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Large numbers of Cape pigeons (Daption capense) breed at the Snares Islands. Egg laying occurs in the second week of November and is probably synchronous. Both adults incubate the single white egg. Hatching occurs from the third week in December to the first week in January. Chicks are brooded continuously for up to 10 days and guarded for up to 15 days after hatching. Weight increases until the chicks reach mean adult weight about three weeks after hatching. Adults continue to feed chicks until they fledge, from 47 to 57 days after hatching. The colonies are then deserted for a period while adults moult at sea. The birds remain around the islands throughout the year. There was no evidence of predation during breeding. Exposure of nest site to wind and rain affected breeding success. Band recoveries suggest a strong nest site attachment from year to year.

During 1977, 3,073 kilometres of coast were patrolled by 132 members of the Ornithological Society of New Zealand and their friends. 5,542 dead seabirds and 135 non-seabirds were found. There were no major wrecks. Small, sometimes local, wrecks of broad-billed prions (Pachyptila vittata), sooty shearwaters (Puffinus griseus), short-tailed shearwaters (P. tenuirostris) and fluttering shearwaters (P. gavia) are noted. Unusual finds were one each of: Antarctic petrel (Thalassoica antarctica), fulmar prion (Pachyptila crassirostris), black-bellied storm petrel (Fregetta tropica), grey ternlet (Procelsterna cerulea) and Pitt Island shag (Stictocarbo punctatus featherstoni) (a new record for beach patrolling).

1978. Oxford University Press. 1012 pp; 404 figures, maps, photographs and field sketches; 14 col. and 18 b & w plates; 19 appendices; bibliography; 275 x 195 mm

Some bird observations for late August-early September 1978, are summarised. The Siberian tattler is recorded for the first time in Western Samoa and two seabirds (crested tern and little tern). A new breeding record for the brown booby is also described. Some brief comments are made on comparative behaviour with Fijian land birds.

Black-fronted terns (Chlidonias albostriatus) were studied between December 1974 and February 1976 along the Waitaki River system and around Otago Harbour. Numbers of terns given in this paper are from a monthly census taken during this period.

Records of wedge-tailed shearwaters (Puffinus pacificus) made between 1960 and 1978 in the south-west Pacific are collated to indicate changes in their annual distribution between New Zealand, Fiji, Samoa, and Tonga. The absence of wedge-tailed shearwaters from the study area on migration from June to September is shown, and migration tracks to and from their supposed wintering grounds in the eastern Pacific are suggested. Reference is made to feeding, and to birds seen in feeding flocks with wedge-tailed shearwaters. The apparent absence of avian food piracy on the species is discussed. An attempt is made, with little success, to deduce the location of breeding sites in the study region.