A chick's diet must be supplemented with vitamins or it dies quickly due to malnourishment and bacterial infections. In captivity the horned puffin does not do well, especially when taken as a chick. Some estimates are that it can survive 20 years or more. The life span of Fratercula corniculata is not well studied. Males show a threat display and fight if provoked. Pairs defend their nests and males defend their mates. After that, the chick is left alone in the nest for the next 37 to 46 days while being attended by the parents only for feeding. The chick is born altricial, but is able to thermoregulate a little over a week after hatching. After the egg hatches, the parents tend the chick closely for the next week. Range age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male) 3 to 5 yearsįemale horned puffins lay a single egg in the spring, which is incubated by both parents for 41 days.Range age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female) 3 to 5 years.Breeding season Horned puffins breed from April to July.Breeding interval Horned puffins breed once yearly.gonochoric/gonochoristic/dioecious (sexes separate).Like some other marine birds, females have sperm storage glands. Not much is known about the molting process besides that it takes place in autumn to winter, and bill ornaments are dropped at the end of caring for the chick. Horned puffins reach reproductive maturity between 3 and 5 years of age. There is no evidence of post-fledging care and the chicks depart at night by themselves. After this and for the next 35 days, the chick is left alone in the nest while both parents bring it food. The chick becomes able to manage its own body temperature between 5 and 6 days after hatching. Feeding of a chick is done during the day by both parents. They incubate for around 41 days, and both males and females participate in caring for and incubating eggs.Īfter the egg is hatched, parental care continues for 6 days. Horned puffin eggs quickly become covered in guano and other debris. The egg itself is gray with purple dots, a type of spotting that suggests an ancestral habit of laying eggs out in the open. If the egg is lost it is replaced in 10 to 21 days. It is lined with feathers, grass, or debris collected by both sexes.Ī mating pair produces one egg, which is oval in shape. The nest itself may be in a burrow, in a rock crevice (usually), or under a boulder. The nesting sites are on steep slopes or cliffs, and nests are usually separated by a distance of 1.5 meters. Birds arrive in the breeding colonies between April and May. The general reproductive behaviors of horned puffins are not as well known as those of most auks. ( 'Alaska Seabird Information Series', 2006 Gatson, et al., 1998) Mating takes place mostly in water with some rare cases on land. Then they flick their heads, and at this time mounting is often observed. Males may perform a swim display in which they raise themselves from the water and extend their necks upwards. Members of a pair may mutually bow or put their bills side by side. During this display, the bill may be open or closed. Birds indicate readiness by head flicking, which may be done either on land or in water. The most common time for mating is either morning or evening. They winter off-shore, preferring open water areas with large populations of the pelagic fish on which they feed. They show no preference with respect to water temperature or salinity. Horned puffins forage off shore close to their breeding colonies, spending most of the year in coastal waters. In the Semidi Islands, they occur in the same habitat as parakeet auklets ( Aethia psittacula). They may also create burrows in upland areas.

Horned puffins nest in bluffs of fractured rock or crevices in cliff faces near the shoreline.

In Alaska, 50% percent of all individuals live ninety kilometers from the mainland of the west coast, on the Semidi Islands. Horned puffins tend to stay in their breeding grounds during the winter as long as the grounds are not iced over. The species is commonly found on Russian islands but can also be seen off the coast of Japan and British Columbia, rarely as far south as southern California. It winters off shore, mainly in the North Pacific.

It breeds along the coast of British Columbia, on some islands and peninsulas around Alaska, and along the Bering Sea coast of Russia. Fratercula corniculata, horned puffins, is widespread in the Pacific and low Arctic.