• Skip to Content
  • Skip to Main Navigation
  • Skip to Local Navigation
  • Skip to Search
  • Skip to Sitemap
  • Skip to Footer
Help develop a Bird ID tool!

Pacific Loon

Gavia pacifica ORDER: GAVIIFORMES FAMILY: GAVIIDAE

IUCN Conservation Status: Least Concern

  • Similar Species
  • Related Species
  • Go to:

The Pacific Loon is perhaps the most abundant loon in North America. It spends most of the year on the Pacific Ocean, returning to inland Arctic tundra lakes only for three months in summer to breed.

Donate to Bird Cams
Get BNA: the definitive resource for North American birds

Calls

  • Yodel and hoot
    Recorded by William W. H. Gunn
    Yukon, Canada July 1971
  • Long wail ("oo-loo-lee")
    Recorded by Gerrit Vyn
    Alaska July 2007
  • Wail
    Recorded by Gerrit Vyn
    Alaska July 2007
  • Croak, yelp and splash dive
    Recorded by Brian J. McCaffery
    Alaska January 2006
    • Courtesy of Macaulay Library
    © Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Call is a hoarse croak, often repeated. Also issues a plaintive wail.

Other

Get BNA: the definitive resource for North American birds
Search the Macaulay Library online archive for more sounds and videos