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DISCHARGE OF OILY FLUID BY YOUNG FULMARS.
Author(s) -
Armstrong Edward
Publication year - 1951
Publication title -
ibis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.933
H-Index - 80
eISSN - 1474-919X
pISSN - 0019-1019
DOI - 10.1111/j.1474-919x.1951.tb05422.x
Subject(s) - predation , biology , ecology , zoology , range (aeronautics) , mechanism (biology) , adaptation (eye) , materials science , composite material , philosophy , epistemology , neuroscience
SUMMARY .It is suggested that the squirting of oily fluid by the young Fulmar is a defence mechanism primarily against winged predators and that it has played an important part in enabling the species te extend its range from the Antarctic to the North Atlantic. The adaptation supports the view that the Fulmar is of Antarctic origin. The onslaught of air‐borne predators is so swift that any delay in squirting might involve disaster to the chick; consequently parents arriving within range are as liable as anything else to be received with a squirt. Apparently oil‐squirting evolved as a defence mechanism of the young bird and enabled the ancestral stock to abandon cavity‐nesting.