Total ABA Species Recorded During 2010 - 731



Monday, September 13, 2010

Half Moon Bay Pelagic I


Chris and I carpooled to the boat dock arriving plenty early.  Before leaving the dock I have to make sure that I've got warm clothes on because the weather out on the Pacific Ocean is plenty cool.  As is true on most pelagic trips you also have to bring your own food for the day, since very few boats have a galley serving food.  So I had to make sure I had my food supply.
There were a lot of birds on the jetties as we left the harbor including Double-crested Cormorants, Brown Pelicans, Western and Heerman's Gulls, and Elegant Terns.  A few Pigeon Guillemots and Western Grebes were bobbing around on the water.  Although the deep, cold water which is close to shore provides much pelagic excitement, the captain set a course to get us out to the albacore fishermen in the warm water. Please realize that Pacific coast warmer water is in the 60's, whereas our Atlantic warmer water is in the 80's. A big difference! We did manage to make it out to the albacore grounds, but it wasn't very birdy. One of the albacore fisherman gave Debi Shearwater a couple of albacores since it was her birthday.  Wes Fritz, the master chummer, did spot a Cooke's Petrel, but none of the rest of us could get on it before it disappeared. However, the pelagic bird show on the way out was quite a spectacle. We had Black-footed and Laysan (photo) Albatrosses, Ashy, Black, Fork-tailed, and Wilson's Storm-Petrels, Pink-footed, Sooty, and Buller's (photo) Shearwaters, Northern Fulmars (mostly dark phase), Red and Red-necked Phalaropes (photo) migrating by the thousands, Arctic Terns, Common Murres, Cassin's and Rhinoceros Auklets, and all three jaegers plus South Polar Skua (photo). But Chris and I are tough customers. We wanted something new for the year and neither of us got a new bird.   We got back to the dock a bit late.  I dropped Chris off at his truck and headed north, driving to Santa Rosa where I got a room in a Motel 6 for three nights.


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