The short-tailed albatross is a large seabird, 33-36 inches (84-91 cm) in length, with a 7-foot (2.1 m) wingspan.
It has light yellowish-brown feathers on its head and the back of its neck, and a white chest and belly. It has black and white wings, yellow feet, and a large pink bill with a blue tip. Juvenile short-tailed albatrosses are brown.
Despite its name, the tail of the short-tailed albatross is not shorter than the tails of other albatross species.
The short-tailed albatross lives on open ocean waters and islands.
The short-tailed albatross is a surface eater. Its diet includes flying fish eggs, crustaceans, and squid.
It will sometimes follow ships and eat what is thrown overboard. It usually feeds in the early morning and at twilight.
The short-tailed albatross begins breeding when it is 6-7 years old. Pairs mate for life and return to the same nesting site year after year.
The female lays a single egg. The chick hatches in a little over two months and stays in the nest for up to five months.
The short-tailed albatross has a lifespan of around 40-45 years.
Sometimes the short-tailed albatross eats plastics and other garbage it skims from the surface of the water. If the trash and plastic are fed to its chick, it can kill the chick. Eating plastics and trash can also kill adult short-tailed albatrosses.
At the turn of the 20th century, close to five million short-tailed albatrosses were killed for their feathers. In fact, the short-tailed albatross was thought to be extinct until 1951, when a colony was discovered on the uninhabited Tori-shima Island, located south of Japan. Tori-shima Island is also known as Bird Island.
A second nesting colony was discovered on Minami-kojima Island south of Taiwan in 1979. Conservation efforts have increased the worldwide population of the short-tailed albatross to close to 1,000 birds.
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The short-tailed albatross was once found in large numbers in the North Pacific Ocean around the seas of Taiwan and Japan.
Today, the short-tailed albatross breeds on only two islands in the Pacific Ocean.
It is occasionally sighted off the Pacific Coast of the United States, south to California.
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