Calm ocean! Great company and Phenomenal sightings!

The day started with a light rain but no swell and a very calm, flat ocean. As the rain stopped our viewing conditions were perfect, especially for alcids and marine mammals. After going through the Common Murre zone (several with chicks), we saw several Humpback Whales and a few Dall's Porpoise. Pink-footed Shearwaters, one fast flying Tufted Puffin and the start of several hundred Cassin's Auklets were also seen as we got into deeper water. As we approached several shrimp boats, we observed Black-footed Albatross, more Pink-foots and our first Buller's Shearwater of the year. We found three Buller's on our trip, with one siting on the water near our boat. This shearwater is truly one of the most colorful shearwaters in the world. As we continued to sort through the flocks of birds, Bill Tweit picked out a Short-tailed Shearwater near us. These are usually a late fall arrival but lately we have encountered several during the summer. Many photos were taken of these two highlight shearwaters.

While getting further out toward Grays Canyon, we spotted the first of three South Polar Skua and the first of up to 14 Long-tailed Jaegers! One of the skuas was an adult with a whitish head. Several of the Long-tailed Jaegers stayed on the water for great photos. We also noticed an alcid on the water near a Sooty Shearwater. As we got closer, it was a Scripp's Murrelet which didn't take to flight. We viewed this bird for quite awhile before it took flight. Later, we found a pair of Scripp's that also afforded us great views. Thanks to the calm waters we were able to see these alcids before they took off.

At our chum spot, we attracted several Fork-tailed Storm Petrels, but because of the lack of wind we didn't have a large feeding flock. Seabirds have a tremendous sense of smell and with no breeze we only had a few albatross and other seabirds. In this deeper water we had great sightings of Sabine's Gulls and Arctic Terns returning from their breeding grounds in the northern tundra. Also from this region, we had many Red and Red-necked Phalaropes throughout the day.

Another highlight in the canyon was a large group of Pacific White-sided Dolphins, which came next to the boat.

Other birds recorded on this trip were: 1 Parasitic Jaeger, Pigeon Guillemot, Marbled Murrelet, Rhinoceros Auklet, Heermann's, California, Western and Glaucous-winged Gulls, Brandt's, Pelagic and Double-crested Cormorants, Brown Pelicans and on the jetty, Wandering Tattlers, Black Turnstone, and in the marina the 300 or more Marble Godwits.

For total numbers of species from this trip and any other information about Westport Seabirds, please visit our website at www.westportseabirds.com

One further note: there has been an added pelagic trip scheduled for August 29th. There are spaces still available. Our other August trips are filled.

Spotters for this trip were Bill Tweit, Kelly Beach and myself. Boat personnel and spotters were Phil and Chris Anderson.

On behalf of Westport Seabirds,
Bruce LaBar

























-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman11.u.washington.edu/pipermail/tweeters/attachments/20190812/add637f4/attachment.html>