Sunday May 20, 2012

Two days of strong north winds prevented us from running the first scheduled spring trip on May 19, but we were pleased with the conditions we encountered yesterday on the 20th!  Typically this wind is excellent for jaegers, Arctic Terns, Leach's Storm-Petrels, and shearwaters...and we were not disappointed.  Sooty Shearwaters were flying by soon after leaving Hatteras Inlet, and we even had a curious Pomarine Jaeger in the first hour.  0737 found us on a nice color change with about a 7 degree temperature break, and while it did not hold the shearwaters we hoped for, we did see some Red-necked Phalaropes and an Arctic Tern.  By just 1030 we had excellent views of Black-capped Petrels, Cory's, Great (!), Sooty, and Audubon's Shearwaters, Red-necked Phalaropes, Bridled & Arctic Terns, Pomarine Jaegers, a striking young dark Long-tailed Jaeger, and a loyal following of Wilson's Storm-Petrels!  A cooperative Leach's Storm-Petrel stayed long enough in the slick for all to see well, and even gave some nice photo ops.  Overall a great and busy day offshore!  We still have space on several of our upcoming trips, check our website http://www.seabirding.com for availability.

Black-capped Petrel   23
Cory's Shearwater   24
Great Shearwater   20-22
Sooty Shearwater   38
Audubon's Shearwater   12
Wilson's Storm-Petrel   420-450
Leach's Storm-Petrel   1
Band-rumped Storm-Petrel   1  (looked like a non molting ind.)
Red-necked Phalarope   32
Bridled Tern   2
Arctic Tern   4
Pomarine Jaeger   11
Long-tailed Jaeger   1

Atlantic Spotted Dolphins   10+
Bottlenose Dolphins   2

(and loads of flying fish!)

sharp looking Black-capped Petrel & Wilson's Storm-Petrel

Adult Great Shearwater - we saw more today than any day last spring!

Sooty Shearwater

 

A couple shots of the Leach's Storm-Petrel

 Pomarine Jaeger

Spring 2011 Photo Gallery - SNGH

As May 19 and the beginning of our 2012 Spring Season nears, we thought it would be a good time to post some photos from last year's Spring Blitz.  Thank you to Steve N. G. Howell for putting together the following photos to share!  We hope to post daily reports again this spring.

Black-capped Petrel & Fea's Petrel

Fea's Petrel; we saw six last spring

Our Gulf Stream specialty, the Black-capped Petrel

ventral view

juvenile Black-capped Petrel, a rare sighting!

Cory's Shearwater;  seen on each trip, but not in the numbers often found later in the summer

Great Shearwaters started showing up in early June

Great Shearwater

Sooty Shearwaters were seen daily on the first few trips

Audubon's Shearwaters did not seem to be as numerous in recent years

A Great Shearwater with some Wilson's Storm-Petrels in the slick

Wilson's Storm-Petrel

Wilson's Storm-Petrel

Wilson's Storm-Petrels with a Leach's Storm-Petrel

Band-rumped Storm-Petrel, not molting

juvenile Band-rumped Storm-Petrel

White-tailed Tropicbirds were seen on 5 spring trips!





A young Red-billed Tropicbird was seen on June 5



Masked Booby (June 1)

This first winter Glaucous Gull was at the dock as we departed on May 21!

Bridled Terns are often common in the summer months, but we did see a handful in the spring.

Roseate Tern that followed us on June 1

Common Tern

Arctic Tern

Black-skimmers are usually seen while motoring out to the inlet...

South Polar Skua;  we had six last spring

South Polar Skua

1st summer Pomarine Jaeger

Gervais Beaked Whale

We encountered cooperative groups of False Killer Whales on May 29 & June 6







Atlantic Spotted Dolphins were seen on 5 of the spring 2011 trips

The extremely photogenic flying fish of the Gulf Stream and its' eddies:





Portuguese Man-of-War

& some Mahi mahi for dinner...

February 26, 2012 - 2 More Great Skuas!

We had decided a few weeks ago that we were going to finish up the winter season with the Presidents Day Weekend trips, but after seeing the Black-browed Albatross on Feb. 18, it seemed there was some interest in another winter boat trip. So we put a trip on for the following weekend, and by mid week, it was apparent that Sunday would be our day to run it. There was plenty of wind on Friday and Saturday to stir things up, and once again we found much warmer water than we would have preferred awaiting us on both sides of Cape Hatteras.

There was still a fair breeze from the north when we went to sea Sunday morning with ten eager participants. It was good to have veteran leader Ned Brinkley back on board, and some old salts had come up for it too- Paul Sykes was there, as well as Wayne Irvin and Nate Dias among others. Aside from the thousands of cormorants that we saw on the Sound behind Hatteras Inlet, seabirds were fairly sparse on the south side of the Cape. We beat it across Diamond Shoals and worked northward a few miles off the beach. I had my mind on alcids, skuas, and, of course, the long shot albatross, the thought of which had lured some of these folks out for the short notice trip. We finally started seeing a fair number of gannets north of Avon, more as we went. By late morning we were on Wimble Shoals off the Tri-Villages. The water was cooler up there, only about 50 degrees. We had a couple of encounters with Razorbill, but mostly we saw gulls, gannets, and Red-throated Loons. I turned around 23 miles north of Diamond Shoals and worked slowly back. About eight miles down, still north of Avon, Kate Sutherland looked outside the wheelhouse port window and excitedly said, “There he is!” And sure enough, there was a fine looking Great Skua, about six miles off the beach. The skua scattered our gull flock and engaged a couple of Herring Gulls in the distance. After a minute or so, it went to rest on the water. We followed it around for a while, and had it under observation for about 15 minutes before getting back on course.

It was a very pleasant ride back, quite nice going downsea, and we had an insane number of Lesser Black-backed Gulls with us feeding on the chum, even outnumbering the Great Black-backs much of the time. Just north of Diamond Shoals, a single Dovekie crossed the bow quickly, amazingly just the second Dovekie of the season for us. West of Diamond Shoals we had another Great Skua buzz the flock, as if to say “Hey, you really didn’t need to go all the way to Wimble Shoals!” Closer to the inlet, there were hundreds of gannets and thousands of cormorants, but no afternoon albatross this time. Still it was a nice day out on Bonxie Boulevard, and it was our fourth weekend in a row with Great Skuas, making it the most successful winter we have had for seeing them. It’s impossible to know what next winter will bring, but one thing is for sure. When the time comes, we will have to go out there to truly find out. Thanks to everyone who went with us this winter and especially to Kate who kept the birds going on the stern all season.

-Captain Brian Patteson

First Great Skua of the day:

Sharp looking adult Lesser Black-backed Gull:

Afternoon Double-crested Cormorants: