Bob, Based on what you described below, I DO believe most of the Murres
we saw were molting adults with a handful of what appeared to smaller,
"juvenile-like" birds accompanying adults. We birders on the ship were
chatting and commenting among ourselves about the Murres' nesting
failures. I think we did not distinquish as well as we should have the
true recently-fledged Murre from the accompanying molting adult.
Translate my expression of "fair number" to a few real fledglings and
perhaps 100 adults in various plumages scattered in mixed groups with
gulls and auklets. Our ship passed quite close to a small group of Murres
that definitely fit the description of kid(s) with Dad(s), perhaps 5-8
juveniles at the most.

However, there did appear to be a larger number (150-200+) of Rhinocerous
auklets in basic-like plumage that appeared to be "immatures." There were
also Rhino auklets in breeding/alternate plumage with larger bills
swimming amongst them. The auklets were scattered in the waters near the
island in rafts of a few to several dozen birds each.

Thank you for the extra education about the Murre's natural history;
I'll be looking more carefully the next time to distinquish and
specifically count the this year's birds.

Maureen Ellis me2 at u.washington.edu Univ of WA and Des Moines, WA
*********************************************************
On Sun, 3 Aug 1997, Bob Boekelheide wrote:

> Subject: Re: 07-26-97 Birding from a tall-masted sailing ship
> Sent: 7/29/97 2:32 PM
> To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
>
> Dear Maureen,
>
> Thank you very much for your recent posting about your sail around
> Protection Island. Sounds like it was a great time, 'cept for those
> misbehavin' kids.
>
> I'm the bird sightings editor for Olympic Peninsula Audubon chapter, so
> I'd like to include your sightings in our newsletter, Harlequin
> Happenings. I have a quick question for you about the birds you saw,
> though. You wrote:
>
> >There were large numbers of juvenile Rhinocerous auklets and a fair number
> >of juvenile Common murres on the water.
>
> I'm really interested in this, because murres don't nest on Protection
> Island or any other local sites. Their closest breeding colony is
> Tatoosh Island, near Cape Flattery. Murre chicks should be leaving nest
> sites from Tatoosh Island in July or early August, but the chicks at sea
> right now would still probably be less than adult size and accompanied by
> their fathers. In addition, the Tatoosh Island murres are doing poorly
> these days, in large part due to eagle predation, as found by Julia
> Parrish and her students from UW, and also probably because of El Nino
> conditions this year.
>
> So if you found a "fair number" of juvenile Common Murres this would be
> very noteworthy. Did you see chicks accompanied by fathers, or were
> these possibly adults starting to molt into non-breeding plumage, making
> them look "juvenile?" We get a fair influx of after-first-year murres
> into the Strait of Juan de Fuca this time of year, particularly this El
> Nino year as murres have been abandoning breeding sites on the outer
> coast, especially Oregon. Just wondering.
>
> Similarly, I believe Rhino Auklets mostly fledge in August at Protection
> Island, so seeing "large numbers" of juveniles in late July is also
> noteworthy.
>
> Again, thank you for your report.
>
> Bob Boekelheide
> Sequim
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