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Posted by Trey Mitchell on 00:27:08 10/15/05
Today I went on another birding adventure with Toe expecting to see at least
several new pelagic species on an offshore trip.
Started the day 4am packing lunch and then hurrying to Toe's by 4:30 am.
There was quite a bit of preparation getting the boat and launching by 6:30am.
We planned to mainly bird, but also catch a few fish along the way. Toe
through out his cast net and caught about 40 lbs of live bait in one cast. Truly
amazing!
Off to Fowey Light House to see what is there before heading out to deeper
water and prized pelagic.
At Fowey we saw 25 Brown Booby and about the same number of Cormorants.
25 Booby
Then we searched along what weed lines we found for pelagics. We searched for
hours only seeing a few Royal Tern and an Osprey and a couple of egret about 7-8
miles offshore.
Finally we Toe spotted something different, it was a Jaeger. We chased the bird
and we both got good looks and were certain that it was a Pomarine Jaeger. I was
unable to get any photos of the bird because we were going about 25 knots and
the boat was bouncing like crazy. I tried to snap a few photos, but missed
completely or the image was so blurred they were unusable.
Although we were happy with the find, we were both disappointed not getting
photos and not seeing much else. To top it off we caught no fish either.
We were almost back to shore when we saw another pelagic and pursed the bird
which was a bit more cooperative. This time we got great looks and OK photos. It
was another Jaeger. This time it appeared to be a Parasitic Jaeger. We debated
the idea all the way home knowing that Parasitic Jaegers aren't seen nearly as
frequently in our area. To make it a bit more difficult the bird was an
immature.
After analyzing the photos and checking with both Larry Manfredi and John Boyd
for their opinion we have concluded that the bird was a Parasitic Jaeger.
Take a look at the photos and if you have any input please let me know.
BTW we saw another 12-15 Brown Booby in flight to finish our trip.
Paul, we missed having you with us. As you would say, "Life is good". Two
more life bird for me. :)
Thanks Toe for another successful trip.
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