In flight they look like flying cigars, moving very quickly close to water. They feed by diving, then flying under water with their wings in pursuit of small minnow-like fish. Puffins hold the fish in their bills until they return to the nest to feed the puffin chicks. No one knows, because no one has watched puffins long enough under water. Puffins breed in holes they dig into the ground and build their nests.
Puffins breed in colonies, some with only a few nests and some very large.
Their habits and migrations are also the same. They are extremely abundant about the Commander Islands where the natives capture them in hand-nets. The skins of both this and the other species are used by the Eskimo of the coast and islands for clothing, and the silky tufts of cirrhata are sewed into ornamental work by the Aleuts. This bird lays 5 single rough grayish-white eggs, measuring about 2.80 or 2.85 by 1.90 or 1.95. The egg is usually laid in a small depression in the damp earth at the bottom of a crevice in the rooks.