The American Princess put on another successful birding pelagic trip on Saturday, departing from Sheepshead Bay in Brooklyn at 6 AM, and this time staying out for all of daylight, coming back to the dock at 6 PM.
The ocean was a bit rolly, and so it was difficult to see alcids floating on the surface, but it was a fine day for birds on the wing. Notably, water temperatures were warmer than average closer to shore, and we were in 44 degree F water ~17 miles off of Sandy Hook, and eventually found water that was nearly 47 degrees F, only about 35 miles off Long Island. Those may not seem like big jumps from the inshore temperatures, but there we have seen a strong correlation between increases of just a degree and numbers of Dovekies off shore. And so it was on Saturday: after a few Dovekies here and there as we got farther from shore and incrementally warmer, we were all of a sudden swimming in Dovekies when we got about 25 miles off of Jones Beach and 44.5+ F. Eventually, when we were ~35 miles south of Fire Island, and the water temperature was over 46 F, you couldn't swing your binoculars around without hitting a Dovekie, and we had flocks of up to 30. Most birds were seen in flight, but we did see some dozens on the water. Aside from the *Dovekie* bonanza (we tallied in the *quadruple* *digits*), we also encountered no fewer than *10 Atlantic Puffins*, a *Northern Fulmar*, a smattering of *Razorbills* (especially closer to shore in the morning - very few in the "Dovekie zone") a gorgeous adult *Iceland Gull*, and a couple of *Lesser Black-backed Gulls*. Surprising to me was the paucity of Common Murres, with just two identified all day. Surely the sea state had something to do with that, but they clearly weren't present in numbers in the 20-30 miles from shore band (which we covered fairly well) where we have had consistent success with them in past years. When we were still within sight of land, we had 5-6 different whale sightings, but due to the chop we could only definitively identify two: one each of Fin Whale and Humpback Whale. Here is the eBird trip report with detailed checklists, total numbers, and photos from our day on the water: https://ebird.org/tripreport/104512 Good Birding -Doug Gochfeld. Brooklyn, NY. -------------------------------------------- Douglas Gochfeld. Brooklyn, NY. Field Guides Birding Tours https://www.instagram.com/douglasgochfeld/ https://fieldguides.com/guides/doug-gochfeld/ https://www.outbirding.com -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/nysbirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birding.aba.org/maillist/NY01 Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
