Whilst staying at Sharma, on the Red Sea coast of northwest Saudi Arabia, Euan
Fergusson saw Brown Booby. Brown Booby is an uncommon resident of the Red Sea,
where it mainly occurs offshore. They breed on the Farasan Islands as well as
other islands in the Red Sea and wander north to the Gulf of Akaba in winter. S.
l. plotus is the subspecies we get in Saudi Arabia and it occurs from
the Red Sea and tropical Indian Ocean east to northern Australia and the
central Pacific Ocean. The race plotus is the largest and has
a blackish head and neck almost concolorous with rest of upperpart. Its iris is
grey to yellowish grey with narrower pale yellow outer ring. The bill is
yellowish horn to pale horn with bluish or greyish cast, facial skin and gular
pouch bluish grey to blue, legs pale greenish yellow. The female has an ivory
or pale horn coloured bill, slightly tinged either yellowish or pale greenish.
The facial and gular skin are pale greenish yellow, with the legs coloured like
the facial skin or slightly more greenish. Birds are strictly marine, feeding
mostly in inshore waters. They breed mainly on bare, rocky islands or coral
atolls.
