Sula nebouxii, Blue-footed Booby [+]
Kingdom Animalia
Phylum Chordata
Class Aves
Order Ciconiiformes
Family Sulidae
Genus Sula
species: Sula nebouxii [+ITIS +WoRMS]
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Description & Behavior
The blue-footed booby, Sula nebouxii (Milne-Edwards, 1882), is famous for two reasons: its link to Charles Darwin's expedition to the Galapagos Islands, and its name. The appellation does in fact have a somewhat silly meaning: The word "booby" comes from the Spanish "bobo," meaning "stupid fellow," and was probably inspired by the bird's clumsiness on land and apparently unwarranted bravery. (It is extremely vulnerable to human visitors because it does not appear to fear them.) A tropical seabird with famous bright blue webbed feet, a brown and white-streaked head, blue-gray facial skin, and a solid white body, it may approach 1.5 m in wingspan. The bird itself is a little under a meter long (about the size of a goose), with a long curved neck. They can live as long as 17 years.
World Range & Habitat
Though best-known as a Galapagos inhabitant, the blue-footed booby can be found on several other arid islands off the western coasts of tropical America, Mexico, and northern South America, from the coast of California to southern Peru.
Feeding Behavior (Ecology)
A skilled hunter in the air and on water despite its awkward gait on land, the Blue-footed booby dines solely on fish. Flying over the water, generally no higher than 25 m, it keeps its bill pointed downward, poised for action. When it spots a fish it breaks into a graceful dive, making almost no splash as it enters the water, then popping up on the surface a few feet away clutching its meal in its beak. The bird is such an accurate dive bomber that it has even been known to catch flying fish mid-leap. Unlike other boobies, the blue-footed booby can also dive from a floating position on the surface of the water.
The blue-footed booby prefers to eat alone, but it is not entirely opposed to group dining and occasionally hunts cooperatively in flocks. When a member of the flock spots a fish, it whistles to alert the others, and the entire flock descends, perfectly synchronized, on its unlucky prey. Males are smaller, and thus tend to stick with shallow dives closer to shore, while heavier females make deeper dives offshore.
Life History
Even if the name doesn't make you laugh, the blue-footed booby's elaborate courtship rituals might. Breeding may occur at any time of year. First the male flaunts his brilliant blue feet with an exaggerated high-stepping strut. Then he presents nest materials to the female. A brief courtship flight follows, after which the male proudly flashes his blue feet to the female once more. Then, both male and female tilt their bills upward, giving respectively a piercing whistle and a series of groans. Mating follows.
Female blue-footed boobies usually lay two or three blue-green eggs in shallow depressions on flat ground, far away from other nests. The blue-footed booby lacks "brooding patches" of skin to keep the eggs warm, so instead it uses its feet to incubate them. (Despite their blue appearance, the feet have an excellent blood supply.) The eggs take about 45 days to hatch, after which time the female will balance them on top of her feet for a month. Both parents feed the chicks continuously with regurgitated fish through their bills. In the event of a famine, the parents will feed only the largest chick, sacrificing the others. Chicks stay with their parents for about two months.
Conservation Status/Additional Comments
The blue-footed booby is legally protected on the Galapagos Islands, where breeding pairs number under 20,000. The other populations around the world (numbering about 20,000 total) are slightly threatened by egg collectors.
References & Further Research
BioOne ~ CITES ~ Discover Life ~ GBIF ~ Google Scholar ~ ITIS ~ IUCN RedList ~ MarineBio Network ~ NCBI ~ SCIRIS ~ SIRIS ~ Tree of Life Web Project ~ Wikipedia
Harris, M. 2001.Sula nebouxii, Animal Diversity Web
NatureWorks - Blue-footed Booby
Birds of the World at Photobirder.com by Marcus G. Martin
Search the Web for Blue-footed Booby » ARKive ~ Ask.com ~ Ask Jeeves ~ bing ~ deviantART ~ dmoz ~ Dogpile ~ Google Images ~ MySpace Images ~ OceanFootage ~ Picsearch ~ StumbleUpon ~ Yahoo! Images ~ YouTube
