There were 25 people on board the Viking Star at La Conner at 1000 on June
19. The day started cloudy and gave way to sunshine by noon. We went out
Deception Pass at the start of an outgoing tide and headed north up Rosario
Strait. We intercepted J pod of 19 whales as they were heading south. We
stayed with them about one hour and then went to Shoal Bight on Lopez Is.
where we watched two gray whales for about 30 minutes. As we headed back to
Deception Pass we intercepted the pod again and got more good viewing. We got
back to La Conner at 0430. We also saw the usual harbor seals and one harbor
porpoise. We saw 30 bird species as well either in La Conner or from the
boat. All in all it was a very good day.

SPECIES SEEN
6/19/1999 ~ on Whale Cruise ~ 30 seen
Brandt's Cormorant
Double-crested Cormorant
Pelagic Cormorant
Great Blue Heron - over 50
Turkey Vulture
Osprey
Bald Eagle - 32
Red-tailed Hawk
Peregrine Falcon
Spotted Sandpiper
Black Oystercatcher
Glaucous-winged Gull
Caspian Tern
Pigeon Guillemot - numerous
Marbled Murrelet - 1
Rhinoceros Auklet - numerous
Common Loon - 1
Rock Dove
Rufous Hummingbird - while at Shoal Bight and about 200 yards off shore, one
flew
over to the boat, checked us out and flew back to shore.
Belted Kingfisher - 5, 4 male and 1 female
American Crow
American Robin
European Starling
Violet-green Swallow
Barn Swallow
Cliff Swallow
House Sparrow
American Goldfinch
House Finch
White-crowned Sparrow

Hugh Jennings
Bellevue, WA
hughbirder at aol.com