BREAKING NEWS: VICTORY for BALD & GOLDEN EAGLES

COURTS INVALIDATE 30 YEAR "EAGLE TAKE" RULE

GOLDEN EAGLE

SAN BENITO COUNTY

COPYRIGHT, BETH HAMEL

Please join me in congratulating the AMERICAN BIRD CONSERVANCY on winning the ruling that invalidates the government's ruling allowing the "take" (killing and maiming) of Bald and Golden Eagles by wind energy companies. 

BALD EAGLE NEST

SAN BENITO COUTY

COPYRIGHT, DEBI SHEARWATER

You can read the ruling here: 

DEBRA SHEARWATER et. al. v FWS and AWEA:

EAGLE 30-YEAR TAKE PERMIT DECISION

I'M SO HAPPY, I FEEL LIKE FIRING OFF THESE CRACKERS!

AS I SAY, IT IS NOT A DAY OF BIRDING IN SAN BENITO COUNTY,

IF ONE DOES NOT SEE A GOLDEN EAGLE!

EAGLES FOREVER,

DEBI SHEARWATER

Birding on the Faultlines

TRIP REPORT: AUGUST 2, 2013, MONTEREY BAY

HAWAIIAN PETREL: STAND UP FOR SEABIRDS

Howdy, Seabirders,

This is a full trip report for Shearwater Journeys' pelagic trip departing from Monterey Bay, August 2, 2013. The highlight of the day was a HAWAIIAN PETREL which flew within 50 feet of the stern of our boat, allowing everyone on board to have stunning views. These images were capture by David Pavlik who was chumming all day long. He is doing a Photographic Conservation Big Year. eBird Project Leader, Brian Sullivan, was co-leading this trip. He kept hourly records of seabirds from start to finish. It turns out that the Hawaiian Petrel was in BOTH SANTA CRUZ AND MONTEREY COUNTIES — A TWO-FER! Next up, a MANX SHEARWATER (SANTA CRUZ COUNTY), spotted by veteran leader, Clay Kempf, zipped past the stern. Gee, did I mention that I made an announcement in the morning that many shearwaters fly toward the stern, and that this is a good place to watch for them? A single BULLER'S SHEARWATER was spotted amongst the thousands of SOOTY SHEARWATERS. Good numbers of BLACK-FOOTED ALBATROSSES were present throughout most of the day. A few SABINE'S GULLS passed by, but nothing like the numbers on our July 27 trip from Half Moon Bay. All three jaegers were spotted: POMARINE, PARASITIC and LONG-TAILED. In the late afternoon, a single FORK-TAILED STORM-PETREL flew into the wake of the boat and a TUFTED PUFFIN was spotted flying off the bow. Along with the more usual fall seabirds and a few HUMPBACK WHALES and dolphins, it was a very lively day, packed full of action. 

This HAWAIIAN PETREL represents the third record for Santa Cruz County. Remarkably, the first Santa Cruz County record was on a Shearwater Journeys' trip, August 2, 2009! This was the year that we saw so many COOK'S PETRELS close to shore. Our August 3, 2011 trip was absolutely fantastic, as well, although no petrels. The surprise on that trip was a nearshore invasion of LEACH'S STORM-PETRELS which had never before been recorded on Monterey Bay. Clearly, early August is a great time to get out on Monterey Bay! Do it!

HAWAIIAN PETREL, above and below. 

This area was dominated by a windless, stationary high pressure system until July 28th when a low pressure trough brought high winds. Very high winds were inside of Monterey Bay by noon, August 1st. There is one theory that Hawaiian Petrels ride on the edges of these high pressure systems. This may have accounted for the fact that the sighting was only a little more than 10 miles off Point Pinos, Monterey Bay. Another theory being put forth is that the main food source of Hawaiian Petrels has shifted over the past few decades, bringing the petrels within reach of one day pelagic trips, or even offshore trips up to 70 miles. Hundreds and hundreds of hours of observations on research vessels offshore, have produced extremely few sightings of the petrel in the past couple of decades. Clearly, their population is experiencing a shift in foraging. Their main prey is thought to be squid. And, there is a lot of squid in Monterey Bay and off Half Moon Bay, right now. Who knows, perhaps, we shall see more Hawaiian Petrels this season! See trips, below, for options.

MANX SHEARWATER, below.

POMARINE JAEGER, below.

 SABINE'S GULL, below.

The amazing thing was that the evening prior to this trip, I was perusing the latest issue of Bird Conservation by the American Bird Conservancy. Each page was of great interest to me, but being a seabirder, I first read the article about feral cat predation of adult Hawaiian Petrels. How auspicious that I would actually spot one the next day! If you care about seabirds, please stand up for them and make a donation to the American Bird Conservancy or your favorite seabird conservation organization. This issue is not going away. It has been written about over the years, but this article by Ted Williams is especially poignant. Seabirds need all the help they can get. As a group, no other birds are disappearing faster. 

All seabird images, copyright, David Pavlik, below. Please do not use without permission.

Brian Sullivan, below, identified the Hawaiian Petrel. It was a life bird for him. 

Finally, Sandy Komito, of The Big Year fame, was on board for his third trip in a row! The HAWAIIAN PETREL was a LIFE BIRD for Sandy. He was a very happy fellow. 

Sandy Komito & Debi Shearwater, above.

Many thanks to all of the birders who joined us on this trip, some of them making their first-ever pelagic trip! The leaders for this trip were: Clay Kempf, Brian Sullivan, Jennifer Green, Debi Shearwater and David Pavlik, chumming. The complete species list follows, including the two counties covered. Many thanks to Brian Sullivan for the tally on this trip.

MONTEREY COUNTY/SANTA CRUZ COUNTY/TOTAL

BLACK-FOOTED ALBATROSS - 41/31/72

NORTHERN FULMAR- 1/0/1

**HAWAIIAN PETREL- 1/1/1 Note: the petrel flew from Santa Cruz County to Monterey County

PINK-FOOTED SHEARWATER - 79/63/142

BULLER'S SHEARWATER - 1/0/1

SOOTY SHEARWATER - 11625/305/119530

* MANX SHEARWATER - 0/1/1

FORK-TAILED STORM-PETREL - 1/0/1

BROWN PELICAN - 64/0/64

BRANDT'S CORMORANT - 115/0/115

DOUBLE-CRESTED CORMORANT - 1/0/1

PELAGIC CORMORANT - 1/0/1

BLACK TURNSTONE - 2/0/2

RED-NECKED PHALAROPE - 18/12/30

RED PHALAROPE - 1/1/2

POMARINE JAEGER - 4/2/6

PARASITIC JAEGER - 1/0/1

LONG-TAILED JAEGER - 0/1/1

HEERMANN'S GULL - 39/1/40

CALIFORNIA GULL - 25/5/30

WESTERN GULL - 133/13/146

SABINE'S GULL - 2/1/3

ELEGANT TERN - 79/0/79

CASPIAN TERN - 1/0/1

COMMON MURRE - 75/27/103

PIGEON GUILLEMOT - 31/0/31

RHINOCEROS AUKLET - 9/1/10

TUFTED PUFFIN - 1/0/1

SEA OTTER - 8

CALIFORNIA SEA LION - 150

HARBOR SEAL - 2

HUMPBACK WHALE - 5

RISSO'S DOLPHIN - 48

PACIFIC WHITE-SIDED DOLPHIN - 8

NORTHERN RIGHT WHALE DOLPHIN - 1

Spaces are available on our upcoming trips:

MONTEREY BAY: AUGUST 9 & 23 & all September, October trips 

HALF MOON BAY: AUGUST 17, 18, 25; SEPTEMBER 8, 9, 16, 22, 28, 29; OCTOBER 6, 27

BODEGA BAY: AUGUST 30, SEPTEMBER 20, OCTOBER 18

Shearwaters & Petrels Forever,

Debi Shearwater

BREAKING NEWS: HAWAIIAN PETREL- MONTEREY BAY, AUGUST 2, 2013

Howdy, Seabirders,

Shearwater Journeys' pelagic trip departing from Monterey today, August 2, 2013 was simply spectacular! The highlight of the day was a HAWAIIAN PETREL, Pterodroma sandwichensis. These images are courtesy of David Pavlik, copyright. Please do not use without permission.

I spotted this petrel without binoculars, about 0945 while in conversation with Brian Sullivan and Will Russell. I said, "What is this bird?" while lifting my bins to look at it. Brian immediately yelled, "HAWAIIAN PETREL" while reaching for his camera. It as a life bird for Brian and many other folks on board, including Sandy Komito of "The Big Year" fame. 

 The Hawaiian Petrel ranges in the central Pacific and breeds on the Hawaiian Islands. 

This mysterious petrel is seriously threatened. A new study by federal and university scientists has provided the first direct evidence of feral cats in Hawaii killing the endangered Hawaiian Petrel. 

These images are provided courtesy of David Pavlik who is doing a Conservation Photographic Big Year, raising funds for the American Bird Conservancy. Please consider a donation in support of their conservation efforts. 

Shearwaters & Petrels Forever,

Debi

A full report of this trip, including county details will follow. 

TRIP REPORT: AUGUST 7, 2011 FARALLON ISLANDS

Howdy, Birders,

Shearwater Journeys' pelagic trip, departing from Emeryville to the Farallon Islands, on August 7, 2011 was a big success. For more than ten years, we have had a 100% success rate in finding our target species, Tufted Puffin. While the puffin is the main feature of this trip, many additional highlights are enjoyed by those on board. "Bonus birds" included a BROWN BOOBY and a LAYSAN ALBATROSS! One glance at the total species list, will not need to convince you that we saw one heck of a lot of seabirds!

Departing from Emeryville, we travel directly under California's iconic GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE. In the image above, the bridge is enshrouded in the morning fog which often blankets the shoreline. Along the way, we encounter many HARBOR PORPOISE, along with many father/chick pairs of COMMON MURRES. At about 20 day's old, the chick jumps from the rocky ledge where it hatched. The father then cares for it over a period of several weeks. They call, back and forth to each other.

After a couple of hours, we arrive at Southeast Farallon Islands. Here, we are overwhelmed by the sights and sounds of thousands ofseabirds, coming and going to their nesting burrows, ledges, or other cavities. On SugarLoaf, we saw many TUFTED PUFFINS, standing, or sitting. Several puffins flew around our vessel, while some sat on the water, as Beth Hamel captured in the above image.
Expert leaders, Peter Pyle and Alan Hopkins gave a detailed

description of the biologist's life on the islands. Seabird monitoring has taken place over many decades. The islands are fully protected, even to the point where we are not permitted to use the public address system while close to shore. Point Reyes Bird Observatory has conducted research here for decades. Meanwhile, we enjoyed great views of CASSIN'S AUKLETS and rafts of hundreds of PIGEON GUILLEMOTS! Below, is Tony Brake's excellent image of a Cassin's Auklet.Russ Bradley who is currently on the island, had reported a Brown Booby the day prior to our trip. We searched in vain, all of the rocky ledges where Russ had reported the booby.

Suddenly, Mike Parr, Vice President of the American Bird Conservancy, shouted, "BROWN BOOBY!" Quickly, most of us were able to spot this adult booby in flight. This was a real bonus bird, as well as a SAN FRANCISCO COUNTY bird for many on board.

Folks broke out their lunches while we took in all of the abundant wildlife— not only seabirds, but NORTHERN ELEPHANT SEALS, HARBOR SEALS, NORTHERN FUR SEALS and STELLER'S SEA LIONS. Heading offshore just a few more miles, we crossed the Continental Shelf. At least a dozen HUMPBACK WHALES were in this area, along with a few distant Gray and Blue Whales. The above image by Tony Brake, shows the underside of a Humpback Whale's tail flukes. The dolphin show was just as thrilling, with both PACIFIC WHITE-SIDED and NORTHERN RIGHT WHALE DOLPHINS riding the bow for over half an hour.
Tony captured this PARASITIC JAEGER in flight. A few SABINE'S GULLS cruised up the wake of our vessel.
Suddenly, Peter Pyle spotted an incoming LAYSAN ALBATROSS amongst the many BLACK-FOOTED ALBATROSSES which were already lured to our boat. Another bonus seabird!
The general thinking is that Laysan Albatrosses which show up at this time of year along our coast, are probably birds which breed in Mexico, rather than the Midway Atoll.
It may be possible to compare the underwing pattern in Tony's image above with images from Shearwater Journeys' July 30, 2011 Half Moon Bay trip to determine if this is the same individual.
Notice how incredibly short the tail of this albatross is in the above image. For close up views, the albatross flew right in to the stern of our vessel. Many NORTHERN FULMARS were also around.
Finally, it was time to head back to the harbor. On our return to Emeryville, the GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE was in full sun.

It is quite a thrill to sail right under the bridge!

Below, is Alcatraz Island.

We end our day with stunning views of the SAN FRANCISCO SKY LINE!

We would like to thank all of the folks who came from near and far for joining us on this spectacular day, including folks from the American Bird Conservancy and Golden Gate Audubon Society. I thank Russ Bradley for giving me the "head's up" about the Brown Booby. Russ and his lovely wife, Annie Schmidt will be co-leading the September 18th trip from Half Moon Bay. I also thank Peter Pyle who works at the Institute for Bird Populations and Alan Hopkins, past president of Golden Gate Audubon Society, and local artist. I thank Tony Brake for the bird images in this post, except for the Tufted Puffin by Beth Hamel. All images are copyright. Non-bird images by Debi Shearwater. Please do not use images without permission.

The complete species list follows:

7 AUGUST 2011, EMERYVILLE to the FARALLON ISLANDS, total species list:

LAYSAN ALBATROSS- 1

BLACK-FOOTED ALBATROSS- 18

NORTHERN FULMAR- 25

SOOTY SHEARWATER- 400

PINK-FOOTED SHEARWATER- 20

*BROWN BOOBY- 1, adult

BROWN PELICAN- 100

BRANDT'S CORMORANT-750

DOUBLE-CRESTED CORMORANT- 4

PELAGIC CORMORANT- 50

BLACK OYSTERCATCHER- 1

RUDDY TURNSTONE- 1

RED-NECKED PHALAROPE- 6

RED PHALAROPE- 3

POMARINE JAEGER- 3

PARASITIC JAEGER- 2

HEERMANN'S GULL- 30

CALIFORNIA GULL- 250

WESTERN GULL- 1000

SABINE'S GULL- 15

ELEGANT TERN- 24, many birds out at the islands

COMMON MURRE- 3000

PIGEON GUILLEMOT- 400, many large rafts in Fisherman's Bay

CASSIN'S AUKLET- 100

RHINOCEROS AUKLET- 25

TUFTED PUFFIN- 30

CALIFORNIA SEA LION- 500

STELLER'S SEA LION- 2

BLUE WHALE- 2, distant

GRAY WHALE- 2, distant

HUMPBACK WHALE- 12

WHITE-SIDED DOLPHIN- 300

NORTHERN RIGHT WHALE DOLPIN- 150

HARBOR PORPOISE- 22

OCEAN SUNFISH- 1, very large

BEAUFORT- 4

Our upcoming trips with spaces available include:

MONTEREY: Aug. 12, 26; Sep, 8, 9, 11, 12, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26; Oct.1, 8, 16; Nov 27.

BODEGA BAY: Aug. 17; Sep. 14 (limited spaces).

HALF MOON BAY: Sep. 16, 17, 18, 19 (ALL Sep trips have limited spaces. Please select a first and second choice). Oct. 2, 10, 15; Nov. 22.

FORT BRAGG: Aug. 19, 21, 22. (Aug 20 is SOLD OUT).

Shearwater Journeys' first five trips of the fall 2011 season have been extremely productive and successful. We think it is going to prove to be a fabulous fall season. I hope that you can join us on a trip or two.

Shearwaters forever,

Debi Shearwater