NY Fall Pelagic 2013 Report...

After the last two miserable Pelagic outings in terms of the LACK of birds, I was excited and hopeful as did many other birders with last Sunday's Pelagic scheduled to depart from Freeport Long Island.  The trip organized by Sealife Paulagics is one of many that is run by Paul and his wife Anita Guris, check out their website for upcoming trips.

In my over exuberance, I set my alarm for Sunday instead of Saturday. Good thing for me, I was not sleeping well on Friday night into Saturday and so I hopped out of bed later than I would have liked but felt I had just about enough time to make it to the boat.  After a hair raising ride on the Southern State Parkway, I made it...just barely and scampered on board.  I was happy that I made it but that happiness turned to dismay as I realized just as the boat pulled out from the docks that in my haste, I had forgotten my winter coat in the car.  This was not going to be fun but what else was I to do but suck it up and of course good birds would make me forget how cold it was.

And we did get GREAT birds that made me forgot about the cold, like this awesome NORTHERN FULMAR that came in close enough for crippling views.  Is this close enough?

Northern Fulmar

No? Well how about this one.

Northern Fulmar

This was a life bird for me and this is the kind of looks that everyone should have of their life Fulmar.  It was SWEET!  What cold?

The FULMAR was awesome but you know us birders, we want more and we got more!  How about point blank looks at adult and juvenile BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKES followed by GREAT SHEARWATERS.

Black-legged Kittiwake

The Trips highlights were summed up by trip leader Doug Gochfeld as: Northern Fulmar, Sooty Shearwater (late, unexpected bird spotted by a few of us as we huddled in the back on the lower deck and later found out it was also seen from the upper deck) , Cory's Shearwater (disappointed we did not get closer looks), Great Shearwater, Black-legged Kittiwake (had a good many out there with EXCELLENT looks at adult and juveniles), "Kumlien's" Iceland Gull- 3 (2nd cycle, juvenile, adult), Lesser Black-backed Gull (juveniles), Bonaparte's Gull, Laughing Gull and Northern Gannet.  We also had Great Blue Heron, American Goldfinch, and Red-winged Blackbird.  We also had some Swallows at the beginning of the trip.

Great Shearwater

Black-legged Kittiwake

Overall a very successful trip despite being cold. Oh and I almost forgot to mention that the ride back was one of the roughest I have encountered at seas with 8ft swells.  There were a lot of "green" faces and "human" chumming taking place; thank goodness I was spared.  Being cold and getting sick would have been double the trouble.  Many thanks to all the leaders on the trip for their hard work in spotting the birds and ensuring all aboard had good looks.  Shout out to leader, Sean Sime, who was IMHO, outstanding in not only spotting birds but helping the many photographers keep track of the specialty birds through traffic.  Sean manned his area LIKE A BOSS!

Northern Fulmar

Great Shearwater

Tags: Pelagic Birding, Northern Fulmar, Great Shearwater, Black-legged Kittiwake

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