Hey guys, it’s time to talk about
Blue-Footed ones, to be exact!
(It looks like a muppet! Wakka wakka wakka!)
The Blue-footed Booby is a type of fish-eating seabird closely related to gannets and frigatebirds, though both will deny this if you ask them. (Seabirds can be judgy.) While graceful and daring in the air, Blue-footed Boobies are just kind of a shambling mess on land, barely coordinated enough to get by.
HUT HUT HUT HUT HUT
Early Spanish explorers noticed this trait and named the species, well… Boobies. Because they’re a bunch of blue avian clowns. It’s pretty self-explanatory.
Like their relatives, the Boobies lack external nostrils of any sort. This is because their entire feeding strategy is to slam themselves face-first into the ocean at speeds approaching 60mph. (You can laugh, but every fish in the path of Booby-missile is praying REALLY HARD to the fishy god of their choice.)
Blue-Footed Boobies form monogamous pairs to raise chicks. You might have heard of their mating dance which mostly involves a lot of drunken shambling. (I’m sure it’s very special to them.) The pair work together to hatch two or three eggs, which fairly quickly becomes just one as the strongest chick murders its siblings in front of its uncaring parents. (Adorable! nature is just the worst, guys. The worst.)
In spite of all this, though, we can’t help but love these goofy buggers. Must be the muppet factor.
WAKKA WAKKA WAKKA!
IMAGE SOURCES
1. A. Davey, Flickr
2. P. J. K., Flickr
3. Kilobug, Wikimedia Commons