December 6

Weather: Wind this morning was moderate NE; it died off by late morning and switched to west in late afternoon. Visibility was pretty good all day--somewhat limited on the far outer line during the first half-hour or so of the count. It was sunny and the swell was moderate. At the outer buoy, winds at dawn were NNE ~8 knots, switching to W at 6 knots at 1300. At sunset the winds were WNW at ~8 knots. Pressure remains high: at dawn it was 30.13, and it stayed around that over the course of the day.

With NE winds, we weren't expecting a large loon flight, so we were delighted to have a BIG loon hour (6687 Pacifics!). It was also one of our most charismatic loon flights of this season: perfect light, many big (50+) flocks passing right in front of the count! Amanda messaged the WhatsApp "it's another wild loon passage morning out at the Pt. Pinos Seawatch! So many!!". Fortunately, she proofread the message before it sent, because "loon" had autocorrected to "loin". (On that note, this is my current phone's first Seawatch, and the autocorrect compilation is, at this point in the season, pretty extensive. Puffin=muffin; egret=regret; alcid=acid; rump=bump; pom=mom; passerines=casseroles).

After a bit of a morning lull (9AM-10AM had just 157 Pac Loons), we had another big loon hour (1658 Pacs) from 10-11. I'm guessing these birds started out further north than our early Loon Hour birds did. We ended the day with 10,068 Pacific Loons and 186 Red-throats.

The alcid flight was fun today too! Loon Hour was also Murre Hour: clicking by 10s, we got 3340, and ended the day with 4011. We also had a great Ancient Murrelet tally--202--with our biggest hourly tally being 117 from 10-11. The Ancient Murrelet flight was not nearly so charismatic as the loon flight; often, the Ancients fly at kelpline, but today, most of them were so far out they were barely recognizable. We had 139 Rhino Auklets today.

Other highlights: a beautiful Black-legged Kittiwake that I picked up during a rare solo moment at the count. It was such a pretty bird that I was like "man, I wish there was someone here to appreciate it with me" and then I heard tripod legs sliding out--Kai got to appreciate the kittiwake too. Shortly after the kittiwake, despite a mad scramble rife with mishaps, Kai also successfully photographed the Royal Tern that's become a Seawatch regular this week. We saw it twice today. I say it, but Bill had 2 Royals in Monterey today, so who knows how many we've actually got right now. Bill also ran to the Seawatch today, as part of a self-inflicted birding full-length marathon. Seawatch provided Ancient Murrelet and American Kestrel for the marathon list...

Tubenose diversity continues to be low, but 2 Black-footed Albatross appearances were nice. We heard that Monterey Whalewatching had a Laysan from one of their boats today--sure would like one at Seawatch.

-Alison Vilag

eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/439463

December 5

Weather: At Pt. Pinos, the morning started, once again, with moderate NNE winds; following the pattern of the last week or so, these winds dropped off and switched to light west towards the end of the count. It was a sunny day with minimal swell and good visibility. At the outer buoy, wind at dawn was NNE at ~12 knots. It switched to W ~6 knots at 1300 and had built to W ~12 knots at sunset. Pressure remained high: 30.17 at dawn to 30.20 at 0900, then falling to 30.11 at count's end.

We had a really enjoyable loon flight this morning from 0700-0900. The volume wasn't full-bore Pinos loon insanity, but these two consecutive thousand-hours featured perfect light on flocks of at least a few dozen passing close in front of the seawatch. I think a lot of us Pinos people take this for granted, but it's so nice to have a seawatch site that both has good light all day AND has a relatively close flight. It's certainly not the case in other places I've watched and counted... We ended the day with 2918 Pacifics and 176 Red-throats, and we also crossed the 10,000 mark for Red-throated Loon for the season today.

Loon hour also brought another nice murre push (492); we counted 834 total today, along with 12 Rhinoceros Auklets and 35 Ancient Murrelets.

The Surf Scoter flight continues to trickle past: 303 today; the/a Royal Tern continues to make appearances -- we saw it fly out of the bay this morning, and it joined a big scrum just offshore the Seawatch this afternoon. The scrum was pretty fun, actually -- there were plenty of Glaucous-winged, Thayer's, Herring, and Short-billed Gulls amongst the California/Western/Heermann's conglomerate -- and Great Egrets, a Great Blue Heron, and some deft American Crows went tidepooling and got in on the inshore part of the anchovy feast. We noticed that a lot of birds looked comically pot-bellied after the scrum broke up...

A CBS newsman turned up this afternoon to do a piece on the king tides. I'm not sure if anything I said will make it to the news: I'm no expert on king tides, and I talked about what I DO know (Seawatch, duh), before the conversation was fortuitously diverted to Don Roberson.

We had our first identifiable jaeger in several days, a Pomarine, and also had two Black-vented Shearwater sightings.

-Alison Vilag

eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/439092

December 4

Weather: At dawn, winds were moderate NE at the Point, and the full moon was glorious as it set into the ocean southwest of Pt. Pinos. Visibility was good, skies were partly cloudy, and the swell was minimal. The wind went more north by mid-morning and dropped off in early afternoon, going a little west in the evening. At the outer buoy, at dawn the wind was 15.5 knots NE. It went NNW at 1300 and was W at ~10 knots at sunset. Pressure at dawn was 30.19; it rose to 30.26 at 1000 and dropped slightly to 30.21 at sunset. These weather anecdotes are probably becoming redundant to read -- a reflection of how redundant they are to experience at Pt. Pinos! A common musing from passers-by this week has been how nice it is I have good weather to be out in. I'd rather have good weather and no birds than bad weather and no birds, but good birds and bad weather is a pretty standard seawatch pairing, and we could use a storm and some good northwest winds to shake things up. Unfortunately, there's still none of that on the horizons...

For the rest of the season, I'll keep expectations low so I can be extra grateful for every moment between now and season's end when the flight isn't a drip-feed. Loon hour today was fun: 775 Pacific Loons (we had 1745 total today and 78 Red-throats); 1100 Common Murres; a sprinkling of Ancient Murrelets; a Black-legged Kittiwake. Outside of loon hour, other highlights included 2 Royal Tern sightings (in morning, one flew out of the bay - perhaps the same individual photographed on rocks at Asilomar; during the sunset hour, one flew back in), occasional horizon Black-footed Albatross, and 2 Marbled Murrelets. We had just 125 Surf Scoters today.

The last hour of the count was highlighted by the very low tide, a beautiful sunset AND a stunning moonrise. Fulmar activity seems highest around dusk and dawn, lately, and I've really been enjoying entering and exiting each day's Seawatch by watching the fulmars wheel, arc, and circle as the sun and the moon punch in, punch out. It is a privilege to stand in one place and experience the passage of time in this manner.

-Alison Vilag

eBird Checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/438824