The See Life Paulagics overnight pelagic trip aboard the Brooklyn VI out of Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, on Monday June 1, was a great success.
We left the dock Sunday night amid rain showers and dark overcast skies, but the farther and farther we got from the dock, the better the weather became. By the time we were stopped 120 miles from shore, at around 4 AM, the seas and wind were calm, and the Big Dipper was shining over the boat from a mostly clear sky. Before the sun had risen we had already picked up two of the main target birds for the trip: Leach's Storm-Petrel, and SOUTH POLAR SKUA. Little did we know it at the time, but that Skua was indeed a strong harbinger of things to come, as we would tally 5 more (4 definite South Polars, and one that was a bit too far to definitively identify, but was most likely also a South Polar). For an extended period of time, we had 3 South Polar Skuas around the boat at once, making very close flight circuits, and at times sitting on the water together. The non-bird marine life was also excellent, and one of the biggest highlights of the trip, for many, was a repeatedly breaching BASKING SHARK, very close to the boat. In addition to that, we saw a group of Pilot Fish amid the tentacles of a Portuguese Man O' War, several Mola mola (Ocean Sunfish), Risso's Dolphins, a Blue Shark, and more. The weather deteriorated markedly as we approached shore, but while we were motoring back through the choppy seas and dreary skies (adjacent to Nassau County), at 18+ knots, we passed a couple of very large aggregations of Shearwaters, numbering around 800 birds. These were predominantly Sooty and Cory's with a fair number of Greats, but we weren't able to stop to sort through them due to time constraints. Either way, the flocks milling around in the weather were a true spectacle. Some photos, including the Basking Shark breaching, a bunch of Skuas, a huge Mola mola, and the Pilot Fish, are here (and also embedded in the various eBird checklists): https://www.flickr.com/photos/29840397@N08 Without further ado, here is the pelagic list: Birds: *SOUTH POLAR SKUA*- *5* *Skua sp*.- 1 *LONG-TAILED JAEGER*- 1 (2nd calendar year bird) POMARINE JAEGER- 1 (adult) LEACH'S STORM-PETREL- *26* Wilson's Storm-Petrel- 215 Oceanodroma sp.- 3 *AUDUBON'S SHEARWATER*-* 5* Manx Shearwater- 9 Sooty Shearwater- *465* Cory's Shearwater- *310* Great Shearwater- 70 Shearwater sp.- 250 ARCTIC TERN- 4 (Probably at least *10*, as one distant flock of 6 birds were probably Arctics) Common Tern- 14 (+75 around the Breezy Point Jetty) Sterna sp.- 30 Common Loon- 2 Double-crested Cormorant- 3 BARN SWALLOW- 2 (separate individuals a mile apart, about 87 miles out from the dock, and 75 miles from the closest point of land. One was fairly pale, and the other was the expected rusty-bellied plumage) PURPLE MARTIN- 1 (about 8 miles from shore on the way in, briefly following the boat). Surf Scoter- 1 drake alongside the Breezy Point jetty Great Black-backed Gull- 1 Non-birds: *BASKING SHARK*- 1 https://www.flickr.com/photos/29840397@N08/18405240816 Blue Shark- 1 Risso's Dolphin- 6 Offshore Bottlenose Dolphin- 3 Common Dolphin- 15 Portuguese Man O' War- 25+ *Pilot Fish*- 40-50 Mola Mola (Ocean Sunfish)- 8 Pelagic barnacles (probably the genus *Lepas*)- 15-20 We left the dock with people on land saying "What are they thinking going off shore on a day like this?" As we approached land and got into the ugly on-shore weather, many people on the boat must have been thinking "What was everybody thinking staying on land on a day like this?!" A huge thank you to Paul and Anita Guris for putting the trip together, and to the crew on the Brooklyn VI (Mike, Matty, Philly, Jesus): https://www.facebook.com/brooklynvi.fishing Good Seabirding, Doug Gochfeld. Brooklyn, NY. https://www.flickr.com/photos/29840397@N08 -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/NYSB.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
