Scientific name: Alca torda
Danish: Nordlig Alk
French: Gode; Petit Pingouin
German: Tordalken
Greenland: Agpardluk
Newfoundland: Tinker
Old English: Falk; Marrot; Scout
Russian: Gagarka

Standing almost erect, at about 45 centimeters tall, the Razorbill resembles a smaller version of the Great Auk. It is a shy bird and a little less specialized than the Great Auk, for the Razorbill flies well in air and water, a factor which has probably enabled it to survive in the expanding human world that helped bring about the extinction of the taller but flightless species.⁶³ It is an Atlantic bird ranging in cool subarctic waters at temperatures between 4° and 15° Celsius.

Studies in the 1960¹s and early 1970¹s indicated a decrease of almost 50 percent in the total Razorbill population. Sanctuaries monitored on the north shore of the Gulf of St. Lawrence showed a possible 71 percent drop in the number of nesting Razorbills between 1965 (14,960 birds) and 1972 (4,320 birds).⁴⁴¹ In 1976, Clare Lloyd calculated that about 208,000 pairs breed in the entire north Atlantic, the total range of the species.^{360, 363} Other authors give higher figures ranging up to 1.2 million pairs.⁴³⁹ Of this number, about 15,000 pairs or 2 percent, are estimated to breed in sixty-one known colonies on the North American side of the Atlantic: more than half this number being limited to three colonies in Labrador. The remainder are more sparsely distributed southward to the coast of Maine.¹⁰⁷ Ninety percent of the world population of Razorbills breed in Iceland, and Great Britain, and about 8 percent in Norway and elsewhere.⁴³⁹

Razorbills are noisy birds. However, alarm calls seem to be lacking in this species although they utter low growls, apparently cries of fear, when cornered in their nesting crevices. On the water the birds engage in "bill-dipping" which, as in other alcids, is intensified during disturbances. Bill-dipping is common to almost all diving seabirds: it is a constant habit of the Diving Petrels in the southern hemisphere and is found in such primarily surface feeders, as shearwaters, prions and other petrels. Bill-dipping is probably a prediving signal or a habit designed to look for underwater predators and prey.⁵⁸⁴ This peering underwater is more accurately called "head-dipping", for the eyes as well as the bill are submerged. Bill-dipping, however, seems to satisfy a number of stimuli: it varies in degree of intensity in auks; sometimes it may function to merely rinse salt secretions from the bill or perhaps to express a mild feeling of anxiety.

Like all birds, Razorbills engage in lengthy periods of preening while on land or water. Like the murres they also bow to the ground as if to inspect their feet. Some observers have interpreted this bowing as an aggressive display toward members of the same species. However, the gesture may be no more aggressive than handshaking in humans. Movements of the body and gestures of the head are very important forms of communication in seabirds. In fact, these visual signals are often more important than sound production. All animals use visual signals to communicate. Hand, eye, or facial expressions in man often completely reverse the meaning of the words simultaneously spoken. So it is with the birds, and this makes it all the more challenging to learn to interpret the meaning of their motions.

The Razorbill displays aggression in two ways: opening its beak; and lunging. In the "open-beak" habit, which some investigators think is entirely an aggressive action, the Razorbill squats on land or water, pulls the neck in short against the body, elevates the head, and partly opens the bill revealing the pale yellow coloration of the mouth.⁵⁷

The "lunge" is without doubt an aggressive action in the Razorbill. The motion may take place ashore or afloat and is characterized by one bird rushing toward another with the neck outstretched. When a third bird intrudes upon a pair, one of the pair may lunge at the intruder, forcing it to leave. The lunger may then return to bill with its mate. On the water, the challenged bird is often forced to dive, resulting in an underwater chase. Lunging often precedes the "open-beaked" squat in the Razorbill, suggesting that this latter posture is associated with aggressiveness.⁵⁷

Mated pairs recognize each other even at a distance. Upon close approach a pair of birds bow, face each other in a greeting display, and at the same time utter loud growls, after which the pair settles down to billing and nebbing at each other's head and neck feathers. Intense billing involves twisting and tossing of the head, rapid lateral swinging of the bill, and clicking of the mandibles together. In many ways the movements are difficult to distinguish from aggressive actions, but in these instances they are signals of appeasement, apparently important sexual motions aimed at maintaining the pair bond.

Billing and nebbing in a contented fashion may lapse into sleeping or preening. It is thought by some observers that nebbing may also function to rid each other of ectoparasites located around the head.

Copulation in the Razorbill occurs without additional motions other than intense forms of billing, and it always occurs on land but usually not in the breeding nooks where space is too limited. At Great Island, Newfoundland, six pairs spent most of a May day swimming in the cove, actively billing, aggressively displaying, and periodically emerging from the water onto a rock to copulate.

In some of the other alcids, copulation is preceded by the male circling the female before mounting. In the Razorbill, the male mounts from the female's side without circling. The female usually responds by crouching and elevating her tail and uttering "copulation cries" through a partly open bill, although copulation may proceed in silence.

Some of the displays exhibited by the Razorbill are difficult to interpret. For example, when the birds nest on cliffs where the approach is steep, a "moth-flight" or fluttering before the nest site is sometimes seen. It is thought by some observers that this may be of sexual significance or merely due to air currents near the cliff. Then there is the "ecstatic posture" in which an individual bird points the bill to the sky with the head and neck tipped backward. The bill is vibrated rapidly producing a rattling noise, and often a growling sound. Some believe bill vibration to be a highly intense display of sexual significance, for it is noted occasionally as a part of the greeting ceremony.

In his study on islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Jean Bédard identified two types of nesting sites that best suited the Razorbill.⁵⁷

Deep fissures between rocks containing debris and masses of smaller rocks provided the primary site, while others nested in deep, debris-free crevices formed horizontally or at an acute angle. Here, a few puffins also nested in association with Razorbills.

As in some of the other alcids, only a mere semblance of a nest is made. With this species it is the nest cavity that is important.²⁹¹ Although the Razorbill picks up small stones and other debris during the beginning stages, not much of this material is actually incorporated into a nest. The single egg is either deposited on a small cluster of debris which the bird may or may not have assembled, or laid on the natural substrate where a depression makes a suitable position for the egg.

The egg of the Razorbill is variously marked with brown to black blotches of pale-buff, ivory-yellow, pale-blue or greenish- white backgrounds, resembling murre eggs except for its smaller size and the absence of darker hues of blue.

Laying its egg in a crack or crevice may be an advantage to the survival of the Razorbill when compared to the survival of various surface nesting species. At least predation upon the egg and the young by gulls is undoubtedly reduced by having the egg partly concealed. On the other hand, the Razorbill is perhaps automatically restricting its population density by seeking only nooks and crannies as nests. Density is naturally controlled by the availability of suitable nesting cavities.

The sight of the egg elicits characteristic bowing toward the egg with the mandibles parted and the usual guttural growls. The head is waggled from side to side and the bill is used to tuck the egg against the incubation patch. The bird then incubates in the horizontal position. The incubation patch is formed on the belly by a defeathering and an increase in blood supply to the bare skin. After the egg hatches, down feathers immediately begin to fill the bare patch, and by the time the chick is fledged, the adult has its patch completely covered with down.

The Razorbill is very attentive to its incubation duties which usually take about 35 days.³⁶² It demonstrates a definite nest-relief display when changing guardianship, exchanging greetings with bowing and billing. The incoming bird enters the nest cautiously and upon seeing the egg or young it proceeds to bow to it and to growl. The relieved bird flies to the water and bill-dips and preens for several minutes before seeking the feeding grounds.

At a Skokholm colony in Wales, 30 percent of all eggs laid failed to hatch. Of this number 73 percent were lost to predation, mainly by jackdaws after human disturbance. Total egg loss from all causes has been as high as 62 percent. Clare Lloyd suggested that inexperienced birds tend to lose eggs more readily than the older birds and that nearly 45 percent of all egg losses occur in the first ten days.^{364, 365}

Pipping of the egg lasts two or three days and the chick gains temperature regulation by Day 4 or 5. The newly hatched chick averages 63 grams in weight. Of all chick losses 75 percent are during the first week of life. However, 93 to 95 percent of the chicks which hatch, fledge successfully. Most chicks develop plumage reflecting the summer type of adults . A few, however, show variations intermediate or similar to winter plumage markings.86 The chick leaves the nest site at about Day 18 before it is able to fly, and weighing 140 to 160 grams or 21 percent of the adult average weight.^{57, 364} At this stage it may still have considerable down adhering to its head and neck, although the development of the body coverts is almost complete. Its departure from the nest is usually in early evening, in darkness, perhaps to avoid predatory gulls. However, even with their lightweight bodies, many suffer serious injuries from collisions with rocks, or are killed by predators despite the precautions. Once out to sea, the young bird is comparatively safe and is convoyed by the parents until it is capable of fending for itself. Young birds have a better chance at winter survival the greater they distance themselves from the breeding area. Staying close to shore apparently means higher accident rates.⁴⁵¹

Most of the young Razorbills which fail to survive the fledging ordeal, do so because of a breakdown in normal behavior.³⁶⁵ For instance, Jeremy Greenwood saw a young Razorbill refuse repeated efforts by its parents to coax it away from the island. One parent even tried to prod the chick toward the open sea with its bill, but the youngster, apparently abnormally afraid of the sea, swam toward shore and was consequently devoured by a Black-backed Gull. Gulls rarely bother a young bird once it is more than 200 meters from shore.²²⁶

At sea Razorbills are frequently seen in mixed groups with murres and puffins. The puffins stay on the periphery of the mixed groups while the Razorbills and murres mix more freely together. The behavior of the Razorbill at sea is much the same as on land: it engages in greeting displays, dives frequently and reappears on the surface with excited growling and greetings. It often swims in line formation like the guillemot, and bill-dips constantly.

More than 90 percent of the summer diet of the Razorbill consists of small fish.^{61, 361} Winters are spent at sea in and around the shelter of ice floes which provide resting places and in winter, at least around Newfoundland, it apparently eats large quantities of crustaceans.⁶¹⁴

During the annual molting the flight feathers are lost simultaneously causing a short period of flightlessness. (The events are graphed in the Appendix Figure 15.)

Banding studies begun in 1936 on Skokholm, Wales, have revealed that only 18 percent of the fledged young make it to the breeding age of 4 or 5 years. Young birds first return to the breeding sites at 2 years of age, returning earlier and staying longer each year as they mature. One-third of the young birds breed at 4 years of age and two-thirds at 5 years. The annual mortality among adults is 8 to 10 percent and surviving young do not quite make up for the loss of adults.³⁶⁵ Hence the population in studied areas is presently declining.

With proper protection, the species should survive well and perhaps eventually increase. Without adequate protection, the Razorbill could become extinct like the larger Great Auk. Each year, for instance, thousands of Razorbills and Murres pitifully die in fish nets.²⁵⁰ However, all the protection we can give them at their breeding sites will not prevent natural disasters, such as extra-cold winters, from decimating their numbers. ( See the Appendix for additional tabulated and graphic information: Figure 7; Spring and Summer weight changes in Razorbills; Figure 10; Comparative growth by weight in Murres and Razorbills).