Razorbill

Description:

The razorbill has white underparts and a black head, neck, back and feet during breeding season. A thin white line also extends from the eyes to the end of the bill. Its head is darker than that of a common murre. During the nonbreeding season, the throat and face behind the eye become white, and the white line on the face becomes less prominent. The thick black bill has a blunt end. It is large for an alcid and its mean weight ranges from 505 to 890 g (17.8 to 31.4 oz). The female and male adults are very much alike, having only small differences such as wing length. The wing length of adult males ranges from 201–216 mm (7.9–8.5 in) while that of females ranges from 201 to 213 mm (7.9 to 8.4 in) Their mating system is female-enforced monogamy; the razorbill chooses one partner for life. It nests in open or hidden crevices among cliffs and boulders. It is a colonial breeder and only comes to land to breed.

Habitat:

Razorbills are distributed across the North Atlantic; the world population of razorbills is estimated to be at less than 1,000,000 breeding pairs, making them among the rarest auks in the world (Chapdelaine et al. 2001). Approximately half of the breeding pairs occur in Iceland. Razorbills thrive in water surface temperature below 15°C. They are often seen with other larger auks, such as the thick-billed murre and common murre. However, unlike other auks, they commonly move into larger estuaries with lower salinity levels to feed. These birds are distributed across sub-arctic and boreal waters of the Atlantic. Their breeding habitat is islands, rocky shores and cliffs on northern Atlantic coasts, in eastern North America as far south as Maine, and in western Europe from northwestern Russia to northern France.