Brown booby

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Brown booby
Temporal range: Middle Quaternary to recent [1]
Male
Female
both S. l. plotus

Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1)[2]
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Suliformes
Family: Sulidae
Genus: Sula
Species:
S. leucogaster
Binomial name
Sula leucogaster
(Boddaert, 1783)
World range,[3] with subspecies:
  S. l. brewsteri
  S. l. etesiaca
  nominate
  S. l. plotus

The brown booby (Sula leucogaster) is a large seabird of the booby family Sulidae, of which it is perhaps the most common and widespread species.[3] It has a pantropical range, which overlaps with that of other booby species. The gregarious brown booby commutes and forages at low height over inshore waters. Flocks plunge-dive to take small fish, especially when these are driven near the surface by their predators. They nest only on the ground, and roost on solid objects rather than the water surface.[3]

Taxonomy

The brown booby was described by the French polymath

Sula was introduced by the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson in 1760.[8] The word Sula is Norwegian for a gannet; the specific leucogaster is from Ancient Greek leuko for "white" and gastēr for "belly".[9]

There are four recognised subspecies:[10]

  • S. l. leucogaster (Boddaert, 1783) – Caribbean and Atlantic Islands
  • S. l. brewsteri Nathaniel Stickney Goss, 1888 – Pacific coasts of USA and Mexico
  • S. l. etesiaca Thayer & Bangs, 1905 – Pacific coasts of Central America and Colombia
  • S. l. plotus (Forster, JR, 1844) – Red Sea through the Indian Ocean to the west and central Pacific[11]
  • male S. l. plotus, Queensland
    male S. l. plotus, Queensland
  • female S. l. plotus, Queensland
    female S. l. plotus, Queensland
  • Juvenile S. l. etesiaca Costa Rica
    Juvenile S. l. etesiaca Costa Rica

Description

The booby's head and upper body (back) is covered in dark brown to blackish plumage, with the remainder (belly) being a contrasting white. The bare-part colours vary geographically, but not seasonally.[3] The species also displays sexual dimorphism of the bare part colours, the males having a blue orbital ring, as opposed to the yellow orbital ring of the female. In addition the male of subspecies S. l. brewsteri is distinctly plumaged in having the forehead, forecrown and chin white, merging to a greyish brown neck and breast.[3]

The female booby reaches about 80 centimetres (31 in) in length, her wingspan measures up to 150 cm (4.9 ft), and she can weigh up to 1,300 g (2.9 lb). The male booby reaches about 75 centimetres (30 in) in length, his wingspan measures up to 140 cm (4.6 ft), and he can weigh up to 1,000 g (2.2 lb).[12]

Unlike other species of sulid, the juvenile plumage already resembles that of the adult.[3] They are gray-brown with darkening on the head, upper surfaces of the wings and tail, while the lower breast and underpart plumages are heavily flecked brown on white. Juveniles of subspecies S. l. brewsteri are once again distinct in having the underpart plumage more evenly mouse brown.[3]

Their beaks are quite sharp and contain many jagged edges. They have fairly short wings resulting in a fast flap rate, but long, tapered tails. While these birds are typically silent, bird watchers have reported occasional sounds similar to grunting or quacking.

  • Female and male S. l. plotus at their stick nest
    Female and male S. l. plotus at their stick nest
  • eggs - MHNT
    eggs -
    MHNT
  • Male with chick in São Pedro and São Paulo Archipelago, Pernambuco, Brazil
    Male with chick in
    São Pedro and São Paulo Archipelago, Pernambuco
    , Brazil
  • feeding S. l. plotus chick
    feeding S. l. plotus chick
  • Juvenile S. l. etesiaca, Pacific coast of Costa Rica
    Juvenile S. l. etesiaca, Pacific coast of Costa Rica
  • Juvenile S. l. leucogaster, São Tomé and Príncipe
    Juvenile S. l. leucogaster, São Tomé and Príncipe

Ecology

This species breeds on islands and coasts in the pantropical areas of the

Pacific oceans. They frequent the breeding grounds of the islands in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. With the rise in pollution in the world, brown boobies have been using marine debris to make their nests, with 90.1 percent of these nest were consisted of plastic, while nests near shipwreck have a high percentage of the wreckage debris.[13] This bird nests in large colonies, laying two chalky blue eggs on the ground in a mound of broken shells and vegetation, but usually raises just one chick, the second one to hatch being unable to compete for food with its older sibling, or even ejected from the nest by it.[14] It winters
at sea over a wider area.

Brown booby pairs may remain together over several seasons. They perform elaborate greeting rituals, and are also spectacular divers, plunging into the ocean at high speed. They eat mainly small

anchovies,[15] goatfish, crowned squirrelfish and Indian mackerel
[16]), squid (including the family Ommastrephidae)[16] or shrimp[15] which gather in groups near the surface and may catch leaping fish while skimming the surface. Along with plunge-diving, some fledglings and some adults practice kleptoparasitism, where they steal prey from other seabirds. For example, brown boobies have been observed stealing prey from great frigatebirds as they transfer food to their young.[16] Although they are powerful and agile fliers, they are particularly clumsy in takeoffs and landings; they use strong winds and high perches to assist their takeoffs.

References

  1. ^ "Sula leucogaster Boddaert 1783 (brown booby)". PBDB.
  2. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2018-2.RLTS.T22696698A132590197.en
    . Retrieved 11 November 2021.
  3. ^
    ISBN 978-0-395-60291-1
    .
  4. ^ Buffon, Georges-Louis Leclerc de (1781). "Le Petit Fou". Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux (in French). Vol. 16. Paris: De L'Imprimerie Royale. p. 142.
  5. Daubenton, Louis-Jean-Marie (1765–1783). "Fou de Cayenne"
    . Planches Enluminées D'Histoire Naturelle. Vol. 10. Paris: De L'Imprimerie Royale. Plate 973.
  6. ^ Boddaert, Pieter (1783). Table des planches enluminéez d'histoire naturelle de M. D'Aubenton: avec les denominations de M.M. de Buffon, Brisson, Edwards, Linnaeus et Latham, precedé d'une notice des principaux ouvrages zoologiques enluminés (in French). Utrecht. p. 57, Number 973.
  7. ^ Mayr, Ernst; Cottrell, G. William, eds. (1979). Check-list of Birds of the World. Vol. 1 (2nd ed.). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Museum of Comparative Zoology. p. 186.
  8. ^ Brisson, Mathurin Jacques (1760). Ornithologie, ou, Méthode contenant la division des oiseaux en ordres, sections, genres, especes & leurs variétés (in French and Latin). Paris: Jean-Baptiste Bauche. Vol. 1, p. 60,Vol. 6 p. 494.
  9. ISBN 978-1-4081-2501-4
    .
  10. ^ Gill, Frank; Donsker, David, eds. (2017). "Hamerkop, Shoebill, pelicans, boobies & cormorants". World Bird List Version 7.3. International Ornithologists' Union. Retrieved 2017-11-05.
  11. OCLC 944380248
    . Retrieved 2018-12-13.
  12. ^ Ospina-Alvarez, A. (2008). "Coloniality of brown booby (Sula leucogaster) in Gorgona National Natural Park, Eastern Tropical Pacific" (PDF). Onitología Neotropical. 19: 517–529.
  13. S2CID 54507773
    .
  14. doi:10.1111/j.1474-919X.1962.tb07244.x
    .
  15. ^
    UWI St. Augustine
    . Retrieved 2023-12-16.
  16. ^ a b c "Sula leucogaster (Brown booby)". Animal Diversity Web.

Further reading

External links
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