Tweeters:

Yesterday I went on a boat trip out of Neah Bay on Tommy Cod Charters
(reached through Olson's Resort in Sekiu), primarily devoted to bottom
fishing but also turning out to be great for marine birds. It was an
excellent day--we had clear, cool weather, outstanding visibility, and
almost no swell. Although we got no further out than 8 miles, the highlight
of the day was a flyby THICK-BILLED MURRE about two miles due west of
Archawat (so named in the Delorme Atlas, p. 90) at about 8 a.m. This is
just south of Cape Flattery. The bird was seen in a group with several
COMMON MURRES, immediately obvious because of its darker (jet black)
coloration, contrasting with the dark brown but lighter-plumaged Com.
Murres, also by its having a stockier, heavier build, thicker neck, and,
especially, darker head, the entire face black to well below the eye,
leaving only a white throat patch. I recognized the bird immediately as
this rarity because I've seen many on both sides of the Bering Sea,
especially off the Pribilofs and Aleutians, also off Capes Navarin and
Olyutorskii in the Russian zone, and elsewhere. So this was a brief, but
diagnostic, sighting.

The other hot sighting, but not 100% certain, was a PUFFIN, sp. that may
very well have been a HORNED, about 8:15 off Waatch Pt. Amazingly, the boat
had almost passed the bird right alongside by the time we saw it; I was so
busy viewing all the other action that I only spotted the bird when it was
about to enter our wake. I could see the wide, red-tipped bill and gizz for
puffin, and saw some dirty white highlighting on (the back part of) the
face, but it could not be deduced for certain--by myself or a nearby
observer--whether or not the bird was white in front or along the flank. I
had to consider the possibility of a delayed facial molt for TUFTED PUFFIN.
Both of us felt we'd seen white at the flanks but the bird was just a little
too far behind us and seen too fleetingly (and was swimming away from us).
So this one is a strong possibility but not for sure.

As we did not get out further than eight miles, tubenoses were few and we
really only started getting small groups of SOOTIES at about four miles out.
I did manage to find among these single PINK-FOOTED and BULLER'S (NEW
ZEALAND) SHEARWATERS. Both birds were seen about 7 miles off Point of
Arches. Although tubenoses were tough, gulls were very well represented for
the day, with 10 species present--and that doesn't include another possible,
a GLAUCOUS that was just a bit too far off for sure identification. My
count for THAYER'S GULL was just two quite pale first-winter birds, there
was also an adult HERRING GULL about 4 miles off Point of Arches.

Lastly--we had two pods of HARBOR PORPOISE, one of six or so animals off the
Waadah I. jetty on departure, a couple more off Archawat; there were
numerous sea-lions also. There were reports of GRAY WHALE on two occasions
(I never saw one), but I did glimpse (after others saw it first) a MINKE
WHALE about a 100 yards behind going right through our wake. And then, the
species diversity of the genus Sebastes (rockfish) was impressive from the
rod-and-reel angle, including at least 7 species. This group included the
striking black-and-yellow CHINA ROCKFISH, the bright orange CANARY ROCKFISH,
and a single deep reddish-orange VERMILION ROCKFISH, the last a real
photogenic, large specimen. Also taken were numbers of LINGCOD, a few
CABEZON and KELP GREENLINGS, and one IRISH LORD. In all, quite a range!

The bird list for the day (includes birds seen in Neah Bay harbor and en
route to open ocean):

Com. Loon 7
Red-throated Loon 2
Pacific Loon 12
Red-necked Grebe 6
Sooty Shearwater 38
Pink-footed Shearwater 1
Buller's Shearwater 1
Double-cr. Cormorant 11
Pelagic Cormorant 235
Brandt's Cormorant 110
Great Blue Heron 2
White-winged scoter 7
Surf Scoter 28
Harlequin Duck 6
Com. Merganser 15
Red-breasted Merganser 18
Bald Eagle 2a
Peregrine Falcon 1
Killdeer 1
Black Oystercatcher 3
Heermann's Gull 27
Bonaparte's Gull 2
Ring-billed Gull 2-4
Mew Gull 38
Herring Gull 1
Thayer's Gull 2
Calif. Gull 400+
W. Gull 3 (low)
Glaucous-winged Gull 500+
"Olympic" hybrid Gull 50
Black-legged Kittiwake 1
gulls too far off for i.d. 200
tern, sp. 2 (Common or Arctic)
Common Murre 850+
THICK-BILLED MURRE 1 (winter adult)
Pigeon Guillimot 4
Rhinocerous Auklet 5
Cassin's Auklet 3
PUFFIN, sp. 1

Total, 37 species

Scott Atkinson
Lake Stevens
mail to: scottratkinson at hotmail.com
















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