Tufted Puffin Fact Sheet
By Yumeko Ziegler
Between horned puffins and tufted puffins, tufted puffins are not nearly as popular in Alaska. They aren’t printed on hoodies, they aren’t being made into stuffed animals, and they aren’t associated with the state like the horned puffin is. However, they make up for their lack of recognition with flowing gold tufts of hair and bold white masks.
Tufted puffins are seabirds and cover a lot of ground They can be seen in the Aleutian Islands as well as Hokkaido, Japan. During breeding season, they head for shores with grassy sloping land so they can dig burrows. They are currently a 9 out of 20 on the Continental Concern Score, meaning their populations are healthy and are of low concern. However, they are facing pressures such as:
Limited food supply due to rising sea temperatures
Bycatch in fishing nets
Complications from eating plastics and microplastics
DID YOU KNOW…
Puffins make low purring sounds when flying
Tufted puffins are also called “crowned puffins” because their tufts resemble a crown
Adult tufted puffins can eat their food underwater
SCIENTIFIC AND COMMON NAMES
Fratercula cirrhata - Tufted Puffin, roughly translated to “curled little brother.”
GENERAL DESCRIPTION
Tufted puffins can be recognized by their gold tufts of hair and their white faces, and their black bodies differ from the white chests of Horned and Atlantic puffins. Their iconic tufts and faces, as well as their bills, turn grey and black after breeding season ends. Their bills even shed, leaving a smaller duller bill for the winter. Between male and female tufted puffins, they look alike.
Compared to other puffins, tufted puffins tend to be larger. They have a wingspan of 25-30 inches (63.5-76.2 cm), they’re around 15 inches (38.1 cm) tall, and weigh around 1.5 pounds (680 gm).
One of the puffin’s most iconic features is their comically large bills. Despite its ornamental look, they do have one interesting purpose: to stay cool! Puffins are excellent swimmers and are known for diving to depths as deep as 250 feet (76.2 m), but they are clumsy fliers. Take off is very difficult for them and because they are heavy by bird standards, flying is pretty strenuous for them. Their large bills help by having many blood vessels in them, and since it is separate from their bodies it gives their blood vessels room to cool down. This is similar to the bills of birds living in warmer climates, and this function can be compared to humans sweating.
RANGE
Map courtesy of The Cornell Lab
Tufted puffins cover a large area of the northern Pacific Ocean. They can be found in breeding colonies from southern Queen Charlotte Island in British Columbia to the northern Aleutian Islands.
Because tufted puffins are seabirds, they live most of their lives on the open waters over the continental shelf. The only time they do go on land is during breeding season, which ranges from March to May. During this time, they make their homes on sea shores, preferably on steep land with soil so that they can dig deep burrows for their eggs.
Check out this page from the Monterey Bay Aquarium for footage of swimming tufted puffins!
THREATS/CONCERNS
Tufted puffins are currently listed as a Species of Low Concern on the Continental Concern Score. However, their health is becoming increasingly impacted. For example, each year into the 1980’s tens of thousands of tufted puffins have been caught and killed from bycatch in fishing nets. Since then, the numbers of puffins caught in nets have gone down, becausethere are currently no driftnets on the high seas. However, coastal fishing nets that are being used still produce high numbers of puffin bycatch.
Another negative impact is pollution in the ocean, particularly from oil spills and plastics. Pollution is extra dangerous for puffins, because they live primarily on the open waters. This means because they spend so much time in polluted water, they’re constantly exposed to the oil which can cause them to undergo a complete molt. Molting is natural for birds, but it is an extremely uncomfortable experience, and the oil is causing it to happen unnaturally when they aren’t expecting. It also leaves the puffins vulnerable to predators like foxes, brown bears, and otters.. In addition to affecting puffins directly, the oil and plastic in the ocean results in less fish for the puffins to hunt, as well.
LIFE HISTORY
Tufted puffins generally reach their nesting grounds in May, and in June or July a pair of puffins will lay a single white egg. For the nests, tufted puffins will dig a burrow in the shore, generally 2-6 feet (0.6-1.8m) deep and 4-6 inches (10.2-15.2cm) in diameter. For their nests they are often made from grass and feathers.
Both parents brood the egg, and after a roughly 42 day incubation period there is a 65% chance of successfully fledgling a chick. When the chick is born, it’s covered in down and able to walk, but it stays in its nest. This means the parents have to bring them fish. The parents will feed their puffling approximately 14 fish per day, and is capable of holding 5-20 fish in its bill at a time. Once the puffling has grown, they won’t return to land for two to three years until they are ready to breed.
Photo courtesy of Larry Miller/Flickr
Here’s a video from Animal Planet of puffins getting ready for their pufflings to hatch!
DIET
Since they are sea birds, their diet is mostly fish and zooplankton. Tufted puffins mostly eat white capelin, which makes up 74% of its diet. The rest of their diet consists of sandlace and other small fish, such as euphasiids and small squid.
When they fish, they flap half-folded wings to send themselves forward and use their feet to change direction. When they bring fish to their young, they hold many fish crosswise in their bills.
CULTURAL SIGNIFICANCE
Like horned puffins, tufted puffins are used for food and clothing by Alaskan Natives. Their tough skin and feathers are used to make parkas, their colorful bills are used for ornamental reasons, and they are also hunted for food.
Haida, Wainwright Inupiat, and Tlingit peoples hunted puffins with lines andbaited hooks. Their eggs and meat were eaten as well as used for trading. Their meat could be roasted against a fire, boiled in a basket with hot stones and water, and baked or steamed in an outdoor pit using hot rocks.
TUFTED PUFFIN COLORING SHEET
Coloring page courtesy of Gennadiy Lukaynenko
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Information obtained from: Alaska SeaLife Center, Audubon, Monterey Bay Aquarium, National Park Service, The Cornell Lab: All About Birds, Traditional Animal Foods of Indigenous Peoples of Northern North America
