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Space on Upcoming Pelagic Trips; Recent Sightings



Dear Seabirders,

Our pelagic trip from Manteo, NC this Saturday aboard the Country Girl
is now full, as are our trips there on September 1 and 17. We do still
have room on Country Girl trips on THIS SUNDAY, August 26 and next
Sunday September 2 (the day before Labor Day). We also have room on a
trip from Virginia Beach  on Sunday, September 16. This trip will be
aboard a faster boat than we usually use up there, and this should cut
down considerably on the riding time to the shelf break compared to the
last couple of years.  We also have two more trips from Hatteras aboard
the Miss Hatteras this fall- October 13 and November 3 (both Saturdays).

Last Saturday’s trip from Manteo was blessed with good weather and
plentiful bird life. While we didn’t find any great rarities, we did see
a good diversity of species (12 pelagic seabirds) and good numbers
overall. We also saw some interesting cetaceans- Sperm Whale and
Cuvier’s Beaked Whale. While the conditions looked promising for
White-faced Storm-Petrel, we did not see any. This has historically been
a good time to find that species off Oregon Inlet, so we have high hopes
for the next two weekends. This has also been a good time for
Trinidade(Herald) Petrel, tropicbirds, and Masked Booby. Juvenile
Long-tailed Jaegers should also be showing up soon. Of course the
regulars on these trips include Black-capped Petrel, Cory’s, Greater,
Audubon’s, and Manx(the last couple of years) Shearwaters, Wilson’s and
Band-rumped Storm-Petrels, Red-necked Phalarope, Pomarine Jaeger, and
Bridled and Sooty Terns. With a few exceptions, most of these birds can
also be seen on our Virginia Beach trip and our later fall trips from
Hatteras.

Here’s the list from August 19:

Black-capped Petrel-16
Cory’s Shearwater-496
Greater Shearwater-6
Manx Shearwater-1
Audubon’s Shearwater-82
Wilson’s Storm-Petrel-186
Band-rumped Storm-Petrel-24
Red-necked Phalarope-6
South Polar Skua-1
Pomarine Jaeger-2
Common Tern- 2
Bridled Tern-6
Sooty Tern-27
Black Tern-9

Leatherback Sea Turtle-1

Sperm Whale-1
Cuvier’s Beaked Whale-5
Bottlenose Dolphin- 41

I hope that some of you can join us on these trips over the next few
weeks. More information about our trips can be found on the Web at
http://www.patteson.com/.We also have an extensive collection of images
scanned from slides that I’ve shot on these trips which is worth a look
even if you can’t get offshore for a while. If you have any questions
that require a thoughtful answer, please call me at (252) 986-1363
before 10PM Eastern Time. If I’m not available please leave a phone
number (NOT e-mail address) where I can reach you.

Thanks,

Brian Patteson
Hatteras, NC
Brian@Patteson.com