Puffin happy feet6/27/2023 My job was to look at puffin bands, which are wrapped around puffin legs. Of course, I couldn’t spend all my time looking at puffin eyes. Scanning the entire colony, I saw an entire range of color, from slate gray to deep ocean navy, stormy silver-blue to almost black. I panned over to another puffin, only to realize his eyes were a deep, chocolatey brown. “Funny” I thought to myself, “I never realized how pretty puffin eyes were”. As I sat there staring at my uncooperative subject, however, I noticed he had the most striking, sky-blue eyes. After I had recorded only two of the letters on his band, however, he promptly sat down on his feet, leaving me to sit there and wait for him to get back up so I could continue recording his bands. I first noticed this when I focused my scope on one particular puffin to try and read his leg band. I’ve always thought of different eye colors as a human thing, with the occasional dog or cat having unique eyes because we bred them that way, but puffins have evolved a vast range of eye colors all on their own. One thing that really struck me was the difference in eye color. But puffins, like people, are individuals, and nothing highlights that fact like meticulously watching a puffin colony for hours every day. Humans like to make sweeping generalizations about people and animals alike, and we often refer to creatures like puffins in regard to their entire species. “One thing I would never have known had I not spent so many hours looking at puffins through high-powered scopes is how different they all are. Project Puffin Research Intern Aubrey Alamshah shares her puffin-watching experiences while working on Maine’s Eastern Egg Rock Island.
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