You Belong In A Boat Out At Sea

October 10, 2017

The much anticipated and alway fun pelagic birding trip, run by The Marine Science Center, disembarked from Port Canaveral on board the Canaveral Princess.

I love pelagic trips. Even during the long stretches with no birds in sight, I enjoy the waves and sun (and even the rain, when it’s not been too cold). This trip, we had great weather, and the seas were only moderately rough.

By far, the bird of the day was the Corey’s Shearwater. As a group, we saw over 200 of them (I recorded 77). We perhaps saw more Common Terns, but Shearwaters are obligate pelagic species – that means they are (barring severe weather events, like hurricanes) only found on the open ocean.

The initial leg out of the port was very smooth, and it wasn’t until we started passing some of the off-shore buoys that we started to feel the 6-foot (2-meter) seas. Buoys also provide places for birds to roost and use as a look-out.

The majority of the shearwaters we saw were Corey’s, we also did see the Great and Audubon’s species (I’ve seen all these shearwater species on my whale watch in New England, last summer.)

Unlike most of the previous pelagic trips I have been on, we did not have many dolphins visiting us. Just one rode our bow wake as we left the port. We did see a couple of sea turtles, including a large Loggerhead Sea Turtle getting attacked by a Tiger Shark! The shark was unable to get a good angle on the turtle, and gave up as we drew closer. The turtle had it’s front flippers held straight up in the air to keep the shark from being able to grab or bite them. After a couple of minutes, the turtle dove out of view.

We also saw a Leatherback Sea Turtle. It was enormous and attended by several large Cobias and some remoras.

Before too long, I did run into some equipment problems. My current camera – a much loved Fujifilm Finepix S990W – has been having some glitches lately. The back-side buttons would activate without being pressed, or when pressed would cycle quickly through various options on their own. This escalated on Saturday, and the camera started changing settings and formats, as well as locking up entirely. I gave up fighting it, especially after taking a spill near the bow when trying to reach for the railing while protecting my camera. There wasn’t much reason to be holding on to a camera that wasn’t working.

The rest of the trip was fantastic. We came upon large flocks of terns, most of which were Common, but interspersed with Black and Sooty Terns. I saw what probably were some species of storm-petrel, but they were gone behind waves before I could really get a good look. Several Peregrine Falcons cruised by, over 30 km (50 miles) from land.

Here’s my complete eBird list for the trip. The “official” list for the trip, via Michael Brothers has a much higher count and some species I missed (and one species not recorded officially).

My eBird list for the entire trip, there and back again:
http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S39610465

“Official” list, via e-mail from Michael Brothers:
Blue-winged Teal 56
Cory’s Shearwater 235
Great Shearwater 5
Brown Pelican 8
Brown Booby 3
Magnificent Frigatebird 6
Parasitic Jaeger 8
Pomarine Jaeger 1
Black Tern 111
Common Tern 419
Royal Tern 41
Sandwich Tern 16
Laughing Gull 9
Sabine’s Gull 1
Short-billed Dowitcher 3
Wilson’s Snipe 1
Red Phalarope 6
Red-necked Phalarope 21
Peregrine Falcon 4
Barn Swallow 1
Black-throated Blue Warbler 1
Warbler sp. 1

Despite the camera glitch and my fall on the deck, I had a spectacular time. I am already looking forward to next year, circumstances willing. I’ll post the few remaining photos that didn’t make the blog, soon.