Fall Pelagics: Blue Whales, Whalebows, Murre[let]s, The Burden

And just like that, the pelagic season has come and gone. I already covered my first two trips of the year, so I figure I can go ahead and wrap up the September and October trips I did out of Half Moon Bay.

The September trip was full of marine life...there was a lot going on offshore. Humpback Whales were present in large numbers, frequently giving great looks near the boat.

Lots and lots of Humpbacks. The sea was boiling with whales. The sea wasn't boiling whales though, climate change isn't that bad yet.

We had nice looks at Blue Whales as well. This is always a major bonus of any trip. I don't think a lot of participants know that this is something they can realistically see on trips here, so there is always an atmosphere of bewildered excitement when one of these surfaces near the boat.

It's always a great honor to get good looks at the largest animal to have ever existed. That's some heavy shit...literally.

The day was bright and sunny, and ultimately bad for photography; I have no crushes to offer you. More importantly, we had good numbers of skuas and jaegers, and hundreds of Sabine's Gulls, the most I had ever seen. The western U.S. has been plagued with them this fall, both offshore, along the coast and on interior lakes; there must have been a bumper crop of them this year.

The real drama came when a Hawaiian Petrel was called out...I was quite convinced (ok, totally convinced) I saw it at one point, but when I chimped my photos, all I could find was a goddamn Pink-footed Shearwater. Great confusion ensued...people were calling it out repeatedly...eventually (after the trip), we all realized that no one had gotten a photo of it and only a couple of the leaders really saw it in the first place. That said, when I was going through pictures for this post, the very first photo of the "petrel" I took shows a bird that...well, it looks like a Hawaiian Petrel, not a Pink-footed Shearwater, but it's so bloody poor that I don't think anything can be conclusively made of it. Did I actually see a Hawaiian Petrel, but it pulled the ol' fucking switcharoo with a shearwater? I do not, and cannot know. This is all very typical, as it would be a life bird and is one of the motivating factors for me to keep getting on boats. So close...so fucking close.

Unlike Hawaiian Petrels, which hate me, the local Northern Gannet loves me now and lets me look at it all the time. Here it is majestically surfing Mavericks.

On the first weekend of October, I led my last pelagic of the year. We were pleasantly surprised early on by the numbers of Black-vented Shearwaters (year bird!) we ran into. Black-vented Shearwaters are very unpredictable north of Monterey Bay, so we're always happy to get them on Half Moon Bay trips.

These little homely shearwaters mostly prefer to spend their lives in inshore waters, though some will venture out over the shelf edge.

Rhinoceros Auklets occasionally allow close approach by the boat, a refreshing change from how they normally react.

It's hard to take interesting scenery photos with no land in sight, but I think this uncropped photo has it all. The excitement of cruising up on a giant feeding frenzy of whales (complete with whalebows), sea lions and seabirds does not ever wane.

One of these murres is not like the other. In fact, one of these murres is not a murre.

2016 is, for me, the year that murres and murrelets come together. I have seen a great many murres and a lot of murrelets, but before this year I've never seen a murrelet of any kind seek the company of a murre. Earlier this fall I found a Marbled Murrelet hiding in the middle of a murre flock next to Sail Rock (famed gannet perch), and then there was this Scripps's Murrelet doing a good impression of a baby murre...what in the fuck is the world coming to?

It's not that unusual I suppose, but novel nonetheless. A pair of Scripps's Murrelets were the most unusual species on this day; they are a difficult bird to come by in October. This was actually the one and only "slow" day I've had offshore this fall...we had no storm-petrels, and for my third trip ever, no Black-footed Albatross. We were in weird, gross brownish water almost the whole time, so I suspect the bulk of the local seabird population were elsewhere.

Lots of Red Phalaropes offshore this fall, outnumbering Red-necked on some days. Most mellow.

Dall's Porpoise...such a good mammal, one of my favorites. This is another one of those species that is neither rare or expected on boat trips here, you just have to hope the boat will blunder into a pod. They do bowride, so you can get great looks, but they are agonizing to try and photograph because they are so fast. Most dolphins are slow and slothful in comparison. You would think that a mammal as big as a person would not be so difficult to crush 15 feet away, but such is life.

The Economy of Style has been absolutely rampant in this post, have you noticed? Black, gray, white, brown, plus a dash of color on the head of the gannet and the bill of the auklet...all part of pelagic birding. Well, no bird off our coast pulls off a limited palette better than a Buller's Shearwater...unfortunately this was another down year for them (locally, anyway) so we only saw a handful, and yet again I will go another year without Flesh-footed Shearwater...unexpected this is. And, unfortunate.

Unfortunate that I know the truth?

No! Unfortunate that you rushed to face him. That incomplete was your training. Not ready for the burden were you...

Sorry. Got a little carried away there. Sometimes dipping on Flesh-footed Shearwater feels like learning Darth Vader is your father.

Half Moon Bay, 8/17 and 8/23

Sooty Shearwater. Angular.

Some coverage today from the August 17 and August 23 pelagic trips with Shearwater Journeys out of Half Moon Bay, CA. My next boat will be on September 7, with This Machine Nate, Laurence of Arizona, and Flycatcher Jen. I have never been on a boat with so many bird bloggers...the tremendous weight of our combined nerd-strength could sink us before we get out of the harbor. Hopefully they will get some lifers...I believe this will be Laurence's first pelagic, so I expect he will be flipping out and spewing puns for the duration. As for me, September 7 is still within the Hawaiian Petrel window, so that is my target bird...don't worry, I'll be looking for White-chinned and Great-winged too, but I am a humble birder. Warm water conditions persist in much of the eastern Pacific, and there are a lot of Sulids in the area right now, so you never know what we might find.

As I compose this post, I am impressively ill. I mean, no one is going to be doing any ice bucket bullshit for me, but existence is rather unpleasant at the moment. So for today I will cut the loquacious crap, and each photo is going to get exactly one word to accompany the species.

Rhinoceros Auklets. Gloomy.

Tufted Puffin. Inspecting.

South Polar Skua. Skippy.

Broad.

Black-footed Albatross. Hello.

Majestic.

Brakes.

Common Tern. Wedged.

Articesque.

California Gull. Cinnamon.

Edgings.

Pink-footed Shearwater, with Western Gulls. Disparate.

Harried.

Pomarine Jaeger. Pomatorhine.

Dauntless.

Pacific Loon. Fresh.

Steller's and California Sea Lions. Blondes.

Steller's Sea Lion. Sneers.

MEGAGREAT SHEARWATER and Other Half Moon Highlights

Just brutal. BB&B is getting really bogged down and backed up...too many pelagic trips! So much chimping remains to be done. I like that I haven't posted a photo of a passerine in weeks, other than the controversial Nutmeg Mannikin (which has been added to the ABA Checklist, as I prophesied).

So after a fairly slow outing out of Monterey, I led 2 more Shearwater Journeys trips out of Half Moon Bay early in the month. On September 8, we pulled off the incredible feat of relocating the Great Shearwater that Alvaro Jamarillo's trip had found the day before. This is a MEGA in California, with currently only 8 accepted records by the Bird Police. Of course, since it is such a good bird, my photos of it were atrocious, but at least I got much better ones less than a month before in North Carolina.

The bird made a single pass up the port side of the boat and then disappeared...it was not part of any feeding flock or raft of birds, so I think it was plain old amazing luck that we were able to find it again, less than a mile from where the bird was seen the previous day.

One of my best California birds this year, without a doubt. We did another trip out there the day after seeing this bird, but could not relocate it. It's a big ocean out there. It still astounds me that the bird paid us a visit...chasing pelagic vagrants successfully is not something to be taken lightly.

It was a good weekend for Scripps's Murrelets. A big body of warm water was reachable on those days, which the murrelets love. Sadly, no Craveri's or Guadalupe Murrelets accompanied them.

Interestingly, at least half the time I've seen these birds on northern California trips, they are spotted off the bow flying directly away from the boats, unnervingly not revealing any field marks except their back color and flight style. They look a lot like Cassin's Auklets when they do this (which is surely their intended way to thwart birders), and I bet many SCMU get missed this way.

Buller's Shearwater are beloved. It is the bird on a pelagic trip that leaders will call out again and again and again, no matter how many have been seen already. I had no idea they had two-tone pink and gray feet until I looked closely at this photo...it's a nice touch.

Although the big dark "M" across the upperwing is the default ID mark for these birds, I find their gleaming white underwing and underparts to be even more useful to spot these birds at a glance.

Here is the iconic back pattern.

Cassin's and Rhinoceros Auklets are similar at first glance, particularly when you see a distant bird on the water and have no way to gauge its size. The comparatively small bill of a Cassin's isn't always obvious, but it's a great field mark besides the overall diminutive size. The differences in head shape (rounded on Cassin's, flat and blocky on Rhino) are also reliable.

Young Rhino Auklets (right) lack the white brows and whiskers of adults, giving them the chance to be confused with both Cassin's Auklets and juvenile Tufted Puffins.

Pacific White-sided Dolphins are frequently found on boats out of Half Moon Bay, Monterey and Bodega Bay. We had an enormous pod this day, with lots of shearwaters fishing with them. Even the most cold-hearted, diehard lister should be happy to run into dolphins on pelagic trips, because they usually have a lot of birds with them.

Of course, Pacific White-throated Dolphin or Pacific Gray-sided Dolphin would be a better names, but I don't think mammalogists are as prone to tinkering with names as bird folk are. Very cool and distinctive animals, regardless of humanity's poor descriptions. They are more than happy to come visit boats, and occasionally have Northern Right Whale Dolphins tagging along with them.

It's been a good fall for Humpback Whales. We've seen hella. Brilliant creatures. Much more pelagic coverage to come soon.

Weathered Out

Rhinoceros Auklet. Photographed off Half Moon Bay, CA.

The long-awaited pelagic trip out of Santa Barbara yesterday was cancelled. This trip is known as a Pterodroma Trawl, a boat capable of netting dozens of birders a pantheon of petrels. It certainly would have been a trip worth getting one's panties in a twist. Alas...it was weathered out. Not that I was planning on going or anything.

All I'm saying is that I feel your pain birders. I too have felt the sting of a canceled boat far too many times. I know what you're going through.

Luckily, the boat I am scheduled to go out on doesn't head out for another three weeks. I'm looking forward to it...I NEED SEABIRDS.

That is all.

Trinidade Petrel All The Way Across The Sky

Common Murres do live up to their name around these parts, but I still think they should be named something else. Wikipedia claims they are sometimes referred to as Thin-billed Murre, but I've never heard that.  Random fact of the day: people in Newfoundland love eating murres.

As promised, here are some more photos from my November pelagic trip out of Half Moon Bay. I think what I really need to do is get on an east coast pelagic, where there are so many potential life birds that I would likely be blinded by the end of a trip. I'm tearing up just thinking about it.

The way I envision my first east coast pelagic (likely a Brian Patteson boat, of course) would be something like what you see in the infamous Double Rainbow video (watch it if for some inexplicable reason you haven't seen it, and yes, he is on mushrooms). It would just be so...intense, you know? Great Shearwater would give me the shakes. Black-capped Petrels would bring me to tears. Band-rumped Storm-Petrels would make me scream for joy. A Trinidade Petrel would have me crapping my pants. I have no intention of eating mushrooms, however, I can totally see myself saying "Whoa. It's a Trinidade Petrel. Trinidade Petrel all the way. Whoa, that's so intense...whoa man.....WHOOOAAAAA! Oh my god oh my god! Woooooooo! Ohhhhhh, wowwwww!!! WOOOOOOO! Yeah! Oh my god, look at that! Trinidade Petrel all the way across the sky! Oh my god! Oh my god! What does this mean?"

Just something to think about. Have a cathartic week everybody.

Northern Fulmar. White morphs are pretty uncommon in California. They look so clean compared to their filthy gray cousins.

Surf Scoter. Not rare, but still rad.

Mew Gulls are celebrated amongst birders for their tenedency to not breed with other gull species, and being easy to identify. And they are, dare I say it, "cute".

A Pink-footed Shearwater has more moves than the average bird; they are perfectly at home flying like this (it's standing on its wing, not flying overhead).

Red-throated Loon. What to say about a basic-plumaged Red-throated Loon? They are....long. Yeah.

Rhinoceros Auklet with mini-horn. There's probably a market for their horns in China, which will eventually lead to their demise. WHY, CHINA?! WHY??????????

Brandt's Cormorant immature.

This was part of the big Ancient Murrelet flock we found. All my photos of said flock totally suck. Sigh.

Brown Pelican. Pretty good composition for a completely uncropped/unrotated photo, I reckon.