Common Murre Uria aalge By: Mattia Scientific Classification Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Aves Order: Ciconiforms Family: Alcidae Genus: Uria Species: aalge

Natural History

The common murre belongs to the Phylum Chordata which means it is a vertebrate. The first breeding season for the common murre takes place at the age of 4 to 5 years. The common murre does not use nesting material, as the one egg is laid on the bare rock or soil of a steep cliff or ledge facing the sea. The eggs are varied in color from pure white to shades of green, blue, or brown with or without speckles of brown, lilac, or black. Both parents take turns sitting on the egg. It takes 34 days for the egg to hatch. Chicks fledge (leave their nest, or grow their feathers) at 18-25 days and go out to sea with the male of the pair. The chick is able to fly at the age of 39-46 days.

Habitat

The common murre is primarily a water bird, except for when it is breeding season. Common murres can be found in the Atlantic Ocean. However, there is a population that is found in the North Pacific. The common murre that makes its home/habitat in the Atlantic Ocean breeds along such rocky coasts as Portugal and Iceland, as well as from New Brunswick to southwestern Greenland. The eastern North American population is about 570,000 pairs of which 550,000 breed in Newfoundland and Labrador. Almost all the rest breed in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

Present Status

The common murre is extirpated in Maine which means it used to live in Maine but now it doesn't.

Physical Description

The length of a common murre is 14 inches. Their bills are black, pointed and long. Their tails are rounded and they have a blurry streak that makes their side appear dusty. Their head, beak, and wings are black, and their underside is white.

Diet and Feeding Habits

The common murre can stay under water for up to one minute at a time. The adult common murre is a consumer. It consumes between 20g and 32g of food everyday. Common murre feed their chicks three to five fish a day. Most adults eat or prey on fish the majority of the time, but they can also eat zooplankton, squid, worms, shrimp, and mollusks. Many common murres can fly up to 125 miles from the nest to find food for their chicks. The common murre often dives up to 100 feet in the water but has been recorded to reach 550 feet.

Causes of Endangerment

The common murres can live for a very long time. We know from tagging the birds with metal leg bands that wild birds of both species have survived for 25 years. A few live even longer, because the aluminum bands used 30 years ago have worn through then fallen off the leg before the oldest birds carrying them had died. Stronger stainless steel bands are now being used to give a better idea of their life span.

Despite their life span, many common murres are legally hunted quite young, often before beginning to breed at five years of age. Some are hunted as they are migrating off the coast of Greenland and Canada. Native people shoot a few thousand near the colonies in a traditional food hunt each year.

During the Exxon Valdez disaster, about 30,000 oiled birds were picked up in the first four months. Seventy-four percent of the birds were common murres and thick billed murres. But in the rescue many more murres probably died than were recovered.

Most murres die off Newfoundland and Labrador. In 1993 up to about 750,000 died; they were shot each winter. New hunting restrictions were made in 1993, and the death of the common murre has been reduced to about 200,000.

Personal Essay

The value of wilderness to modern society is that it benefits us and supplies us with air, homes, food, pets, and life. Some people think polluting the air and the environment where we live is not a big deal, but when you look at it from another angle we are the ones who are hurting ourselves.

If there was no such thing as wilderness we would be doomed or even worse, we might not even exist. Wilderness has a food chain, and if we don't keep this food chain going everything would be mixed up and animals would be overpopulated. Like if an owl feeds on skunks, the owl become extinct then the skunks would be overpopulated because there is nothing to eat them. Most of our food and material we need comes from wilderness. For example without wilderness you would not have a bed with feathers to sleep on or a couch with feathers to sit on to watch T.V.

The common murre is mainly a water bird except for when it is breeding season. It lays their eggs on rocky coastal cliffs or the soil. It used to live in Maine but now it doesn't because we destroyed its habitat. So now it’s extirpated from Maine. Instead of protecting its environment we were selfish and wanted the sea for ourselves. It seemes to me like we waited too long to help the populations in Maine because it's extripated and no longer lives here. 

Bibliography

Common murre Uria aalge   http://www.mbrpwrc.usgs.gov/id/framlst/i0300id.html. (February 28, 2003)

California Wildlife Habitat Relationships System. http://www.dfg.ca.gov/whdab/B237.html. (February 28, 2003)

Uria aalge. http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/accounts/uria/u._aalge$narrative.html. (February 30, 2003)

USGS. http://www.absc.usgs.gov/research/seabird_foragefish/seabirds/flash_cards/common_murre.html. (March 7,2003)

Canadian Wildlife Service Hinterland Who’s Who. May 15, 2002. www.cws-scf.ec.gc.ca/hww-fap/hww-fap.cfm?ID_species=29&lang=e. (April 2, 2003)

Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council. http://www.oilspill.state.ak.us/facts/status_murre.html. (April 3, 2003)