"Petrel is a popular name for certain small oceanic birds of dusky plumage, nocturnal in habit, widely distributed but most abundant in the Southern Hemisphere. The term stormy petrel is more exclusively applied to the Thalassidroma pelagica, a bird which seems to run in a remarkable manner along the surface of the sea, where it picks up its food. This species was well known to sailors as Mother Carey's chickens (q. v.), and their appearance is supposed to foretell a storm."—(Charles Leonard-Stuart, 1911)

Stormy Petrel

"Petrel is a popular name for certain small oceanic birds of dusky plumage, nocturnal in habit, widely…