It's been a few days since we've made it offshore...the wind has shifted and we had to take a few of days off as a low pressure system moved offshore. Winds and seas were quite high on May 31, June 2, and June 3 and we headed offshore today with winds blowing from the north, but a sea that was overall a bit more organized! It was exciting to see that the Great Shearwaters are here and we had more than we've seen all season in the slick right after slowing down.
They are always so nice to watch quarreling and feeding on the chum! We tried a bit of a drift first thing in the morning and had some luck seeing Leach's and Band-rumped Storm-Petrels, though they didn't stick as well as the Wilson's and the shearwaters (we had a number of Greats and one Sooty putting on a show as they fed on some home made chum).
The Gulf Stream current wasn't super strong, thankfully, since what we had was just enough for us to maneuver in for the best views without too much spray. As we continued making our way offshore we had great views of Scopoli's and Cory's Shearwaters in the slick with the Greats. Right around noontime leader Daniel Irons spotted a feeding flock and we worked our way over to it...as we did so he said he could see what looked to be a dark Trindade Petrel in the group, feeding and chasing shearwaters! 
We pulled up to the flock and sure enough there was one working the group and feeding!! It only made one close pass by us on the boat when we first arrived, coming in from the glare as they do, but we were able to observe it with this shearwater flock for almost thirty minutes!!! Wow! We have never had the opportunity to see this type of display - the shearwaters were feeding over what looked like some small tuna species and flyingfishes were airing it out everywhere. It was a beautiful place to be for a bit and everyone enjoyed having time to observe not only the Trindade Petrel, but a Manx Shearwater who was in with the flock, some Sargasso Shearwaters and compare a Sooty Shearwater to the more compact and dynamic Trindade Petrel! There was a ship passing by the flock and flying ahead of the bow? A Brown Booby!!
What a day, we thought as we begin the inshore tack!! The habitat is finally here after a few years of fairly subdued spring trips...it feels like things are back to normal for a bit.
Right after leaving the flock we began our inshore tack with the sun behind us over the slick. As we donned our sunglasses and began our watch a small gadfly petrel zipped in from the left side of the slick, checked us out for a second, then banked away - it was a Bermuda Petrel!! And we thought the day was over!!
Our list can be found here: https://ebird.org/tripreport/534692
Thanks to everyone who joined us offshore! Next single day trip of the season is Saturday 6 June then we have a two out of three day set.
Leaders today were: Brian Patteson, Kate Sutherland, Daniel Irons, Sage Church, and Scott Peterson
