54 | Chapter 4
data showed all had headed south over the ocean on their autumn mi-
gration. All had stopped on a Caribbean island (Hispaniola or Puerto
Rico or the Turks & Caicos) before completing the journey to conti-
nental South America. These tiny birds had completed a trans- oceanic
2,500 km journey lasting up to three days.^2
Modern devices sometimes confirm what is already suspected of sea-
bird migrations. And sometimes the devices have revealed journeys
barely suspected, where the reaction in public might be along the lines
‘Well, I wouldn’t have guessed that!’ and, in private, a more colourful
‘Holy S$%t!’ Who would have anticipated that the male and female of a
single pair of Sabine’s Gulls, nesting together in the Canadian Arctic,
would elect to spend the northern winter far apart, she over the Hum-
boldt Current off Peru and he over the Benguela Current off South
Africa, only to re- unite the following spring back in the north?
In this chapter I will sketch a handful of the more remarkable migra-
tory journeys that have been documented as information has flooded in
from modern devices, very often attached to adult seabirds one breed-
ing season and retrieved the following season. Thus the birds’ fidelity to
a colony renders them far more amenable to research than during those
‘lost’ years of immaturity. From this research findings have emerged that
sometimes startle, sometimes amaze, and sometimes merely plug knowl-
edge gaps. The results have led to researchers then asking, and partly
answering, more subtle questions. What are the routes taken between
breeding and non- breeding areas? Are those routes traversed at a more
or less steady speed, or is the journey completed by a mix of long dis-
tance flying days interspersed with feeding ‘rests’? Do all individuals
of a population use the same non- breeding area? If the answer is no, are
individual birds faithful to just one area? Are there any differences be-
tween the non- breeding areas or migratory routes used by males and
females? Perhaps most intriguing of all, is there any sign that the two
pair members stick together outside the breeding season during the
rough times and calmer periods at sea?
Anticipated but still breathtaking has been the confirmation of the
incessant flying feats of Arctic Terns, each weighing 100– 125 g, similar to
a small and barely acceptable steak. More poetically these sea swallows