Puffinus Puffinus Puffinus is a genus of seabirds in the order Procellariiformes. It comprises about 20 small to medium-sized shearwaters. Two other shearwater genera are named: "Calonectris", which comprises three or four large shearwaters, and "Ardenna" with another seven species (formerly often included within "Puffinus"). "Puffinus" is a New Latin loanword based on the English "puffin". The original Latin term for shearwaters was usually the catchall name for sea-birds, "mergus". "Puffin" and its variants, such as poffin, pophyn and puffing, referred to the cured carcass of the fat nestling of the shearwater, a former delicacy. The original usage dates from at
Yelkouan shearwater 2008 and vulnerable in 2012. Yelkouan shearwater The yelkouan shearwater, Levantine shearwater or Mediterranean shearwater ("Puffinus yelkouan") is a medium-sized shearwater in the seabird family Procellariidae. Yelkouan shearwaters are 30–38 cm long, with a 76–89 cm wingspan. It has the typically "shearing" flight of the genus, dipping from side to side on stiff wings with few wingbeats, the wingtips almost touching the water. This bird looks like a flying cross, with its wing held at right angles to the body, and it changes from very dark brown to white as the dark upperparts and paler undersides are alternately exposed as