The head of the Scottish Seabird Centre is asking people around North Berwick, on the southern coast of the Firth of Forth, to be on the lookout for wandering, misguided young puffins.

The young birds, known as pufflings, are apparently emerging from their burrows at night and "seem to be getting disoriented by the lights in the nearby town, and they're coming into town."

People are being asked to check under their cars and in their basements to see if there's a puffling lurking.

"We've already had quite a few handed in this season already," Tom Brock, chief executive of the Scottish Seabird Centre told CBC's As It Happens.Brock said the puffin parents are "very diligent" when they are feeding the young birds and when they are in their burrow.

"Unfortunately, when the pufflings leave at night, the parental duty is over. So the parents go off to sea, and the little puffling is on its own."

The pufflings should be heading toward the ocean, he said, but they are getting disoriented and heading into town instead.

The pufflings can turn up in "all sorts of places," including a supermarket parking lot.

Last year, he said, a security guard at a hotel was making his rounds in the early morning hours when he spotted something odd: a puffling, waddling its way down the hotel corridor.

Brock said he expects to be on "puffling alert" for about another week as the end of breeding season nears.

"If anybody finds them, then our Scottish Seabird Centre puffling rescue service will come in and help."

Listen to the full As It Happens interview here.