yelkouan shearwater
Levantine shearwater latin
Mediterranean shearwater
puffinus yelkouan latin

The Yelkouan Shearwater feeds on fish and molluscs.

Apart from the less contrasted plumage, this species is very similar to the Atlantic Manx Shearwater and the Yelkouan Shearwater found elsewhere in the Mediterranean.

The island is important for migrant and breeding seabirds and raptors, including Cory's Shearwater, Yelkouan Shearwater and Eleonora's Falcon.

The Yelkouan Shearwater has a more contrasted appearance than the Balearic Shearwater with which its winter range overlaps, since the latter species is brown above and dirty white below.

Montecristo is also a resting place for thousands of migratory birds and is home to large colonies of seabirds (particularly relevant the Yelkouan Shearwater, as of 2012 critically endangered on the island).

The Yelkouan Shearwater, Levantine Shearwater or Mediterranean Shearwater (Puffinus yelkouan) is a medium-sized shearwater in the seabird family Procellariidae.

The extant Yelkouan Shearwater and Balearic Shearwater (Sangster et al. 2002), Hutton's Shearwater, Black-vented Shearwater, Townsend's Shearwater, the Hawaiian Shearwater, and the Fluttering Shearwater are now considered good species.

The study of the Minorcan colony concluded that at least in these westernmost birds, genetic variation was extremely low, suggesting that the Yelkouan Shearwater may have suffered a marked population decline historically and thus, while not threatened judging from its absolute numbers, could be vulnerable to adverse effects of inbreeding.

It appears to belong to a group of Mediterranean and adjacent Atlantic species which includes the Yelkouan Shearwater (Austin 1996) and one to three prehistorically extinct taxa, Hole's and possibly also Olson's Shearwater and an undescribed form of unclear distinctness from Menorca (Alcover 2001).

The Yelkouan Shearwater, Levantine Shearwater or Mediterranean Shearwater (Puffinus yelkouan) is a medium-sized shearwater in the seabird family Procellariidae.

It was speculated that it was the direct ancestor of the Mediterranean Shearwater (now split into Balearic and Yelkouan Shearwaters).

There also existed a Late Pliocene/Early Pleistocene species known from Ibiza, Puffinus nestori, which may have been the direct ancestor of the Mediterranean Shearwater (Heidrich et al. 1998).

After the first split, it was the nominate subspecies of the so-called "Mediterranean Shearwater" for nearly ten more years; it is considered a monotypic species nowadays, as the Balearic form mauretanicus has been separated as Balearic Shearwater.

The Yelkouan Shearwater, Levantine Shearwater or Mediterranean Shearwater (Puffinus yelkouan) is a medium-sized shearwater in the seabird family Procellariidae.