Shearwater Journey's Monterey offshore trip was a smashing success by any standards! California County Birders had a field day, adding as many as eight species to some of their county lists. With incredibly perfect seas and weather, we covered three counties today: MONTEREY, SANTA CRUZ, and SAN MATEO COUNTIES. Most of the day was spent in Santa Cruz County. Highlights in that county included thousands of storm-petrels— at least 7,000 ASHY STORM-PETRELS, 8 BLACK STORM-PETRELS, 3 FORK-TAILED STORM-PETRELS, 4 WILSON'S STORM-PETRELS, and amazingly, ONE LEACH'S STORM-PETREL! Other Santa Cruz County highlights included a BLACK AND WHITE WARBLER, 1 FLESH-FOOTED SHEARWATER, all three species of JAEGERS, SOUTH POLAR SKUA, and RED PHALAROPES. SAN MATEO COUNTY highlights included: BLACK-FOOTED ALBATROSS, PINK-FOOTED, BULLER'S and SOOTY SHEARWATERS, ASHY STORM-PETREL, RED and RED-NECKED PHALAROPE, SOUTH POLAR SKUA, POMARINE and PARASITIC JAEGERS, COMMON TERN, CASSIN'S and RHINOCEROS AUKLETS.
Dawn broke on greasy-smooth seas, with PACIFIC WHITE-SIDED DOLPHINS riding the bow, and ASHY STORM-PETRELS still feeding in the earliest light, just off of Point Pinos. Many species were still actively feeding, while small flocks of shearwaters were awakened as our boat headed offshore to the shipping lanes. Miles and miles of feeding White-sided dolphins, and seabirds were soon joined by NORTHERN RIGHT WHALE DOLPHINS. After traveling for many hours, we left many of the albatrosses and shearwaters behind, but found more CASSIN'S AUKLETS and mixed flocks of RED and RED-NECKED PHALAROPES. Large container ships seemed so close to us, owing to the incredibly flat-calm seas, when in reality they were more than 8 miles away! Linda Terrill spotted a lone storm-petrel offshore, which Steve Howell announced was as a LEACH'S STORM-PETREL! Nearly everyone on board saw this single bird, and it was "high fives" everywhere! Jaegers hunting and harassing gulls, and just about anything that they could harass, filled the skies! Finally, a group of gulls and jaegers were seen harassing a passerine. We stopped the boat in hopes of saving the bird, as it escaped the jaws of one of its hunters. It made a beeline for our vessel— and on the deck plopped a Brown-headed Cowbird. Later, we found a Black and White Warbler, but it never landed on our boat. Dipping into San Mateo County was a lot of fun, and more county birds were ticked. We spent several hours with the storm-petrel flocks, picking them over and over until everyone had seen Wilson's, Fork-tailed, and Black. Satisfied and strained at the neck (Is there a petrel neck, like "warbler neck"?), the bow was given over to the photographers who then took their shots of the little petrels. It was not until the end of the day when we found our first HUMPBACK WHALES. Exhausted, we returned to the dock, although many of us are preparing for yet another day or two on Monterey Bay! Truly, it must be one of the most spectacular places on earth for seabirds and marine mammals!
Many thanks to all of the folks who traveled with us today, and to the leaders: Linda Terrill, Scott Terrill, Brian Sullivan, John Sterling, David Vander Pluym, and chummer Lauren Harter. The sea surface temperature ranged from 58-59F throughout the day. The Beaufort reading was 0, skies were uniformly high overcast for most of the day. Perfect.
Spaces are still available on Sep 14, 15, 22, 25, 27, 28 and on all of the October trips. Please email Debra Shearwater for a reservation.
The incomplete (marine mammal numbers missing) species list for SEPTEMBER 13, 2008 OFFSHORE MONTEREY BAY TRIP follows:
SANTA CRUZ/SAN MATEO/MONTEREY
BLACK-FOOTED ALBATROSS- 11/1/3
NORTHERN FULMAR- 2/0/0
PINK-FOOTED SHEARWATER- 78/28/98
FLESH-FOOTED SHEARWATER- 1/0/0
BULLER'S SHEARWATER- 60/2/25
SOOTY SHEARWATER- 55/14/130
WILSON'S STORM-PETREL- 4/0/0
FORK-TAILED STORM-PETREL- 3/0/0
LEACH'S STORM-PETREL- 1/0/0
ASHY STORM-PETREL- 7,000 (minimum)/5/200
BLACK STORM-PETREL- 8/0/1
LEAST STORM-PETREL-1 (?)/0/0
BROWN PELICAN- 5/0/40
BRANDT'S CORMORANT- 0/0/75
WESTERN SANDPIPER- 1/0/0
RED-NECKED PHALAROPE- 48/40/45
RED PHALAROPE- 4/6/0
SOUTH POLAR SKUA- 8/2/2
POMARINE JAEGER- 9/2/9
PARASITIC JAEGER- 4/0/8
LONG-TAILED JAEGER- 1/4/1
JAEGER SP.- 4/0/0
HEERMANN'S GULL- 40/0/150
WESTERN GULL- 120/0/250
SABINE'S GULL- 19/0/0
ELEGANT TERN- 12/2/137
COMMON TERN- 2/2/0
COMMON MURRE- 6/1/28
CASSIN'S AUKLET- 36/4/4
RHINOCEROS AUKLET- 47/1/24
BROWN-HEADED COWBIRD- 1/0/0
BLACK & WHITE WARBLER- 1/0/0
Marine mammal totals will be posted tomorrow.
SEA OTTER
CALIFORNIA SEA LION
NORTHERN FUR SEAL
NORTHERN ELEPHANT SEAL
HARBOR SEAL
HUMPBACK WHALE
NORTHERN RIGHT WHALE DOLPHIN
PACIFIC WHITE-SIDED DOLHIN
DALL'S PORPOISE
It was a terrific birthday birding day for me!
Shearwaters forever,
Debra
Debra Shearwater
Shearwater Journeys, Inc.
PO Box 190
Hollister, CA 95024
831.637.8527
www.shearwaterjourneys.com
*Antarctica, South Georgia, & The Falkland Islands, January 5-24, 2010*
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