Wrapping up the Spring! 10, 11, 12 June 2022 by Kate Sutherland

This trio wrapping up our spring trips went very well finding a total of 12 pelagic species and a lot of hungry shearwaters who were happy to follow us and show off during the offshore portion of the trips!    The weather definitely spanned most of what we can find offshore here from northeasterly winds and rain on Friday, to lighter winds on Saturday and southerly winds with thunderstorms on Sunday.  Black-capped Petrels were seen well on all three trips and each had at least one young individual, fledged this year, while on Sunday we had at least three! (Bob Fogg) 

Most were the pale form and a few of them stayed with us feeding in the slick with the shearwaters for hours, not a common sight! (Kate Sutherland) 

Most of the adults we saw were well into molting their flight feathers and of these we saw both forms.  Large shearwaters were also seen well on all three trips with great views of Cory's, Scopoli's, and Greats in the chum slick and a number of Audubon's Shearwaters zipping around as well.  Sunday we added a couple of Sooty Shearwaters and a Manx to the weekend's list.  One of the Sooties was especially cooperative diving for pieces of fish and flying close to the boat. (Kate Sutherland) 

Wilson's Storm-Petrels were seen well each day, though we didn't see the numbers we had earlier in the spring.  It was a treat to have Leach's Storm-Petrels on every trip, they were moving quickly and were not the easiest for everyone to get on, but they did show well!  Band-rumpeds were a bit more skittish and didn't spend much time close to the boat, however we did see them each day and many made close passes for those who were in the right place at the right time!  (Kate Sutherland)

Friday we had a bit of rain, but also had a good northeasterly wind that can be nice for drifting!  We put out a chum block to sit with for awhile and within a few minutes a shark swam through the slick taking the block with it!  It was tough to see it well with the wind waves but it looked like a Carcharhinus species - maybe a silky, bignose, or dusky. (Bob Fogg) 

That put a quick end to our desire to drift and we moved on...pulling our chum block and shearwaters with us.  Less than thirty minutes later a Brown Booby flew in to check us out!  This bird followed us in the slick for a bit feeding with the shearwaters and making some really nice passes by the boat. (Kate Sutherland) 

Saturday we saw just the usual suspects but they were super cooperative and we had excellent views of Cory's and Scopoli's with the Greats in the slick.  We also had really good numbers of Audubon's out there as well! (Bob Fogg) 

Sunday our trip offshore was a little sidetracked by some thunderstorms, but we had a chance to see this awesome cumulonibus arcus feature on the leading edge of the storms! (Kate Sutherland) 

We again had a nice following once we got around this storm and to the shelf break with good views, but the highlight of the three day set came when the wind breezed up a bit in about 200 fathoms (1200 feet) on our inshore tack just after one in the afternoon.  As we were keeping an eye on our following flock, a Fea's Petrel zipped up the slick and made a close pass by the stern! (Kate Sutherland) 

This bird continued up the slick, so we circled back to see if we could get another view...  Leader Daniel Irons spotted the bird up ahead and it slowly made its way back toward us on the slick flying right by us and giving spectacular views!  A few minutes later leader Mario Balibit spotted the bird off the starboard bow while I had one coming in towards the stern from about 7:00!  Sure enough, looking back at photos we had at least two individuals visit us in just a ten or fifteen minute period! (Second individual - Kate Sutherland) 

I put out more chum and one of these birds came right in to feed with the shearwaters in the slick - always a rewarding sight!

A huge thank you to everyone who joined us for this set making all three trips possible, and thank you so much to our leaders, Bob Fogg, Daniel Irons, and Mario Balibit for helping us lead the trips!  Thank you also to Bob for contributing some of his awesome images for this post!

Species list for June 10 / 11 / 12

Wilson's Storm-Petrel - 201 to 211 / 172 to 182 / 150 to 160

Leach's Storm-Petrel - 3 / 1 / 7

Band-rumped Storm-Petrel - 2 / 6 / 5

Fea's Petrel - 0 / 0 / 2

Black-capped Petrel - 31 / 21 to 24 / 57 to 60

Scopoli's Shearwater - 8 / 4 to 6 / 7

Atlantic Cory's Shearwater - 11 / 26 / 27

Cory's / Scopoli's - 102 / 60 / 155 to 158

Great Shearwater - 167 / 93 / 115

Sooty Shearwater - 0 / 0 / 2

Manx Shearwater - 0 / 0 / 1

Audubon's Shearwater - 48 / 56 to 59 / 66

Manx / Audubon's - 0 / 0 / 1

Brown Booby - 1 / 0 / 0

Northern Gannet - 1 / 0 / 0

Laughing Gull - 0 / 0 / 1 offshore

Common Tern - 0 / 1 / 0

Royal Tern - 1 / 5 / 3

Common Loon - 0 / 1 / 5

Atlantic Spotted Dolphins - 15 to 20 / 3 to 5 / 0

Offshore Bottlenose Dolphins - 0 / 21 to 23 / 0

Coastal Bottlenose Dolphins - 0 / 0 / 10 to 15

Carcharhinus species (silky, bignose, or dusky shark?) - 1 / 0 / 0 

Hammerhead (scalloped or Carolina) - 0 / 0 / 1

A few more images of the Fea's Petrels - head on - the first and second individuals (Kate Sutherland), you can see the difference in their facial patterns.

Ventral images (Kate Sutherland, Bob Fogg)

And dorsal images (Bob Fogg, Kate Sutherland)

Another image of the very cooperative Brown Booby sitting on the water Friday!  (Kate Sutherland)

Black-capped Petrels were very cooperative each day! (top three by Kate Sutherland, bottom two by Bob Fogg). Here are some representative images of mostly white-faced birds

While the facial pattern looks pale on this bird, the underwing is quite dark!

A darker faced individual with a smudgy looking nape just beginning to molt its primaries.

Bob captured this Atlantic Cory's as it was calling!

Another Cory's / Scopoli's shearwater in the same pose! (Bob Fogg)

We had really nice views of Scopoli's Shearwaters in the slick on both trips! (Kate Sutherland) This top bird was banded, not something we see very often!!

These smaller Calonectris were outnumbered by the larger Atlantic Cory's, however (top Kate Sutherland, bottom image by Bob Fogg).  As we move into the summer months the tables will turn and we typically find more Scopoli's offshore from Hatteras.

Great Shearwaters put on quite a show for us every day, diving, calling, and feeding on our fish block behind the boat!  This is the time of year that they push through down here heading for richer feeding grounds up north - sleek, fresh youngsters were here with older birds attending in smaller numbers. (top image by Bob Fogg, others by Kate Sutherland)

With a Black-capped Petrel above

Audubon's were zipping around all three days and we saw good numbers of them for the spring!  (Bob Fogg top, Kate Sutherland bottom image)

Wilson's Storm-Petrels kept their distance in the slick most days, preferring to be farther back in the slick than the large group of shearwaters!  Sometimes when we circled back these small storm-petrels made some nice passes!  (Kate Sutherland, Bob Fogg)

Bob captured this cool image of our flock with a Leach's Storm-Petrel flaring up on the left side!

Some gorgeous light on a flyingfish Sunday morning near the squall line - this is either an Atlantic or Fourwing flyingfish (. (Kate Sutherland)

Fea's Type Spring ~ 4 June 2022 by Kate Sutherland

Different wind for our June 4th trip, north / northeast with an underlying easterly swell.  Skies were cloudy as we left the dock in the morning switching to partly cloudy out in the Gulf Stream.  The wind was against the current today so the blue water was a bit sportier than the nearshore, shelf waters which can make for an exciting day to watch seabirds!  They were certainly in their element out there today and they were also hungry (Kate Sutherland GRSH & WISP),

so we had good luck with the chum and also perfect conditions for studying how these birds move around in the wind and use the sea surface / air interface to help them travel.  We found a place with some Black-capped Petrels and set out for a short drift. (Kate Sutherland)

It was very successful for the usual suspects, but it was a little later that morning when the Fea's Petrel came zipping in to the boat and proceeded to make numerous passes, feeding in the chum like they will do with the shearwaters and storm-petrels!!  A gorgeous individual that had hundreds of photos taken during its time nearby. (Ed Corey) 

This was our seventh or eighth "Fea's" Petrel this spring, and while we use this general name for these gadfly petrels with blackish looking underwings, it is actually the "Fea's Petrel Complex" with some cryptic species nesting in different locales.  Pterodroma deserta (Desertas Petrel) nests on Bugio, part of the Desertas Islands near Madeira in the western north Atlantic.  Another species, Pterodroma feae (Cape Verde Petrel), nests on the Cape Verde Islands.  These two look very similar and are difficult to differentiate to species away from their nesting islands.  They do have different breeding seasons and also some size differences, underwing patterns, and known distributions...but easily determining them at sea away from their breeding grounds is not yet something we can do.  We expect that these birds we see from Hatteras are Desertas Petrels, not molting, with a little white in their underwings, and sometimes large, deep bills.  However, since there is much overlap between the two species and molt can be useful but does not always take age or aberrations into consideration, we err on the side of caution and note that these are presumed, possible, or probable Desertas Petrels in the Fea's Complex!  While I know this doesn't answer all of the questions you may have about yet another complicated, at sea identification, we will do our best to continue keeping you posted on what we can do with current criteria!  

Our chum was very effective and our inshore tack had Great, Cory's, Sooty, Manx, and Audubon's in the slick with Greats by far out numbering the others! (Nate Dias) 

All of them made close passes by the stern at one time or another, however.  Wilson's Storm-Petrels were also cooperative and we had nice passes by both Leach's and Band-rumpeds over the course of the day!  Tough to follow some of them in the large swells, but a few times they came close enough that it didn't matter.  While in the blue water we also had a Roseate Tern (Ed Corey) 

and Arctic Tern each pay us a visit and check out the slick.  This was our first Roseate of the spring and it was awesome to see one, it is not a species we commonly find on our trips though they have been at Cape Point in varying numbers over the past few springs.

On the shelf as we headed back Ed Corey spotted a flock of feeding shearwaters.  Brian caught up to them and as we approached a Brown Booby was spotted feeding there with them! (Ed Corey) 

Wow!  This was a much better look than the one we had earlier in the spring and Brian was able to approach it at the best angle for us to see it.  We had really great views as it dove and fed with the Cory's and Greats that were also present!  

Unfortunately we had to cut our long weekend short due to high winds and short period seas forecast for Sunday, not to mention the swell beginning to move in from Tropical Storm Alex!  But we were really glad to get out there for at least the two days and find such a great list of birds!

Thanks so much to everyone who joined us out there!  A big thank you as well to our leaders: Todd McGrath, Chris Sloan, Nate Dias, and Ed Corey, they all did a great job and also contributed photos for the blog!

Species List for 4 June 2022

jaeger sp - 1

Laughing Gull - 1

Roseate Tern - 1

Arctic Tern - 1

Wilson's Storm-Petrel - 330 to 380

Leach's Storm-Petrel - 7 to 8

Band-rumped Storm-Petrel - 6 to 7

Leach's / Band-rumped - 2

Fea's (likely Desertas) Petrel - 1

Black-capped Petrel - 107 to 108

Scopoli's Shearwater - 1

Atlantic Cory's Shearwater - 19

Cory's / Scopoli's - 55

Great Shearwater - 68 to 69

Sooty Shearwater - 2

Manx Shearwater - 2 to 3

Audubon's Shearwater - 23

Brown Booby - 1

peep sp - 1

Offshore Bottlenose Dolphin - 17

A couple more images of the Fea's Petrel by Kate Sutherland and one by Chris Sloan

Black-capped Petrels were incredible and very cooperative for photos!  (Kate Sutherland, final image by Nate Dias)

I photographed one Scopoli's in the 1030 period, you can compare the underwing to the Atlantic Cory's below and see the white in the underside of the primaries in the former (Kate Sutherland)

The Sooty Shearwater we had offshore followed us for awhile in the slick, resting on the water occasionally (Kate Sutherland)

It was really cool to watch the Manx Shearwaters work their way up the slick, their flight is so much more powerful than the lighter Audubon's Shearwater (Kate Sutherland)

Wilson's Storm-Petrels were a lot of fun to watch on our drift! (Kate Sutherland)

The Great Shearwater who ate a lot of the chum didn't mind them at all... (Kate Sutherland)

Arctic Tern (Chris Sloan)

The Laughing Gull that joined the slick offshore (Kate Sutherland)

Another Euro for '22 ~ 3 June 2022 by Kate Sutherland

Winds were back to our usual southwest today and forecast to shift to the west in the afternoon, we hoped it would be a good day but with few birds on the shelf and not many once we passed the shelf break we weren't sure how it would go.  There was some current out there so the waves smoothed out a bit with the wind and current moving together and we had a Band-rumped Storm-Petrel in the slick soon after we put out the chum, then Black-capped Petrels started coming in to see what we had to offer and dropping down to the slick!  So we decided to take some time to just drift around there.  We had close looks at Leach's Storm-Petrels as our Wilson's began to gather, Great, Cory's and Audubon's Shearwaters all flew through, and less than an hour after beginning our drift leader Chris Sloan spotted a small gadfly petrel coming in at 1000 on the bow!  A dark Trindade Petrel came in with the wind, checked out the chum, and then flew across the bow and away! (Todd McGrath)

It happened so quickly some of us in the stern barely caught a glimpse of the bird, but those in place on the bow had awesome views!  Chris was on fire today and less than an hour later he spotted a European Storm-Petrel that was following a Band-rumped toward the bow and into the slick!!!  This tiny stormie hung out with us for almost 25 minutes and everyone had awesome views of it feeding with the Wilson's and flying around the boat! (Kate Sutherland) 

To finish off our list we had a gorgeous adult Pomarine Jaeger come in and feed on chum behind us for almost an hour.  It was a great day out there, we'll see what we can turn up tomorrow!

Thanks so much to everyone who joined us out there and a huge thank you to our leaders Todd McGrath, Chris Sloan, Nate Dias, and Ed Corey - they all helped get everyone on the bird of the day, our little Euro!!

Species List for 3 June 2022

Pomarine Jaeger - 2

jaeger species - 1

Wilson's Storm-Petrel - 67 to 72

European Storm-Petrel - 1

Leach's Storm-Petrel - 3

Band-rumped Storm-Petrel - 12

Trindade Petrel - 1 dark morph

Black-capped Petrel - 53 to 56

Cory's Shearwater - 5

Cory's / Scopoli's Shearwater - 42

Great Shearwater - 12 to 13

Sooty Shearwater - 2

Audubon's Shearwater - 17

Sanderling - 1

Offshore Bottlenose Dolphin - 5

Loggerhead Turtle - 2

Ventral view of the Trindade Petrel by Nate Dias

A few more images of our little visitor!  top Nate Dias, followed by Chris Sloan, then Ed Corey, and the others by Kate Sutherland

Black-capped Petrels were super cooperative!  (Kate Sutherland top, Ed Corey bottom)

Leach's and Band-rumped Storm-Petrels (Kate Sutherland)

The Pomarine Jaeger that followed us for a while (Chris Sloan)

One of the Offshore Bottlenose Dolphins we saw out there (Ed Corey)