Another fun day out at the Seawatch! Like yesterday, sunrise itself was tame enough, but a half-hour or so into the count, just like they did yesterday, Common Murres and Rhinoceros Auklets started pouring out of the bay en masse. We tallied 2509 Rhinoceros Auklets (peak hour 0700, with 1630 recorded) and 4958 Common Murres (peak hour also 0700, with 3200 recorded). Both murres and Rhinoceros Auklets were clicked by 10s during that peak hour but otherwise counted individually. The other alcid highlight today was a flock of 20 Ancient Murrelets that flew out of the bay drafting a Common Murre.
The swell today (it's king tide, too) was utterly dramatic, and just as much a part of the alcid flight as the murres and Rhinos were. At times it felt like a towering wall of surf was bearing down on the Point, and teasing trough-traveling alcids from the sea today was both frustrating and awesome: a ball of 60+ birds would heave into view, just to be swallowed back up almost immediately.
Fortunately, the ceiling today was low enough that the loon flight was both late to start (peaking around 0930 instead of 0700) AND it the flightline was relatively low in altitude: peak alcid and peak loon movement was happening in the same field of view, which is a rare treat. It was our first 1000+ Pacific Loon day of the season (1744 total; peak hour 0900 with 609 and several flocks of ~40), and we only tallied 101 Red-throats today.
The Surf Scoter flight picked up a bit today, with 341 tallied.
Yesterday, I suspected the thousand+ Bonaparte's Gulls leaving the bay were some sort of exodus, and that does seem to be the case: I only tallied 29 today, and also had 69 Elegant Terns leaving the bay.
Tubenose numbers were low today, testament to light winds. We had 5 Pink-foots, 2 Sooties, 1 Short-tailed Shearwater, 4 Black-vents, and 6 Sooty/Short-tails.
Visibility was limited to somewhat beyond the buoy for most of the count today, and was reduced to about buoy-distance for about an hour in the early afternoon. Winds at the Point were light all day, and at the outer buoy, they were light overnight, building to 8kt from the west by 1300 and 12 kt from the west by count's close. Pressure dropped from 30.11 overnight to 29.96 at count's close.
Tomorrow (Friday's) forecast looks to be the best winds we've had to date this season. I'm excited and hopeful over what will transpire: perhaps, my most reasonable hope is our season's first thousand-loon hour.
See the full checklist here: https://ebird.org/tripreport/292646
- Alison Vilag
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