Bird of the Week – Tufted Puffin
From the smallest Alcid to the largest Alcid, the Tufted Puffin. WC has received complaints that Alcids aren’t very colorful. We’ll address that, too. At just under 16 inches long, the Tufted Puffin is more than three times bigger than its diminutive cousin, the Least Auklet. The flashy plumes are a breeding season characteristic, as are the electric-orange legs and feet. (Technically, this is the second time Tufted Puffin has been the Bird of the Week. But the earlier post was a captive bird, at the Alaska Sealife Center. These are wild birds, on St. Paul Island, in the Priiblofs.)…
Bird of the Week – Tufted Puffin
There aren’t a lot of sea birds that are more spectacular than a Tufted Puffing in breeding plumage. This fancy fellow works as an educational bird in the Sea Bird Aviary at the Seward SeaLife Center. Technical stuff: Olympus 1D-X, 300mm lens with a 2.0 teleconverter, f6.3 at 1/500, ISO2500, handheld. And if you live in Alaska and haven’t visited the Seward SeaLife Center, you’ve missed a treat.