The Manx Shearwater (Puffinus puffinus) is a medium-sized shearwater in the seabird family Procellariidae.

This species breeds in the eastern North Atlantic, with major colonies on islands and coastal cliffs around Great Britain and Ireland. It nests in burrows which are only visited at night to avoid predation by large gulls.

This bird has the typically "shearing" flight of the genus, dipping from side to side on stiff wings with few wingbeats, the wingtips almost touching the water. This bird looks like a flying cross, with its wing held at right angles to the body, and it changes from black to white as the black upperparts and white undersides are alternately exposed as it travels low over the sea.

This is a gregarious species, which can been seen in large numbers from boats or headlands, especially on passage in autumn. It is silent at sea, but at night the breeding colonies are alive with raucous cackling calls. The Manx Shearwater feeds on fish and molluscs. It does not follow boats.

They are extraordinarily long-lived. A Manx Shearwater breeding on Copeland Island, Northern Ireland, is currently (2003/2004) the oldest known wild bird in the world: ringed as an adult (at least 5 years old) in July 1953, it was retrapped in July 2003, at least 55 years old. Manx Shearwaters migrate over 10,000 km to South America in winter, using waters off southern Brazil and Argentina, so this bird has covered a minimum of 1,000,000 km on migration alone (not counting day-to-day fishing trips). Another bird nearly as old, breeding on Bardsey Island off Wales was calculated by ornithologist Chris Mead to have flown over 8 million km (5 million miles) during its life (and this bird is still alive in 2003, having outlived Chris Mead).
Copeland, ringed 1953
Copeland Bird Observatory
BBC News
Bardsey Island, ringed 1957
Bardsey Island Bird Observatory
BBC News
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