Altho not a bird is in sight, a few minutes after we start "chumming" the dark forms come wavering up the slick, eagerly seizing bits of "bunker." Soon there are a dozen, then twenty, and by the time the bluefish have hit the hooks there may be a hundred PETRELS tending the dinner table.
When breeding on Maine coast islands, LEACH PETRELS have a singular aversion to daylight, remaining all day in their dark burrows but here over the August sea no eyes could be keener. The difficulty they have in taking wing from the ground must be an imaginary complex for the wing area is ample for the weight of their bodies. Short acquaintance enables one to distinguish this species from Wilson Petrel.
Leach has "shorebird wings" and handles them like Sanderlings, while Wilson Petrels have a spasmodic batlike manner of flight. The long legs and square tail are also good "field" marks.
North Atlantic and North Pacific Oceans, south probably to the equator.