Tropicbirds!!! 5, 6, 7 June 2025 by Kate Sutherland

Luck was with us that we had some easterly wind and swell for this set of trips following our annual Spring Blitz! This was really evident in our luck with species that can be a bit out of range on a westerly like a tropicbird...so imagine our joy to have a White-tailed on Thursday (5 June) and a Red-billed on Friday (6 June)!! We were super lucky! Then on Saturday we had awesome encounters with Black-capped Petrels!! Which we definitely did not have on the previous two trips...easterlies seem to send Black-cappeds elsewhere...so Saturday was really the only day we had them coming to the slick and passing close to the boat! 

Thursday we had southerly winds but still some swell from southeast so we were happy to find some shearwaters on the shelf and to see our first Leach's Storm-Petrel in the 08:00 period. Wilson's Storm-Petrels were around in better numbers than we had last weekend and at 08:47 participant Brian Moldashel spotted an adult White-tailed Tropicbird hovering near the boat on the starboard side!! It proceeded to give us some incredible views as it flew around the boat checking out our slick (photo K. Sutherland)

We also had great views of Bridled Terns plus six species of shearwater were encountered over the course of the day and we also had good views of both Leach's and Band-rumped Storm-Petrels in addition to the Wilson's. A really cool sighting this afternoon were some schools of small Mahi mahi (Atlantic Dolphinfish) on the shelf! They may have been fleeing some of the Blackfin Tuna we caught there, who knows? But very cool to see (photo K. Sutherland)

On Friday winds began in the southeast in the morning then shifted around to the south, southwest and west by the time we returned to the Inlet! The swell was still from the southeast and we had shearwaters on the shelf in the morning again and we missed Manx so had five species for the day. A Band-rumped Storm-Petrel came to the slick so we set out a chum slick to try to get a better view and a young Red-billed Tropicbird came to investigate!! Not only did this bird fly around the slick, it even was so kind as to sit on the water and allow us to approach it. Brian Patteson captured these images as it took off near the boat:

What a beauty!! It was a great comparison for those who were with us on both trips to see these two species just a day apart. Shearwaters were around in much higher numbers than we had on Thursday and for most of the afternoon we had a following flock of Greats with Cory's, Scopoli's, and Sooties coming in and out. Wilson's were around in fair numbers and we saw both Leach's and Band-rumpeds again but just had brief views of Bridled Tern in the morning and a brief view of a passing Parasitic Jaeger. Arctic Terns made a nice showing, however, and this was the only trip we saw them out of this set (photo K. Sutherland).

Saturday winds were back to west southwest though we still had a bit of southeasterly swell left! This definitely brought the Black-capped Petrels back to us and once we got into them they really came in well to the chum (photo K. Sutherland)!

Everywhere you scanned on the horizon you could see Black-cappeds arcing up, we had already seen more than Thursday and Friday combined by 08:30! Otherwise we had five species of shearwater again (no Sooty today but we had a nice, cooperative Manx) with quite a few Sargasso Shearwaters and finally by the end of the day we got a nice view of Band-rumped Storm-Petrel. 

Overall a great set of trips with a total of fifteen pelagic species seen by those who joined all three trips (yes! we had a few that did!!). 

Leaders in addition to me were: Brian Patteson, Daniel Irons, Todd McGrath, Nate Dias, and Chris Sloan

Next up are Friday and Saturday this week (13 & 14 June) - we still have space if anyone wants to join us 🙂 💙 - Kate Sutherland (all photos today except for the RBTB are © Kate Sutherland)

eBird Trip reports can be found here:

5 June 2025

6 June 2025

7 June 2025

Species List for 5 / 6 / 7 June 2025

Parasitic Jaeger 0 / 1 / 0

Bridled Tern 2 / 1 / 0

Arctic Tern 0 / 3 / 0

Common Tern 0 / 4 / 2

Common / Arctic Tern 0 / 2 / 0

Red-billed Tropicbird 0 / 1 / 0

White-tailed Tropicbird 1 / 0 / 0

Wilson's Storm-Petrel 97 to 107 / 80 to 100 / 78

Leach's Storm-Petrel 14 to 15 / 2 / 0

Band-rumped Storm-Petrel 4 to 6 / 8 / 4

Black-capped Petrel 21 to 22 / 21 / 151 to 153

Atlantic Cory's Shearwater 17 / 41 / 9

Scopoli's Shearwater 2 / 7 / 2

Cory's / Scopoli's  16 / 37 / 16

Great Shearwater 19 / 97 / 15

Sooty Shearwater 1 / 3 / 0

Manx Shearwater 2 / 0 / 1

Sargasso Shearwater 49 / 65 / 81

Laughing Gull 0 / 2 / 2

Least Tern  0 / 0 / 1

Royal Tern 1 / 8 / 2

Barn Swallow 0 / 0 / 1

White Marlin 1 / 0 / 0

Billfish species (white or sail) 0 / 1 / 0

Mahi mahi (Atlantic Dolphinfish) 4 / 0 / 2

shark sp 0 / 0 / 1

And a few more images from the trips, as usual!! 

White-tailed Tropicbird

And another of the Red-billed Tropicbird by Brian Patteson

Black-capped Petrels!

Black-capped Petrel followed by Great Shearwater!

Bridled Tern 5 June 2025

Atlantic Cory's Shearwater with squid 6 June 2025

Scopoli's Shearwater 5 June 2025

Great Shearwater 5 June 2025

Great Shearwater and Black-capped Petrel in the chum! 7 June 2025

Sooty Shearwater 6 June 2025

Sargasso Shearwater (formerly known as Audubon's) 5 June2025

Wilson's Storm-Petrel 5 & 7th of June 2025

Leach's Storm-Petrel on the day we had them! 5 June 2025

Band-rumped Storm-Petrel 5 June 2025...interestingly enough we have seen mostly the "little" Band-rumpeds this spring instead of the Grant's type or winter breeders...maybe they are held up with the Desertas (Fea's) Petrels!

Arctic Tern 6 June 2025

Common Tern 6 June 2025 feeding in the slick

Micro Mahi mahi!!! Very cool to see on 5 June 2025

And one on a hook! 7 June 2025

Portuguese Man of War 6 June 2025

And some flyingfishes! Some "grasshoppers" likely Bandwing Flyers and a bog standard either Fourwing or Atlantic Flyingfish 💙

Monday 2 June 2025

And such a finale for our Spring Blitz that was plagued by bizarre weather patterns and off timing for our usually dependable seabirds of the spring! We weathered out four days during this set: May 21, 26, 28 and 31st. But today we ended it with the spectacular species that kicked it all off on May 22 - Bermuda Petrel or Cahow!! And almost at the same time! I never would have imagined it possible that we would find another Bermuda Petrel this spring - it brings the total to six for the spring (May 20, 22, and 2 June) and five for the two participants who joined us for all of the Blitz trips this spring: Kenneth Kelly and Stephen Davies. Here we are (left to right: Stephen, Kate, Daniel, Ken, Brian) with the Bermuda flag we fly after seeing a Cahow:

This gadfly petrel was in a group of Black-capped Petrels and Daniel spotted it coming in on the port bow just before 09:00 (about the time we had the four individuals on 22 May!! but a different location, of course!) and it zipped by in the harsh light giving everyone a great view then disappeared not to be relocated or seen again though we spent time trying to see if we could entice it back with some chum!

Diversity other than than was a bit low, but just after noontime some Mesoplodons surfaced just off the port bow again! Same place they popped up yesterday! These were presumed to be Gervais' Beaked Whales (Mesoplodon europaeus), the species we typically see out here, but there was one male in the group and he had quite a large arch and tooth not quite as large as Mesoplodon densirostris (Dense Beaked Whale or Blainville's Beaked Whale) but much larger than we have even seen in M. europaeus. You can see it in the photos below. This animal was much more heavily scarred than we have ever seen. Anyhow - an exciting find and really great conditions for photographing them! We saw them around this location last year on 23 May.

You can read the eBird trip report here: 2 June 2025 - there are photos of the Cahow since I failed to get any! 

Thank you so much to everyone who joined us out there for the Blitz! Our next trips are the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday (5, 6, 7 June) and we have space on all of them! Thank you also to Todd McGrath and Liam Waters for helping Brian, Daniel and me lead the trip today! All photos are © Kate Sutherland for this report except for the Bermuda Petrel that was kindly given to me by Todd McGrath 🙂 please see below:

Gervais' Beaked Whales (Mesoplodon europaeus)!

Here is the male showing the arched lower jaw and teeth at the top followed by two images of the back.

And a female showing the beak followed by images of the face and back.

Dark-faced Black-capped Petrel

Bridled Tern checking us out!

We finally had some Great Shearwaters show well today!

Wilson's were seen in higher numbers than yesterday but still not as many as we had earlier in the season!

And it's been a few days since we've seen the Portuguese Man of War, but we had a few out there today!

Sunday 1 June 2025

Today was a gorgeous day offshore, though this morning the sea still held a bit of swell from the wind yesterday and last night. While diversity was a bit low, we found really great numbers of Sargasso Shearwaters out there past the shelf break! They were definitely the seabird highlight today with the highest number of individuals out there, we counted 170. Black-capped Petrels came in second with 52 individuals tallied and we were delighted to see some Bridled Terns! A highlight for me was seeing our first pod of Gervais' Beaked Whales (Mesoplodon europaeus), also known as Gulf Stream Beaked Whale or Antillean Beaked Whale, of the spring! There were at least six, possibly seven individuals in the group including at least one calf that looked like it was born this year. They are about seven feet at birth and this one was a bit larger than that but still quite small in comparison with the other individuals in the pod. 

eBird Trip Report can be found here: 1 June 2025

Thanks to everyone who joined us out there today and a big thank you to our guest leaders Todd McGrath, Chris Sloan, and Liam Waters who helped Brian, Daniel & me lead the trip!

Of course here are some of the Mesoplodon europaeus!

And some of the cute, little Sargasso Shearwaters

And one of our Bridled Terns

We also passed our weather buoy this afternoon on the way in!