Animalia Life

Diomedea cauta eremita
TAXONOMY
Diomedea cauta eremita Murphy, 1930, Pyramid Rock, Chatham Islands.
OTHER COMMON NAMES
English: Chatham Islands albatross; shy albatross; French: Albatros des Chatham; German: Chatham albatros; Spanish: Albatros de Chatham.
PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS
The “shy” mollymawks are the largest mollymawks. D. eremita is the smallest (6.8–10.4 lb; 3.1–4.7 kg) and darkest of the “shy” mollymawks. White body, dark gray head and mantle, black upper wing and tail, underwing white except for wingtip and small dark patch at base of wing leading edge. Bill chrome yellow with dark spot at tip of lower mandible. Orange cheek stripe.
DISTRIBUTION
Breeds only at The Pyramid, a small rocky cone (650 ft; 200 m high) in the Chatham Islands. Rarely recorded at sea away from breeding location. During the breeding season mainly found within 190 mi (300 km) of the colony on and along the edge of the continental shelf.
HABITAT
Marine. Small pedestal nests of soil and limited vegetation, which may collapse in periods of extended drought, on mainly bare steep rocky slopes, crevices and ledges.
BEHAVIOR
Similar to other mollymawks with harsh buzzing bray with open mouth used in both threat and courtship. A range of displays featuring fanning of the tail, mutual jousting of bills, and tympanic grunting over the back between partly raised wings.
FEEDING ECOLOGY AND DIET
Probably surface seizing of a mix of cephalopods, krill, floating barnacles, and fish. Scavenges behind fishing vessels for baits, discards and offal.
REPRODUCTIVE BIOLOGY
Lays one egg between 20 August and 1 October. Incubation period 68–72 days shared by both parents with short stints rarely longer than 5 days. Fledging estimated at 130–140 days from hatching. Adolescents return from 4 years and first breeding recorded at 7 years. Productivity averages 60% of available nest sites. Crude estimates of annual adult mortality range between 4 and 15%. Breeds annually and seemingly monogamous, pairing for life.
CONSERVATION STATUS
One of two albatrosses classed as Critically Endangered because of tiny single breeding place, and recent evidence of deterioration of habitat. With 5,300 occupied breeding sites, the breeding population is probably c. 4,200 pairs. No evidence of population decline between 1975 and 2001. Now protected, but sporadic small harvests of tens of birds still occur.
SIGNIFICANCE TO HUMANS
None known.

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