PARTICIPANTS NEEDED For March 3(4) Hatteras Pelagic Trip

[Brian <patteson1@mindspring.com>]

Dear Carolinabirders,

If you did not read last week's posting about our succesful pelagic trip
from Hatteras on Feb. 18 and our just scheduled trip for next weekend,
March 3(4), here it is again because we NEED AT LEAST TEN MORE PEOPLE by
Wednesday to be able to run the trip.

"I just wanted to announce that we are  planning to run a third winter
pelagic trip from Hatteras during the weekend of March 3 and 4. Like the
two February trips that we have run here this year, it is scheduled for
Saturday with an obligatory weather date on Sunday, and the fee is
$95/person. It will be run aboard the 75=92 long Miss Hatteras and will
depart from Oden=92s Dock in Hatteras Village at 0630. We thought that it
would be a good idea to try to get out at least once more this winter to
document the good flight of Razorbills and Puffins into our waters off
the Outer Banks.

 If you did not read Harry LeGrand=92s recent post about Sunday=92s pelagi=
c
trip from Hatteras, we saw over 800 Razorbills on that trip and a new
record high count of at least 24 Atlantic Puffins on that trip as well.
Had the seas been a bit calmer, I suspect those numbers would have been
much higher. While we did not see any Dovekies on either of our trips
here this month, there is always a chance of seeing them in early March.
We did see a Common Murre on our trip here on Feb. 3, and I saw at least
two birds (in flight) which I thought were murres on Sunday=92s trip. With
the large numbers of Razorbills and puffins that we saw in a fairly
small area just inshore of the Gulf Stream, I think the conditions are
ripe for finding more murres off the Outer Banks. I have seen both
Common and Thick-billed Murres in similar conditions off Virginia and
Maryland in years past.

After not seeing any Great Skuas on Feb. 3, we had four encounters on
Sunday=92s trip. Over the course of running ten winter trips here since
1994, we have seen Great Skuas on seven of them, often three or more
birds on a trip. Aside from alcids, most of the other pelagic birds were
in low numbers, but we did see a flock of 60 Red Phalaropes, and we were
surprised to find a Black-capped Petrel several miles inshore of the
Gulf Stream. There were also hundreds of Bonaparte=92s Gulls offshore, and
we managed to find at least four Little Gulls among them.  An albino
Northern Gannet was a shocking sight when it came up the wake and passed
off the starboard side of the boat. The official list from Sundays trip
follows.

Razorbill   831
Atlantic Puffin   24
Black-capped Petrel   1
Northern Fulmar   3
 Great Skua   3
 Black-legged Kittiwake   1
 Red Phalarope   62
 Little Gull   4
 Lesser Black-backed Gull   14

 Common Dolphin   4
 Bottlenose Dolphin   54
 Humpback Whale   7
 whale sp   1
 Loggerhead Sea Turtle  1

Other seabirds that we have seen here on previous winter trips include
Yellow-nosed Albatross, Greater Shearwater, Sooty Shearwater, Manx
Shearwater, Audubon=92s Shearwater, Dovekie, and Bridled Tern. We have
also seen both Iceland and Glaucous Gulls on a number of these trips,
and while we haven=92t yet seen Thayer=92s Gull offshore here, at least
three individuals were at Cape Point on Saturday.

I hope that many of you can join us on the trip here on March 3(4).  In
my experience, puffins are usually late winter birds that linger until
early spring off Virginia and Maryland, so I am optimistic that we can
again find good numbers of them on this next trip."

Please let me know ASAP if you will be able to participate in the trip
on March 3(4) either via e-mail or by telephone at (252) 986-1363.

I WOULD ALSO LIKE TO ADD that we saw over 50 puffins on a trip from
Virginia Beach yesterday, as well as at least two Dovekies. We saw far
less Razorbills than we have seen from Hatteras this winter though,
making me think this might be the hotspot for large alcids, including
murres.

I hope that we can get enough folks to run this trip and see what's out
there.

Thanks,

Brian Patteson
Hatteras, NC
Brian@Patteson.com



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