First week complete! 2025 Pt. Pinos Seawatch - 8 Nov

Weather: No fog today, which was much appreciated by all who have endured the fair amount of fog we'd had this week... winds weren't great: moderate NNE at the Point for most of the morning, dying off in late afternoon. Swell was moderate, skies were mostly clear, no precipitation. At the outer buoy, winds at dawn were NNE at 8 knots, switching to NNW at 0900. They built to 12 knots W at 1600. Pressure at dawn was 30.00, and it fell slightly to 29.94 at sunset.

Birds: There was nice Surf Scoter movement today: we tallied 1171; the biggest push happened in late afternoon, with our biggest "hour" actually being less than a half-hour: the 1700-last light checklist. We had 253 go by in that short span of time, which has me wondering if there will be a good push Sunday morning, which is my day off. We had a few other ducks mixed in today: 5 Northern Shoveler, 1 Green-winged Teal, 1 Black Scoter, 3 Bufflehead.

There were also some interesting shorebirds around: 4 Wilson's Snipe flew in, seemingly off the ocean, shortly after sunrise, and 3 dowitcher sp. passed by during the afternoon. Red Phalaropes continue to fly out of the bay in good numbers--today we had 181.

We had 5 Parasitic Jaegers and 1 Pomarine today; they're the perfect bird at Seawatch when it's been a long (but a great!) week, the wind is in your face, salt is in eyes and coating lenses, and you need a little pick-me-up. Watching their stealth missions towards unsuspecting Heermann's Gulls and Elegant Terns is always a thrill!

Alcid presence continues to be relatively low. We had 2 Rhinoceros Auklets, 983 Common Murres (mostly dawn-0900), and 4 Ancient Murrelets--another favorite Seawatch bird--today. We all got spoiled by the abundance of ANMU last year and would really love a repeat...

There was consistent movement of Bonaparte's Gulls (253) and Elegant Terns (145) out of the bay today, and we had our first-of-Seawatch season Black-legged Kittiwake.

The loon flight was quite quiet today: 120 Red-throats, 220 Pacifics, and 5 Commons. Most loon movement happened during "loon hour" (0700-0800), and there were some loons and scoters moving along the far outer line.

Our storm-petrel run continues! We had 2 today; the one we identified was a Black Storm-Petrel that flew into the bay around sunset. We also had 29 Northern Fulmars and 10 Sooty Shearwaters.

There was a little American Pipit flight that headed towards Santa Cruz today--we had 49, and probably missed many more.

The last hour and a half of today's count was a perfect way to end my workweek. Elegant Terns, close enough to hear, were streaming towards the sunset; we had a jaeger or two; the Black Storm-Petrel, our fifteenth (!!) of the week, was fantastic, especially since Madison, who had to work during our biggest storm-petrel runs this week, was able to see it. And having big scoter flocks flying out of the bay through the dusk always makes you wonder what the next morning will hold... thank you Seawatch and thank you Monterey Audubon for an absolute banger of a first week back.

-Alison Vilag

eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/430877

2025 Pt. Pinos Seawatch - 7 Nov

Weather: At the Point, it was a calm day. The swell was substantial, though somewhat diminished from yesterday, and visibility was generally pretty good, except from about 1400-1545, when the fog was so thick we couldn't even see the end of Pt. Pinos. At the outer buoy at dawn, winds were NNE at 4 knots. They switched to W at 1100, building to 12 knots by the count's end. Pressure at dawn was 30.18 and it fell to 30.03 by the count's end.

Birds: We had a modest loon flight this morning! 382 Red-throats and 381 Pacifics were tallied today, with the busiest loon hours being 0700-0900. I really was expecting a big Surf Scoter flight today: winds further north on the Pacific coast have finally become favorable for migration, but we still had just 313 pass by. A lone drake Redhead came by this afternoon: always a good bird at Seawatch!

It was a decent alcid day: 288 Rhinoceros (mostly from 0700-0900), a Cassin's Auklet, 2 Marbled Murrelets, and 285 Common Murres (mostly during the dawn and sunset hours).

Red Phalaropes were moving out of the bay today; we tallied 336.

The jaeger show (5 Parasitics and 3 Poms) was a fun watch, as always. There sure seem to be more Parasitics hanging around the bay than there have during my other seasons (perhaps, this coincides with the good amount of Elegant Terns that are still around!), and I'm digging it, though the terns and gulls sure don't seem to share my opinion...

And the storm-petrels keep going! Today's Leach's (1), Ashy (4), and Black (4) put us over FIFTY storm-petrels logged during Seawatch's first week. Scoters and storm-petrels occupy completely different levels of airspace at Pt. Pinos, so I guess it's a good thing the scoter flight is not happening right now--there's no way I could spend as much time fixated on the storm-petrel zone if high scoter flocks were blasting by... Bill even ran (yes, ran with his legs) from Seaside to see if he could get a storm-petrel on his running list. Hopefully, the Black Storm-Petrel he got gave him enough juice to make the return run somewhat painless...

Kai was on a boat that departed from Moss Landing today and had Black and Ashy Storm-Petrels... what a crazy week it's been for them in the bay!

-Alison Vilag

eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/430380

2025 Pt. Pinos Seawatch - 6 Nov

Weather: In terms of wind, it was calm at Seawatch today, but in terms of the Pacific Ocean, it was some of the wildest surf I've seen here. During high tide, waves were crashing over the highest parts of Pt. Pinos, and surf was raging up to within a few feet of the bench. The waves flushed all the kelp flies from the rocks--they took refuge on the green concrete block. At one point, fifteen Black Oystercatchers were huddled on the same bit of Pt. Pinos and managed to not bicker about their circumstances. (Typically, the two oystercatcher pairs have several territorial disagreements each day.) Visibility was frustrating: there were birds, but for most of the day we struggled to see them due to salt spray and fog; the last hour of the count was completely socked in... At the outer buoy, it was blowing 8 knots from the northeast at dawn. The wind dropped to 4 knots at 0900, switched to NNW at 1100, and built back to 15 knots by sunset. Always a bit confounding when we want the west wind to give us tubenoses, but instead it gives us fog that prevents us from seeing them... pressure at dawn was 30.22, at sunset 30.19

Birds: We had our first strong SURF SCOTER flight in several days, finishing with 1296 tallied, as well as 1 BLACK SCOTER. Two interesting notes about today's flocks: almost all individuals were females, and we noted a lot of flocks flying into the bay (per protocol, these are not counted.) Before the fog set in, there was some decent afternoon alcid movement: 118 RHINOCEROS AUKLETS, 284 COMMON MURRES. It was a good afternoon for loons--we had our first triple-digit PACIFIC LOON hour right before the fog came in, and we ended the day with 109 Red-throats, 338 Pacifics, and 14 Commons.

More storm-petrels!! In fact, by ordinary Seawatch standards, today was a spectacular storm-petrel day, with 1 Black and 3 Leach's, all essentially at kelpline distance. We're still a little spoiled by yesterday's forty-four storm-petrels, though, so today's storm-petrel show didn't feel as spectacular as it truly should have. We also had twenty Northern Fulmars, 10 Pink-footed Shearwaters (the first of this species for a couple days), and 6 Sooty Shearwaters.

Other highlights included 6 Parasitic and 1 Pomarine Jaeger, a Northern Harrier setting out over the bay, and four Common Ravens that caught our attention when they croaked overhead as they did a brief sightseeing flight above Pt. Pinos. This is the first time I've seen more than one raven from the Point, and per eBird, the previous high count was two...

-Alison Vilag

eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/430088