Masked Booby, with egg, and yes that's its nest.MABO's are terrestrial roosting birds. They do not perch above ground for any reason. Making them particularly vulnerable to introduced predators, and human development. Not an issue on Tern I.
Their nest is pretty much a scrape identified by a slight depression surrounded by a circle of pebbles, or other debris.
Remember me describing how the vast majority of true seabirds lay a clutch of only one egg. The Masked Booby, however, has a two egg clutch. The above pic shows just the first egg. The "B-Egg" has not been layed yet.
Their is one little twist to this. One chick commits siblicide, that is kills the other chick. This is generally the older chick that survives this.
Also, this species lacks incubation patches. Instead, heat transfers through webs of feet, which cover upper surface of egg.
-mwyork
2 comments:
...my sister wanted a dog, not a little sister. Thank goodness she didn't get any ideas from the sulids! Though admittedly she did try to drag me down 2 flights of stairs when I was a week old. Hm. Foot heat transfer is pretty nifty =)
Matt,
The bird seems to be saying, "What are you looking at?" Of course, we are looking at a rare sight for us humans. Thanks for pulling the curtain back a bit.
bd
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