After a winter at sea roaming the vast inhospitable wastes of the Pacific Ocean, thirty thousand shear-waters descend out of the night on to the tiny Japanese island of Kammurijima, there to eke out a nocturnal and subterranean existence for six months. Their annual struggle for survival in the face of storms, starvation, and enemies is one of the most remarkable of all bird life-cycles.

(from the South and West)