The feae-complex comprises the three taxa of petrel Cape Verde Fea's Pterodroma f. feae, Desertas Fea's P. f. desertae, and Zino's P. madeira, breeding on the Cape Verde Islands, Desertas Islands, and Madeira Island, respectively (Mathews 1934; Bourne 1983). At-sea identification (ID) of these three cryptic taxa is challenging. A petrel belonging to this complex was observed from a boat off the Isles of Scilly, SW England, on 16 August 2015. An excellent series of photographs document the sighting and key ones reproduced below permit detailed examination of the petrel's characteristics and assessment of its ID.

Many thanks to skipper Joe Pender for the many hundreds of times that we have taken to the sea off Scilly on MV Sapphire. Thanks to Jim Almond, Peter Moore, and Joe Pender for permitting me to incorporate their photographs in this article. Ashley Fisher prepared the scorecard.

Bourne, W. R. P. 1983. The Soft-plumaged Petrel, the Gon-gon and the Freira, Pterodroma mollis, P. feae and P. madeira. Bulletin of the British Ornithologists' Club 105: 52-58.

Catley, G. 2009. A Soft-plumaged Petrel in Arctic Norway - the first record for the North Atlantic region. Birding World 22: 249-252.

Flood, B. & Fisher, A. 2013a. North Atlantic Seabirds: Storm-petrels and Bulwer's Petrel (revised edition). Pelagic Birds & Birding Multimedia ID Guides, Scilly.

Flood, B. & Fisher, A. 2013b. North Atlantic Seabirds: Pterodroma Petrels. Pelagic Birds & Birding Multimedia ID Guides, Scilly.

Harrop, A. J. H. 2004. The 'soft-plumaged petrel' complex : a review of the literature on taxonomy, identification and distribution. British Birds 97: 6-15.

Howell, S. N. G. 2012. Petrels, Albatrosses, and Storm-petrels of North America: a photographic guide. Princeton University Press, Princeton and Oxford. [Crossref]

Mathews, G. M. 1934. [Untitled note on the Soft-plumaged Petrel, Pterodroma mollis, and its subspecies]. Bulletin of the British Ornithologists' Club 54: 178-179.

Menezes, D., Oliveira, P., & Ramírez, I. 2010. Pterodromas do Arquipélago da Madeira. Duas espécies em recuperação. Serviço do Parque Natural da Madeira, Funchal. Funchal, Portugal.

Ramírez, I., Paiva, V. H., Menezes, D., Silva, I., Phillips, R. A., Ramos, J. A., & Garthe, S. 2013. Year-round distribution and habitat preferences of the Bugio Petrel. Marine Ecology Progress Series 476: 269-284. [Crossref]

Shirihai, H., Bretagnolle, V., & Zino, F. 2010. Identification of Fea's, Desertas and Zino's Petrels at sea. Birding World 23: 239-275.

Zino, F., Phillips, R., & Boscoito, M. 2011. Zino's Petrel movements at sea - a preliminary analysis of datalogger results. Birding World 24: 216-219.