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Brown Skua or Subantarctic Skua (Stercorarius antarcticus), EAT A TASRT FISH!!!, family Stercorariidae, order Charadriiformes, Hout Bay, South Africa

photograph by Trevor Hardaker

#seabird #skua #stercorarius #stercorariidae #charadriiformes #bird #ocean #animals #nature #ornithology #africa

great skuas (stercorarius skua), ireland

#charadriiformes #stercorariidae #stercorarius #great skua #bonxie #seabirds #birds #birdwatching #bird photography #display flight #oh to be a big scary seabird sitting in a mound of pretty pink flowers <3 #also love how one is a little bit darker...one reason i love skuas is their colour variation #literally adore skuas so much!!!!

Skua (Stercorariidae) family (genus Stercorarius)

Which is the best bird?

Pomarine jaeger

Brown skua

Chilean skua

Long-tailed jaeger

Parasitic jaeger

Great skua

South polar skua

Voting ended onNov 12, 2025

This genus is monotypic in its family.

#bird poll #skua #jaeger #stercorariidae #stercorarius #family level #completed

today we have quite the interesting critter - the long-tailed skua, known in North America as the long-tailed jaeger. the littlest member of the skua family, which is a small and rather remarkable clade. if you're a regular on the zoology-oriented portions of the internet, their reputation may well precede them - there's a good reason they're called jaegers! the word is German for "hunter", but even that's a bit of a light word in my opinion. the family is well known for being active and very prolific thieves of other birds' prey, eggs, and even chicks. they're also extremely well traveled, even as pelagic birds go!

our bird today regularly crosses the equator in its search for the most productive stretches of sea. here, it continues its streak of bad behavior, chasing other seabirds until they drop their catch. kleptoparasitism makes up the majority of its diet, in fact. it's as close to a pirate as a bird can get. its yearly nomadic roaming of the oceans can take it as far south as Antarctica before it returns north - its breeding grounds are exclusively in the extreme northern stretches of North America, Europe, and Asia.

here, while it may sometimes dabble in its habitual thievery, most of its diet is made up of voles and lemmings. should the breeding season roll around, only for the jaegers to find lemmings scarce, they don't even bother, simply returning to sea. in years where the jaegers do breed, they are in fact excellent parents, in stark contrast to their nest-robbing habits. they fiercely defend their nests, often hovering far above them in search of any would-be threats, and their chicks are well fed on rodents and other calorie-dense foods.

12 June 2026

#birds #daily post #ornithology #long tailed skua #long tailed jaeger #stercorarius longicaudus #pelagic bird #jaeger #jaegers #skuas #stercorarius #stercorariidae #charadriiformes #the ones without the black cap and long tail streamers are juveniles!

Uncharismatic Fact of the Day

Where does the Arctic skua live? If you guessed the South Pole, you're right! Although these birds breed within the Arctic circle, they spend their winter months searching for food in the Southern Ocean, particularly around the southern coasts of Africa, South America, and Australia.

(Image: An Arctic skua (Stercorarius parasiticus) by Eric Gofreed)

If you send me proof that you’ve made a donation to UNRWA or another fund benefiting Palestinians– including esim donations and verified gofundmes– I’ll make art of any animal of your choosing.

#arctic skua #Charadriiformes #Stercorariidae #skuas #sea birds #birds #uncharismatic facts