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Back	The Wandering Albatross

Quick Facts:
                  Population:                                             the call of the albatross!
                            21,000 pairs
                   Location:
                            Southern Seas
                  Wingspan:
                            avrg. 10-12 feet WOW*
                     Weight:
                            18 pounds
                       Diet:
                            Squid and fish, mmmm
                      Nests: Mounds of mud and grass (home sweet home)                                                                 funny looking
*the longest wingspan of an albatross is 17 FEET! WOW.-information from the encyclopedia Britanica.                      funny lookin

Wandering Albatrosses eat mostly fish eggs, fish, and tasty squid. They will kill their food at right under the oceans surface or find dead animals floating on the surface, Delectable! Albatrosses live in oceans worldwide, especially Southern hemisphere.

Albatrosses can live to be 80 - 85 years old and they mate for life. (aww that's nice) Once they leave home they may not return to land for 7 to 10 years, when they return to the island where they were born. They have a big funny lookin white head, white neck and body, a wedge-shaped tail, and a large pink beak. (HA!) Feather color varies through its life, from dark brown in the first year to almost fully white in old age.

big bird A funny thing about albatrosses, is well, their name! But besides that, they only lay one egg each year. other birds lay lots of eggs. chickens lay lots of eggs. (mmmmm chicken eggs) Most birds lay more than one egg per breeding season, but not albatrosses.
big bird

Albatrosses spend the better part of their lives flying, gliding around on the wind There is thought to be a total of 750,000 breeding pairs of the 13 species of these huge birds. Grown-up albatrosses have been recorded flying up to 550 miles per day at speeds of 50 mph, (wicked fast) and in a single fooding flight they can cover an lot of space, like 1800 to 9300 miles, a distance greater than the diameter of the earth. (HOLY CRAP) They are capable of flying so far each day because they have the ability to "lock" their wings.

In storys of old the Albatross carried the soul of dead mariners. If a sailor killed the bird, bad luck would fall upon him for the rest of his natural life. This belief was not universally held, as Albatross feet were once used as tobacco pouches. The moral of all this is: DO NOT KILL MY ALBATROSSES! or... Albatri...or...my gaggle of albatreese.....Albuttocks...anywho.....

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