Rare red footed arrival takes booby prize

An odd-looking seabird was found, emaciated and shivering, on St. Leonard’s Beach in Sussex, three weeks ago, writes Richard Collins. 

It’s now in the care of the RSPCA. The patient resembles a juvenile gannet but its legs and feet are bright red, a clue to the bird’s identity. Red-footed boobies live in warm tropical waters. The occasional one is seen off Spain, but boobies seldom venture into the colder waters of the North Atlantic. This is the first record of one in Britain or Ireland.

Gannets and boobies belong to a family of pelicans known as the ‘sulids’. The name comes from the Irish ‘súil’; sulids have excellent sight. Ranging over vast expanses of ocean, they can spot a shoal of fish from afar. Plunge-diving on their prey from high in the air, binocular vision gives them unerring accuracy. The red-footed species catches flying fish on the wing. To escape an underwater predator, a hapless fish takes off into the air, only to be clobbered by a bird!