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The 3 Hatteras trips over Memorial Day



I've gotten plenty of inquiries about the results of the Hatteras
pelagic trips from the past holiday weekend, based on my teaser
comments. I was expecting Brian Patteson to chime in either Tuesday or
Wednesday. He might be waiting on the condition of the Miss Hatteras
before making an announcement.

Sat., May 24 and Sun, May 25. We saw 17 species of true pelagic birds
each day! This is about as well as one can do off NC on a single trip.
We had the following species:
Black-capped Petrel
Sooty Shearwater
Cory's Shearwater
Greater Shearwater
Manx Shearwater (1-2 each day); scarce this late
Audubon's Shearwater
Wilson's Storm-Petrel
Band-rumped Storm-Petrel (a few)
Leach's Storm-Petrel (a very few)
White-tailed Tropicbird (one imm. on Sat.)
Red-billed Tropicbird (on imm. on Sun.), my lifer
Red-necked Phalarope
Pomarine Jaeger
Parasitic Jaeger (Sat. only)
Long-tailed Jaeger (Sun. only)
Roseate Tern (1 each day)  a great rarity on pelagic trips
Arctic Tern (great looks)
Bridled Tern 
Sooty Tern (15 or more each day; normally scarce now)

Also had 40 or more Clymene Dolphins on Sunday, very rare in NC.

The Red-billed was unfortunately a distant bird seen plunging to the
water, then getting up and heading away. We gave chase but to no avail.
I could see that it was a big tropicbird, and I've seen about 10
White-tailed, including the one on Saturday. By process of elimination,
I knew it was a Red-billed. Brian called it a Red-billed afterwards, so
there was confirmation. Some folks could see the large amount of black
in the primaries, and lack of shading on the mantle. But, the bulk of
the bird was what impressed me -- Ring-billed or Herring Gull (or
Caspian Tern) sized, versus Royal Tern or Laughing Gull size and bulk of
the smaller White-tailed. I'll want/need to get a better look on another
trip. We were all disappointed at not seeing any of the 3 rare gadfly
petrels on the two trips; all were seen off Manteo on Saturday. I need a
better look at Bermuda Petrel. We checked all the Gannets for Brown
Booby, but to no avail. And, we saw no South Polar Skuas.

About Monday's trip. I wasn't on the boat, and Derb Carter and I were
surprised to run into Paul Sykes and Bill Blakeslee at Bodie Island
around 11:30 on Monday. Turns out that there was an engine fire as the
boat was heading out, maybe 8 miles from the inlet. There was a lot of
smoke, and other boats came to the rescue. (This is second-hand info.
from Paul). Needless to say, there was "no" Monday trip. And, I have no
idea if the Miss Hatteras is fixed and ready to go this weekend. If you
are scheduled to go offshore this weekend, you might need to call,
e-mail, etc. Normally, a blown engine could be repaired (boats have two
engines, one as a back-up) within the week. I'm not sure I'd want to
head for Hatteras on Friday without knowing a bit more about the boat. 

-- 
Harry LeGrand
NC Natural Heritage Program
DENR   Office of Conservation and Community Affairs
1615 MSC
Raleigh, NC 27699-1615
(919) 715-8687 (work)
FAX: 919-715-3085
e-mail: harry.legrand@ncmail.net