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There are two things I've consistently noticed about big flights here that don't seem attached to any particular weather system: 1. There is condensation on my vehicle when I'm leaving predawn for the count; 2. during the afternoon prior, the loon flight picked up again after a late morning lull. I entered the count yesterday knowing that both these factors were at play. However, I don't put a lot of stock into my flight fortunetelling, so when I set up at Pinos yesterday morning, I had no expectations.
Since Pinos protocol is to start new checklists on the hour, and the count starts more or less at first light, our first checklist is running a few minutes shy of a half-hour. This is great, because it allows a faint idea of where attention will need to be focused during the 0700 and 0800 hours, which are typically our busiest.
Catherine has been joining me every morning, and she often helps me click Common Murres: we've been having big morning murre flights, and whereas loons can and will travel through every possible patch of sky, water, and horizon, murres stay low and have a more predictable flightline. Also, those assigned to clicking murres have the benefits of being focused on a great area to pick out less-common alcids or tubenoses--as well as not having to fret over the distant loon mirages on the bay-cutting line, nor deal with the fatigue of holding binoculars in one hand and clickers in the other while working the loon "high line" out front.
About fifteen minutes after it was light enough to see, I knew that Catherine would be clicking murres while I figured out what the loons were doing, but things still seemed reasonable. Then the 0700 hour rolled around and it seemed that anywhere you directed your gaze over the bay was absolutely erupting with birds making passage to somewhere else. The murre flight was absolute insanity: every few seconds, dozens charged through my scope, and when I took binocular scans, the whole bay was just heaving murres from the troughs. By then, Joan and Robert had rolled up and I quickly set them on the Loon High Line--which, by Pinos loon flights, wasn't high-traffic, but we were still getting dozens of loons or so per minute and I was very grateful to not have to divide my focus between that and the far outer line.
There were fair numbers of loons moving on the far outer line, but what was particularly spectacular out there was the most immense flock of Bonaparte's Gulls I've ever seen from Pinos. Initially, they were strung out across the horizon, streaming southwest, but well past the point, they began to mill about, at times merging into a flock that--while so distant you couldn't pick out individual birds, much less markings--was so immense and so dense that it filled almost the entire field of view on a spotting scope. I encouraged everyone to quickly abandon their counting duties and take a look, because it was just too cool. Other things that demanded deviation from our assignments were the stratospheric, twinkling-white Red-throated Loon flocks that passed directly overhead, traveling through the sky like unmoored constellations and the horizon Black-footed Albatross that wheeled past.
The flight settled down a bit in late morning, but Pacific Loons and murres picked up again by noon, tapering off only when we reached the last two hours of the count. I had moments when I had second thoughts about clicking birds individually, and most of our Pacific Loon hours today ended up being thousand-plus.
Today was one of those Seawatch days that I look forward to when I arrive for the season. It was also one of the rare big flights that happens without the accompaniment of challenging weather conditions. And, for the first time ever, thanks to Catherine, Fred, Joan, Kai, and Robert and the division of duties they allowed, it was one of the most enjoyable big flights I've ever had--many of the others I've counted here have been dominated by the frustration of being unable to, as one person, keep up with volume of birds pushing past the Point.
So, here are species and numbers highlights:
-1376 Surf Scoters, a steady flight all day. Ring-necked Duck, Green-winged Teal, Gadwall, White-winged and Black Scoters, and Long-tailed Duck all less-common waterfowl highlights.
-16,926 Common Murres (with a 9435 hour at 0700, and the biggest pushes sunrise-1000 and 1300-1500). 216 Rhinoceros Auklets. 2 Marbled Murrelets. 1 Pigeon Guillemot. 52 Ancient Murrelets.
-Bonaparte's Gulls. While it's hard to decide on what the day's number actually was, as after the first hour most of the birds were milling in the flock to the southwest (though some were still streaming out of the bay), our highest hourly count was 2318 and I think that's low. We also had a Pomarine Jaeger and 6 Black-legged Kittiwakes; all the kittiwakes save 1 were afternoon birds.
-Loons: We had 441 Red-throats (peak movement 7-9) and 11,917 Pacifics (peak hour was 4460 at 0800; 0700-1400 were all generally 1000+ hours).
-2 Black-footed Albatross, 1 Sooty Shearwater, 9 Northern Fulmars, 1 (distant) albatross sp.
The winds were light, <5 knots, at the Point all day, variable to start off by going west at 0900 where they stayed till count's end. At the outer buoy it was NNE 12 knots at sunrise, keeping the north but dropping to 6 knots by 11 and going west around noon, which it kept till the count's end.
-Alison Vilag
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