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Shy Albatross | Thalassarche cauta
Witkapalbatros | Albatros Cauto
The Shy Albatross is the largest mollymawk: a heavy, white and grey albatross with an almost entirely white underwing. Off the west coast of South Africa it is the commonest albatross at the trawlers after Black-browed. The birds in these waters belong overwhelmingly to the New Zealand form steadi, often treated as a separate species (White-Capped Albatross); the Tasmanian nominate form is rare here.
Voice
At trawlers cackling and croaking calls; at the colony a deep, throaty braying with bill-clapping.
Recording: Barry Edmonston — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
90–100 cm, wingspan 2.2–2.6 m. Large, with a white head, a pale grey wash on the cheeks and a dark brow that gives a 'shy' look; the crown is bright white, contrasting with the grey cheeks. Mantle and upperwing are dark greyish brown, rump and underparts white. The underwing is almost wholly white with very narrow black margins and a small black 'thumbprint' on the leading edge at the axilla, the best feature at distance. Adults have a grey bill with a yellow tip; juveniles have a greyer head and a grey bill with a black tip.
Confusion species
Salvin's Albatross (Thalassarche salvini) has a greyish-brown head and neck with only a paler forehead, and an olive-grey bill with a pale yellow ridge and a dark spot at the tip of the lower mandible; the underwing pattern is almost identical. The Black-Browed Albatross (Thalassarche melanophris) is smaller, with an orange-yellow bill and an underwing with broad black margins. Young great albatrosses and royal albatrosses are much larger and have a pink or pale bill without a yellow tip.
Habitat
Open sea, especially over the continental shelf and shelf edge, where it follows trawlers for discards. It also eats fish, squid and crustaceans. It breeds on bare rocky islands and cliffs.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of southern Africa.
Range and movements
Present all year at sea off the west coast of South Africa and Namibia, most numerous from May to September, and along the south coast to the Eastern Cape; scarce off KwaZulu-Natal and rare north to off Angola and Mozambique. The birds from the New Zealand colonies in the Auckland Islands cross half the Southern Ocean to get here. The Tasmanian nominate form breeds on three islands off Tasmania and stays mostly in Australian waters.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
On a pelagic trip from Cape Town the Shy Albatross stands out among the Black-Browed Albatrosses by its size and its white underwing with the thumbprint. Separating the forms cauta and steadi is almost impossible in the field; only the colour of the bill base in adults and measurements give a lead. Watch also for greyer-headed birds: that may be a Salvin's Albatross.
Conservation status
Near Threatened. The Tasmanian population is small and suffers from disease and climate effects at the breeding sites; the form steadi dies in large numbers as bycatch, including in the trawl fishery off South Africa, where collisions with trawl warp cables are a major cause of death. Bird-scaring lines have greatly reduced mortality there.
Scientific name
Thalassarche cauta | (Gould, 1841)
Gould described the species in 1841 as Diomedea cauta; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Thalassarche was introduced in 1853 by Reichenbach. Thalassarche comes from the Greek thalassa, 'sea', and arkhos, 'ruler' — 'ruler of the sea', for these masterly gliders of the open ocean. cauta is Latin for 'cautious, wary'; why Gould gave this albatross that name is unclear. The specimen the first description was based on came from Bass Strait, Australia.