One Buller's Shearwater was recorded out at sea off the Shiretoko Peninsula on September 5, 2008, an event that was published in issue #31 (2010) of the Bulletin of the Shiretoko Museum (Kenkyuu Houkoku). This is the only confirmed sighting in the Okhotsk region.
Elsewhere in Hokkaido, two photos of Buller's Shearwater in A Photographic Guide to the Birds of Japan (2000) were taken off the coast of Kushiro, southeastern Hokkaido, in October (year unknown).
Buller's Shearwater breeds on islands off the north island of New Zealand and is an accidental visitor in Japan with sightings occurring mainly off the east coast of Honshu (south of Hokkaido) in August through October.