Seawatch Report - Nov 28

3 surf scoters (left) and 2 black scoters (right)

A big Surf Scoter flight and the Nazca Booby that continued for a third day (but had seemingly departed for parts yet unknown by the last hours of the count) highlighted this year's edition of Thanksgiving Seawatch. A lot of passers-by expressed surprise that the count continues on Thanksgiving--but southbound birds don't know it's a holiday, and when you're a migration counter you run on bird time and not human time, which I love. (Last year, 2023, our biggest flight of the whole year fell on Thanksgiving!)

Anyway, we had 4069 Surf Scoters at Seawatch today. The flight was heaviest from 1100-sunrise, with the heaviest hours being 1300 (894) and sunset hour (891). The bulk of the flight today was big, low bay-cutting flocks >60 that, though distant, looked like these awesome freight trains of southbound scoters. We had a couple >200 flocks in sunset hour that did pass directly in front of the Seawatch. This was marvelous--the amount of motion in a Surf Scoter flock this size, the twisting and coming together and stringing out and rising and falling and just sort of spilling across a sunset sky--is something that will always be jaw-droppingly beautiful to me, no matter how many times I see it. One of these big flocks had two Black Scoters at the very end, which was a fun identification via silhouette... I think Kai got cool photos. In total, we had 4 Black Scoters and 1 White-winged today.

The Nazca Booby went undetected for about an hour after the count started, then just sort of appeared on the Point rocks, where it slept and preened until somewhat after 1300, when it departed. (Interestingly, this is the same hour where it left yesterday, too!). I caught a glimpse of it in flight over the bay, distant and to the east of Pt. Pinos, during the 1500 hour. For me, it was just as exciting to randomly come across a huge black-and-white booby on a scope scan as it was when the booby first showed up two days ago. I watched it forage for a few minutes but it never came back to land that I noticed.

Otherwise, it was a quiet day! Just 235 Common Murres, 6 Rhinoceros Auklets, 5 Ancient Murrelets, and 5 Marbled Murrelets; 140 Red-throated and 369 Pacific Loons; 14 Northern Fulmars, 1 Pink-footed Shearwater, 1 Sooty Shearwater (and the mystery white tubenose again!), and our only (identified) jaeger today was a Parasitic.

See the full checklist here: https://ebird.org/tripreport/296495

-Alison Vilag

Seawatch Report - Nov 27

Nazca booby

Today's seawatch was highlighted by the Nazca Booby that reappeared during the 1000 hour, perched on the Pt. Pinos rocks until 1300, returned again sometime during the 1400 hour, and was still on the Pt. Pinos rocks when I left somewhat after sunset. Many birders--and many passers-by--got great looks at this great bird today, and I'm glad it's stuck around.

The winds today were less favorable than they've been: 7-16 knots ENE in the morning becoming more north and diminishing to around 5 knots in the afternoon, then turning a little west in the last hours of the count. At the outer buoy overnight and during the morning it was blowing from the north at 8-12 knots, becoming northwest 6-12 knots in the afternoon hours.

The scoter flight turned back on today! We tallied 4880 over the course of the day, with our peak hour being the last hour of the count, when 1502 came by. Many of the flocks today were cutting low across the bay near the buoy, and some of our largest evening flocks were cutting over the golf course behind the Seawatch. Tagging along in these scoter flocks were 2 White-winged Scoters, 1 Black Scoter, and 2 Cinnamon Teal.

The alcid flight was comparatively quiet: 468 Common Murres (peak hour 0700) and 9 Ancient Murrelets; I did not see any Rhinoceros Auklets today.

The loon flight was a shadow of yesterday's: just 2114 Pacifics and 287 Red-throats. A Black-footed Albatross, our first in nearly two weeks, was the tubenose highlight; we also had 1 Pink-footed and 1 Sooty Shearwater, 35 Northern Fulmars, and an all-white tubenose that, judging from flight style and shape, was likely a Black-vent with pigment issues.

1 Parasitic and 2 Pomarine Jaegers and 3 Marbled Murrelets were also highlights from today.

See the full checklist here: https://ebird.org/tripreport/296240

-Alison Vilag

Nazca Booby! - Nov 26

Today flew by at the Seawatch, testament to the good numbers AND the fun birds that passed by.

The morning started with drizzle and a steady flow of high Red-throated Loons. It was quiet enough in regard to wind and surf that we could hear several flocks "quacking" as they passed directly overhead. This is a Seawatch event I look forward to each season--it's not a sound we get to hear often and it always catches me by surprise. Alcids were moving too, though not at the chaotic volumes we've experienced during a few other mornings this week. We had 368 Rhinoceros Auklets and 862 Common Murres (peak hour for both 0700), as well as 2 Pigeon Guillemots and 27 Ancient Murrelets.

The Pacific Loon flight didn't really pick up until the 0800 hour, and there were two major flightlines: large scattered medium-high flocks passing directly in front of the count, and an even more scattered low line cutting the bay somewhat southwest of the buoy (but not the very distant loon line). This line pulsed PALOs for several hours: our biggest hour today was 5585 (0900), and our total daily tally was 14,844. (Our total Red-throated tally was 1426).

Our first super fun bird today was the Black Storm-Petrel that essentially did what yesterday's Black Storm-Petrel did, but in reverse (flying out of the bay instead of into the bay). Not much later, a Fork-tailed Storm-Petrel flew into the bay, which was a really fun comparison of storm-petrel flight style while the Black was still fresh in our minds. The Fork-tailed was actually a life bird for Rhoda, and she took a quick bench nap to recover from the excitement. She was actually asleep when I spotted, naked-eye, a black-and-white booby flying over the Point. I yelled something like "THERE'S A NAZCA BOOBY RIGHT OVER THE POINT!". Rhoda woke up. We then confirmed it actually was a Nazca, photographed it, got the word out to area birders, and stayed on the bird (which had roosted on the South Gull Roost rocks) till everyone started to show up. The Nazca didn't just disrupt a nap--it disrupted Thanksgiving grocery shopping, laundry, and apple pie making. It was sleeping on the rocks when we left after sunset.

Other highlights today included 1 White-winged Scoter, 25 Brant, 3 Pomarine Jaegers, 1 Parasitic Jaeger, 6 Elegant Terns, and a handful of Sooty, Short-tailed, and Black-vented Shearwaters.

I'm also happy to report that we have Surf Scoters again. We ended the day with 401, and 170 of those came by during the last hour of the count, so I am hopeful we'll have some sort of a scoter flight tomorrow. (I'm feeling like we might have a good loon flight tomorrow morning too!)

It was overcast and great visibility all day, with drizzle during the first couple hours of the count and again briefly in early afternoon. The wind at the count was <5 knots from the ENE all day; at the outer buoy it was south 6-12 overnight, switching to ENE 4-10 during the first hours of the count, then to WNW <5 knots through the rest of the count. Pressure overnight was 30.10 dropping to 30.07 around sunrise and rising again to 30.11 around sunset.

See the full checklist here: https://ebird.org/tripreport/295951

- Alison Vilag