How is the albatross described

Subsequent research has shown that over the course of their long lives—the birds can live for more than 50 years—wandering albatrosses may travel more than 5. They cover almost all this distance by soaring effortlessly upon the wind. Read: An albatross census from space.

Wandering albatrosses are slow to reach maturity, and breed slowly once they do. In a given breeding attempt, the female lays a single egg, which the parents take turns incubating until, more than two and a half months later, it hatches. If all goes well, the chick will fledge about nine months after that.

The effort to raise a chick is so long and strenuous that, after doing so, both parents take a sabbatical year, which they spend entirely at sea. Like so many other life-forms now, almost half of all albatross species are endangered, some critically. The birds take the bait, get caught on the hooks, and drown. Moreover, because they live so long and prey on fish and squid, albatrosses are among the birds most contaminated with mercury.

The largest species, the wandering Albatross , has a wingspan of 12 ft. For birds with such large wings, they are surprisingly lightweight. At their heaviest, most Albatrosses weigh no more than 25 lbs.

This is because they are perfectly adapted for aerodynamic ability, and the less you weigh, the easier it is to fly. Because they are so large, it is a small wonder that these birds have attracted the attention of humans for centuries. Learn more about what makes these imposing seabirds so unique below. Even though there are many different species of Albatross, these birds all share the same habitat — the sea! All species spend most of their lives on or above the ocean, and only come to shore when they are ready to breed.

Most species prefer to feed in exceptionally deep areas, though they cannot dive very far below the surface. They rarely hunt for fish in oceans shallower than 3, ft. These birds live in two wide bands across the open ocean of the southern hemisphere and the northern hemisphere, with the exception of the North Atlantic Ocean. The vast majority of species live to the south, primarily between Antarctica and the southern coasts of South America, Africa, and Australia.

There are several species that live in the northern Pacific Ocean, from the west coast of North America to the east coast of Asia. As seabirds, Albatrosses primarily feed on fish and other sea creatures. Further, birds in general were often seen as having the ability to move between the earthly and spiritual realms, and this albatross in particular—with its habit of appearing from out of the fog—seems to be both natural and supernatural. Thus the albatross can be seen as symbolizing the connection between the natural and spiritual worlds, a connection that the rest of the poem will show even more clearly, and it can further be seen as a symbol of the sublime the unearthly bird as it sports with the mundane the ship.

The dead albatross, also, can be read more generally as a mark of sin. But as all these symbols build up around the albatross, it also starts to be possible to see the albatross as a symbol of resistance to symbolism: a symbol that is not a symbol of nature but rather something that Coleridge has created to be similar to nature in the sense of its complexity, its resistance to being easily analyzed or pinned down.

The poem insists that nature is something to be revered just as God is revered, but that, like God, nature is beyond both the mastery and comprehension of mankind. And in the albatross, with its multiplying potential symbols, Coleridge has created something similar. The Mariner does so by killing it: what was once so many things, natural and supernatural, has been reduced to just being dead. At length did cross an Albatross, Thorough the fog it came; As if it had been a Christian soul, We hailed it in God's name.

It ate the food it ne'er had eat, And round and round it flew. The ice did split with a thunder-fit; The helmsman steered us through! From the fiends, that plague thee thus!

Instead of the cross, the Albatross About my neck was hung. O happy living things! By him who died on cross, With his cruel bow he laid full low The harmless Albatross. It is the Hermit good! He singeth loud his godly hymns That he makes in the wood. He'll shrieve my soul, he'll wash away The Albatross's blood. Size: Wingspan: 6. Weight: Up to 22 pounds. Size relative to a 6-ft man:.

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