Flesh-footed Shearwater

How to find it

Offshore pelagic trips are the only realistic way to look for it. It stays far from shore, so scanning from the mainland will not help. Watch mixed seabird flocks that are following dolphins, since that is how the Costa Rican bird was found. Check each dark shearwater for a pale, heavy bill and a dark belly. Treat any sighting as a bonus, as there is only one record so far.

How to recognise it

Flesh-footed Shearwater is a large, broad-winged shearwater, and the clues are on the bill, the belly and the underwings.

Look for these marks:

- Plumage an even, deep chocolate brown, all dark.

- A fairly heavy pale bill, pink-white with a dark hooked tip.

- Pink legs and flesh-coloured feet, which may show pink webbing when the bird lands on water.

- Entirely dark underwings, without pale coverts.

- A dark belly.

- A long pointed tail, visible in flight.

That dark belly keeps it apart from the white-bellied Pink-footed Shearwater, a Costa Rican offshore species that otherwise shares its size, shape and flight style.

What it sounds like

Recording: Spencer McIntyre, CC BY 4.0, source, read 4 Nov 2026.

Behaviour and diet

This shearwater is often seen alone or feeding with other shearwaters. It eats mainly fish and squid, and catches most prey by diving from the surface or in flight. Outside the breeding season it also takes soft-bodied invertebrates such as jellyfish relatives.

It often joins flocks of smaller shearwaters, scavenges around whales and dolphins, and follows fishing boats for scraps. That fits the Costa Rican bird, which was feeding beside pantropical spotted dolphins. In flight it uses energetic wingbeats on stiff wings, as the Pink-footed does, while Wedge-tailed Shearwaters fly low with wings angled forward, using relaxed glides.

Where it lives

It is a deep-ocean bird. The Costa Rican record came from open water well offshore, over an oceanic trench, not from the coast. The only documented spot is Pacific water about 25 miles off Cabo Blanco.

Range-wide the species breeds in the South Pacific and migrates north. Its migration reaches from the Indian Ocean to the coasts of Alaska and California, and tropical waters are not its usual home.

When to see it

The only documented Costa Rican sighting so far was on 10 January 2025.

Similar birds

Three birds cause most of the confusion. Dark-form Wedge-tailed Shearwater, a regular offshore bird in Costa Rica, has a longer pointed tail and a thinner, dull dark bill. Sooty Shearwater has narrower wings, a slim dark bill and silvery underwings, and lacks the Flesh-footed's deep brown tone. Pink-footed Shearwater has a white belly, where the Flesh-footed is dark below.

Names and lore in Costa Rica

The AOCR Spanish name is Pardela Patas Pálidas. UCR and the press use Pardela Paticlara, the name used in Spain, and Ecuador uses Pardela Paticárnea.

Status and conservation

The AOCR list gives it status A (accidental) in Costa Rica, and the IUCN lists the species as near threatened.

Photography tips

Expect distant views on Costa Rican trips. In New Zealand it is attracted to boats, but one other source says it rarely comes close to them. Mixed flocks following dolphins are the best place to point a long lens.