Sula granti
Silhouette: Beth Reinke · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~90% in a week >90%
The Nazca booby (Sula granti) is a large seabird of the booby family, Sulidae, native to the eastern Pacific. First described by Walter Rothschild in 1902, it was long considered a subspecies of the masked booby until recognised as distinct genetically and behaviorally in 2002. It has a typical sulid body shape, with a long pointed orange-yellow bill, long neck, aerodynamic body, long slender wings and pointed tail. The adult is bright white with black and white wings, a black tail and a dark face mask.
Walter Rothschild organised and sent an expedition to the Galapagos Islands in 1897 to collect and review the animal life there. He wrote of a distinctive booby there, which he and William Robert Ogilvie-Grant diagnosed as the Peruvian booby (Sula variegata), then only known from juvenile plumage. Later, in 1902, Rothschild named it a new species, Sula granti. Rothschild later reclassified as a subspecies of the masked booby.
In 1998, Pitman and colleagues observed that Nazca boobies on Clipperton Island did not interbreed with masked boobies there. The genus Sula was previously placed in the order Pelecaniformes, but recently was collected in the family Sulidae and order... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Galápagos Islands | 🇪🇨 Ecuador | |
| 2 | Machalilla National Park | 🇪🇨 Ecuador | |
| 3 | Isla del Coco National Park | 🇨🇷 Costa Rica | |
| 4 | Cabo Blanco Absolute Nature Reserve | 🇨🇷 Costa Rica | |
| 5 | Channel Islands National Park | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 6 | Great Bear Rainforest | 🇨🇦 Canada |
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | San Diego | 🇺🇸 United States |
Likely
About 50% of wildlife watchers report a Nazca Booby sighting in Galápagos Islands on a given day, based on 7,276 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 12th most-seen of the 114 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 90%, and over a week to over 90%, if each day is a fresh chance.
June
In that month about 60% of wildlife watchers report a Nazca Booby in Galápagos Islands on a given day, against about 40% in January–March, May and August–September, the lowest months. That is one of Galápagos Islands's driest months, with almost no rain against 50 mm in March.
Between 8 and 11 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Nazca Booby sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Yes
Of the 6 parks where we can rate Nazca Booby sightings, Galápagos Islands has the highest daily chance: about 50%. Next come Machalilla National Park (Ecuador, about 30%) and Isla del Coco National Park (Costa Rica, about 10%).
Same genus: Sula
The closest relatives of the Nazca Booby that you can see in Galápagos Islands (genus Sula, Typical Boobies) are Blue-footed Booby (about 80%) and Red-footed Booby (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Nazca Booby is recorded against all the birds logged in Galápagos Islands (7,276 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
