Page "Skua" Paragraph 3

Outside the breeding season, skuas take fish, offal, and carrion.

Many are partial kleptoparasites, comprising up to 95 % of the feeding methods of wintering birds, by chasing gulls, terns and other seabirds to steal their catches, regardless of the size of the species attacked ( up to 3 times heavier than the attacking skua ).

The larger species, such as the Great Skua, also regularly kill and eat adult birds, such as puffins and gulls, and have been recorded as killing birds as large as a Grey Heron.

On the breeding grounds, the three, more slender Northern breeding species commonly eat lemmings.

Those species that breed in the Southern Oceans, largely feed on fish that can be caught near their colonies.

The eggs and young of other birds are an important food source for most skua species during the nesting season.

In the Southern oceans and Antarctica region, some skua species ( especially the South Polar Skua ) will readily scavenge the carcasses at breeding colonies of penguins and pinnipeds, sometimes taking live penguin chicks.

In these areas, skuas seem to defer to the considerably larger giant petrels.