Cassin's Auklet (Ptychoramphus aleuticus)

Description: Cassin’s auklets are one of the smaller members of the auklet and puffin family. They have the compact football shaped body typical of this group of birds, with a short gray beak. Their feathers are a steel gray on their heads and back, and fade to a white on their bellies.

Habitat: Ranging from the Aleutian Islands in Alaska to Baja California, Mexico, Cassin’s auklets spend breeding season on isolated offshore islands that are free of land predators and spend the non-breeding season in open ocean.

Nesting: Although this species nests on offshore islands in Oregon, there is not a known colony on Haystack Rock. Like their auklet relatives, Cassin’s auklets nest in burrows and lay one egg. Both parents incubate the egg for about 40 days. After the chick hatches, the parents fish during the day and return at night to feed the chick for 40 to 50 days until the chick leaves the nest.

Diet: This species of auklet forages for very small prey, mainly crustaceans and other invertebrates, and sometimes juvenile fish and eggs.

Tide Pool Tidbits:

• Cassin’s auklets can dive to more than 36 m when foraging for fish.

• Parents carry fish for their young in a pouch in their throat then regurgitate it to their young.

• Cassin’s auklets are sometimes forced to dig a new burrow when their original burrow sites are taken over by their larger relatives such as tufted puffins, rhinoceros auklets, or pigeon guillemots.

References: The Cornell Lab, Audubon