A New Species Of Storm Petrel Was Discovered Soaring Over The Andes Mountains In Chile
Over the Andes Mountains in Chile, a new species of storm petrel was discovered flying to its breeding grounds. The bird was soaring up from the Pacific Ocean and headed to the west.
Researchers determined it was a new species after taking a closer look at native storm petrels and finding that some of the birds were different.
Many bird watchers who live in towering apartment buildings in Santiago, Chile, or even just office workers staring out the windows of their skyscrapers can see storm petrels flitting through the air every day. The city of Santiago is located in central Chile, about 70 miles inland from the Pacific Ocean.
“Imagine that high up over one of the largest cities in the southern hemisphere, storm petrels fly daily from the ocean to the high mountains,” said a researcher named Alvaro Jaramillo. “Birders see them when watching the full moon over the city.”
Storm petrels are nocturnal seabirds that belong to the family Hydrobatidae, sometimes referred to as Oceanitidae, and there are about 20 species of them.
They spend most of their time out at sea and only return to land when it’s breeding season. They feed on small fish and planktonic crustaceans from the ocean’s surface.
Jaramillo and his colleagues from Chile, Peru, Hawaii, and New Zealand traveled up to the snow-capped mountains and used mist nets to capture, photograph, and study the birds.
When they compared the genetics of storm petrels in Santiago to other species in South America, they found major differences.
Jaramillo was amazed that the genetically distinct bird was “right under everyone’s noses during all of this time.” Storm petrels typically nest on islands, but now, others have been seen in inland deserts and mountains.
Silvio – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only, not the actual bird
The new species is named Oceanites barrosi, or the Andean storm petrel. It was named after ornithologist Rafael Barros Valenzuela.
He was the first to record storm petrels in Chile and became one of the most well-known ornithologists in Chile during the 20th century.
“We propose the name Andean storm petrel due to its unique breeding area. Although a nest has not yet been found, the Andean storm petrel is seen going in and out of high elevation areas during the breeding season, and many recently fledged juveniles have been found in elevations above the city of Santiago,” said the researchers.
The bird is small and fits into the palm of a hand. It is mostly blackish-brown in color with a white “band-shaped” patch on its back.
Previously, there were three known species in the genus Oceanites. However, Jaramillo and the research team suggest that they might actually be seven separate species.
Identifying the different species of storm petrel may be a challenge because they all look the same even though they are genetically distinct. Hopefully, future research can pinpoint their nesting areas so it’ll be easier to tell them apart.
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