2025 Pt. Pinos Seawatch - 18 Nov

Black-legged kittiwakes

Weather: The wind at Pt. Pinos this day had quite a bit of east in it at sunrise, and as the day went on it shifted to north and then built to a moderate NW for the last couple hours of light. It was dry and partly cloudy; visibility was quite good and the swell was moderate. At the outer buoy, at sunrise the winds were E at 8 knots, switching to N, 6 knots at 1100 and switching to W at 1400. At sunset the wind was 14 knots from the west. Pressure was rising: 29.91 at sunrise to 29.99 at sunset.

Birds: The day-to-day changeability at Pt. Pinos is astounding. Yesterday, Loon Hour brought us over 10,000 loons. Today, Loon Hour brought us less than 100. But it was still a very enjoyable day: we had a nice scoter flight, a wonderful late-evening run of kittiwakes, and the relief of not having to count back-to-back days of migration passing with the flow rate of a firehose.

We had 5553 Surf Scoters, which brought us past the 40,000 threshold for the season. The flight was heaviest from 1500-sunset, when big messy flocks rolled over the waves past the buoy, battled the headwind at the Point, and occasionally cut behind us past the lighthouse... We also had 6 Northern Pintail, 2 Black Scoter, and 4 Common Mergansers--which are quite uncommon at Pt. Pinos.

The alcid flight was quiet. 6 Rhinoceros Auklets, 1 Pigeon Guillemot, 788 Common Murres, 3 Ancient Murrelets.

For loons, we had 135 Red-throats, 234 Pacifics, and 34 Commons. (Again, yesterday, we had over 14,000 loons!)

225 Northern Fulmars were our only tubenose.

We all loved the kelpline kittiwake show today! Our tally was 33, and 27 of these were from 1500-sunset, which is kinda kittiwake-o-clock at Pinos. It's so great to have a fun bird with a straightforward identification that flies comparatively slow, comparatively close, and comes by at a time when the late-afternoon light so beautifully brings out the black M; most of our fun birds at Seawatch are not nearly so obliging.

-Alison Vilag

eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/433861

November 17

Monday's forecast has been one I've looked forward to since last Thursday; it did not disappoint. The rain that had been a definitive feature for most of the previous four days was supposed to change from all-day soakings to squalls blown in from the west: lessening rain, winds from our favorite direction, and just being within the season where so much is ready to migrate when conditions are right all hinted towards an epic Seawatch day. It was. At the count, it was squally all day, with the wind becoming pretty gusty from the W by late morning. Visibility was good; the swell was moderately large. At the outer buoy, winds at dawn were WSW at 17.5 knots; by 0800 they were W at 19 knots. At sunset, WSW at ~14 knots. Pressure rose from 29.81 at dawn to 29.88 at sunset. There are some less-scientific measures of weather that accompany big flights here. Today was the first day I wore my down pants; the first day we hunkered on the lee side of a car because of a west wind; it was the first day we had a thousand-loon hour, and it was not just a thousand-loon hour: our first thousand-loon hour of this season was a TEN-THOUSAND loon hour. (751 Red-throats, 10,104 Pacifics, 91 Commons).

We knew it was going to be a big day as soon as it got light enough to separate Surf Scoters from the dark. By Loon Hour, regardless of whether your field of view was spotting-scope sized, binocular-sized, or as expansive as everything you could see with the naked eye, that entire field of view--from the horizon, to the tippy-tops of clouds, to the wavetroughs that kept heaving Bonaparte's Gull and murre flocks up--was all flying out of the bay. It was one of those quintessential Pt. Pinos Seawatch mornings that I look forward to at the beginning of the season. The flight kept going all day, too--by the last full hour of the count, I couldn't believe the volume of Surf Scoters that were still flying out of the bay, especially, since we had a 12,000+ day last week.

Surf Scoters: 10,251 today. The biggest hour was 2805 (1500-1600), and we were clicking flocks by 5s for most of the day. There were two flightlines--right past the point, and low lines roller-coastering (roller-scotering?) across the bay behind the buoy. We also had 4 White-winged Scoters, 1 Green-winged Teal, 1 Lesser Scaup, and 3 Black Scoters.

Alcids: We had a BUSY murre flight during from dawn-0900. Peak hour was Loon Hour, 4280, and the day's total was 9406. We also had 16 Rhino Auklets, 3 Marbled Murrelets, 1 Pigeon Guillemot, and 8 Ancient Murrelets.

Gulls: We had 4 Black-legged Kittiwakes, all first-cycle, and a lovely, late SABINE'S GULL that Kai picked up basically over the beach during the height of Loon Hour chaos. Lots of Bonaparte's flew out of the bay today, too--1217.

Loons: It was a BIG loon day. We had 2591 Red-throats (peak hour=751, loon hour), 12,193 Pacific Loons (peak hour 10,104, loon hour), and 224 Common Loons. We had another cool "frontline flock" of COLO: 93 that flew stratospherically high as they cut due south over the count site in late afternoon.

For tubenoses, we had less shearwater diversity than I'd expected, but we did have 481 Northern Fulmar, 2 Pink-footed Shearwaters, a Manx/Black-vented Shearwater that was probably a Manx but only gave a brief look, and four storm-petrels: 2 Ashy, 1 Leach's, and 1 storm-petrel sp.

A Common Raven flew around the beach for a bit during afternoon, our most interesting non-seabird of the day.

Some quick notes that hopefully give perspective to the magnitude of this flight:

** We tallied 36,555 migrating seabirds yesterday (this number does not include things like pelicans, cormorants, or Heermann's Gulls whose movements past the point are explicitly migratory). Looking at last year's data, this flight would have constituted 10.8% of the 2024 Seawatch volume, and would have been the 2nd-largest flight of that season.

**Our first thousand-hour for PALO in 2024 was Nov 15; in 2022 and 2023 it was Nov 19; in 2025 it was Nov 17.

**Today's Red-throated Loon tally, 2591, eclipses my high daily counts from 2022 (689), 2023 (900), and 2024 (1426).

Pacific Loons and Surf Scoters are the two focal species of the Pt. Pinos Seawatch. Year to year, their movements through Monterey Bay are high-volume and comparatively dependable, being associated more with weather conditions and juncture in season than, for example, the more food-driven presences of alcids and tubenoses. It bears mention that, at this writing, Pt. Pinos is the only standardized migration count that samples Pacific coast Surf Scoter and Red-throated Loon migration. It is the only North American count that samples Pacific Loon migration.

However, the Red-throated Loon flight at Pt. Pinos is of particular intrigue to me. The numbers tallied during the Seawatch period exceed the North American population estimate given in Birds of the World. Further, we know, from transmitter data, that at least some of those Alaskan arctic plain birds winter in Japan and the Korean Peninsula (Rizzolo et. al., 2020). Is the North American population estimate markedly low? Are some of the Seawatch’s Red-throated Loons Siberian-borne? Regardless, to me, this exemplifies why migration counts are vital tools for population surveys—particularly of tundra-breeding bird species.

-Alison Vilag

eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/433598

November 16

Great SUSC day! The morning crew, Catherine, Kai, John, and Ashley, had to battle driving rains for most of the morning. Even with reduced visibility, there were nice views of thousands of Surf Scoters (SUSC) leaving the bay. Amanda, Karen, and Fred took over at noon, getting the opportunity to put their rain gear to the test as well. The SUSCs continued to go by in big numbers, but an Ashy Storm-Petrel and a few very close groups of Brant geese in lovely golden light when the rain slackened was an afternoon highlight. We had nice company in the late afternoon when the rain finally ended, with some morning counters returning plus our awesome CSUMB buddy, Abraham, there for good conversation. We got to show the enormous raft of Southern Sea Otters to a group that came to the coast specifically so that one person could see otters in the wild and they were just about in tears at seeing all of the cute otters. Folks walking by were intrigued and/or confused by our excited cheering when the last few massive SUSC flocks came by in the dimming light. What a sight! Another glorious day at Point Pinos.

- Amanda

eBird checklist: https://ebird.org/tripreport/433302