A strange band spotted!  A Laysan Albatross moves from Mexico to Hawaii

Laysan Albatross orange 6M3 in the Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge

A Laysan Albatross Phoebastria immutabilis was photographed on 16 January in the Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge on the Hawaiian island of Kauai wearing the orange colour band 6M3.  Laysan Albatrosses banded on Kauai usually get blacl colour bands with white lettering, so this bird was clearly unusual.  The bird had been banded as a chick in May 2017 on Islote Morro Prieto, a small islet that is part of Mexico’s Guadalupe Island.  The bird had been sighted for the first time in the refuge in April 2024 and then three times in April 2025.  This year it has turned up significantly earlier in the 2025/26 breeding season.

Laysan Albatrosses that fledged from a Mexican breeding island being recorded ashore on a Hawaiian island is quite common.  In addition to 6M3, a Guadalupe bird fledged a chick in the 2025/26 season and is now back incubating with the same partner.  In addition, Louise Barnfield writes "We also have a couple of other walkers [= non-breeders] who first showed up a couple of years ago and are back this year, but still just as walkers."

Over on Oahu in the Kaena Point Natural Area Reserve, three Mexican-fledged birds are reported breeding in the current season along with “several more that hang out regularly”, according to Lyndsay Young.

Information from the Facebook page of Pacific Rim Conservation, and from Louise Barnfield and Lyndsay Young, with thanks.

John Cooper, Emeritus Information Officer, Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels, 19 January 2026, updated 20 January 2026