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Posted by Toe on 21:48:53 09/17/12
On Sunday Carlos and I went on another pelagic trip off Ponce Inlet. These trips are run by the Marine Science Center at New Smyrna Beach and there is always much anticipation on what will turn up. This trip produced good birds as always, but no surprises. We had ~20 Black-capped Petrels, which is a good number anywhere considering their entire world population is estimated at 1,000-2,000 breeding pairs. As always they zip by the boat, never coming closer than 100 yards, so photo ops aren't always great. I managed one decent shot I think.
In addition to birds, we found a feeding group of Leatherback Turtles. Each way we looked we'd see one of those huge animals pop up. There must have been 8-10 of them that we could see. We also had a pod of 50 or more Atlantic Spotted Dolphin come by to play with the boat.
Our day's list:
Black-capped Petrel (~20)
Cory's Shearwater (50)
Great Shearwater
Audubon's Shearwater
Red-necked Phalarope (5)
Pomarine Jaeger (5)
Jaeger sp, (not much bigger than the Sooty Tern that chased it away. My vote: Long-tailed but too distant for positive ID)
Sooty Tern (50)
Common Tern (several flocks)
Black Tern (in flocks and singles)
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