWJVW7
Notice something odd about the one in the middle?
http://imgur.com/m5sByuK
Here’s a nice 5 minute video (of Puffins) from Nat Geo with some nice photography. National Geographic also has a good story with photos in the June issue.
I love puffins. I’ve been lucky enough to observe them fairly closely from the water (sea kayak) on many occasions.
One of the best ever nest cams!