A Mini-Pelagic out of Mini-Depoe Bay

Head-fake! Just when you think we're gonna start posting dispatches from our France trip, we hit you with a mini-pelagic instead. Thanks to Stephanie Hazen, who organized the outing, we were able to join a group of fellow Salem Auduboners heading out of Depoe Bay on zodiacs to get up close and personal with seabirds and Gray Whales.

Collectively, we were led by marine biologist Carrie Newell, owner of the Whale, Sea Life and Shark Museum, who studies Gray Whales and who's made important discoveries about their local feeding habits. Her dog joins her on the boat and barks whenever he smells a whale nearby. It's awesome. Our zodiac was captained by Captain Joe, who led us farther out to sea than the other boats, which allowed us to pick up some really excellent birds that the others didn't get to see.

These are our marina buddies. We spotted this Harbor Seal on our way out of the harbor.

And this Pelagic Cormorant came right up to the boat as we were docking on our way back in. It was easily just an arm's length away outside the zodiac.

The bay is the world's smallest navigable harbor (or so the claim goes). You would know it as the scene of the fishing trip in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. On the way out of (and back into) the harbor we passed dozens of Surfbirds and Black Turnstones, mostly looking drowsy.

Surfbirds and Black Turnstones

It wasn't long after we hit the open sea that the whales started popping up. One of the other zodiacs radioed in so we could zero in on the location, and in the process of getting the boat oriented we came alongside a Lion's Mane Jellyfish, which is among the largest jellyfish species, if not the largest altogether. As someone who's read the entire Sherlock Holmes canon more than once, I'm starstruck having now met the antagonist of "The Adventure of the Lion's Mane". (Sorry about the spoiler).

Lion's Mane Jellyfish

When we managed to get on a whale, the experience was a lot more intense than past sightings. For one thing, the zodiac brings you a lot closer to the level of the water than when you see them from a fishing boat. The boats are prohibited from approaching within less than 100 or 150 yards, but with an animal this large we certainly didn't feel like we were out in the nosebleed section.

Gray Whale

It was perfectly thrilling being as close as we were, and getting to see the entire tail fluke rise out of the water was the absolute best. Even the spray from the blowhole put on a show for us, turning into a rainbow for one spectacular moment.

Steller's Sea Lions were the only other mammals out there, hanging out on a buoy. Steller's Sea Lions tend to hang out farther from shore, so pelagic trips are the only time we really get to see them.

Steller's Sea Lions

Clusters of half a dozen or so Common Murres consisted of dads and their young, the fathers spending this time feeding the chicks out on the water, instead of back at the nest. Very occasionally, we chanced upon Marbled Murrelets, adorably tiny, and whose constant diving made it difficult to watch for any length of time.

Common Murre

Marbled Murrelet

The auklets were the particular specialty the zodiac we rode on. At first we started getting looks at Rhinoceros Auklets. A bit later, a Cassin's Auklet took off before we got a proper look. We weren't content to count it, as a would-be lifer, but fortunately, we were able to find another not long after.

Rhinoceros Auklet

So long, Cassin's Auklet

Our most numerous seabirds were the Sooty Shearwaters. From several places along the coast you can watch them migrate in tremendous numbers, but this was our first time getting out among them. I'd conservatively estimate we saw at least 50. You can see seven just in the photo below. Several of them came close to the boat, but none settled on the water.

Sooty Shearwaters

When we arrived at the museum before the trip out, we heard a Wrentit calling from some low trees up against the bridge. It came right out in the sun, and was way more cooperative than any Wrentits we've seen. Unfortunately, our cameras weren't ready, and we thought we'd blown our chance. Fortunately, it just happens to be a really friendly Wrentit, and there it was still singing to welcome us back to shore.

A sinister-looking Wrentit

From the harbor we traveled down to Hatfield Marine Science Center, but it was uncharacteristically slow. Aside from hundreds of Mew Gulls, about the only thing it had going for it were the Least and Western Sandpipers along the shore.

Least Sandpipers

Western Sandpipers

This happened to be the same day that Dave Irons discovered Oregon's fourth Yellow-throated Vireo, just a few miles up Hwy 101. The sighting was a few hours old by the time we got there, and we ran into a few folks who had been hanging around without any luck. We gave it a go, but apparently weren't patient enough -- it was seen later that day, and everyday since. C'est la vie (that's a teaser for the next post).

Shorebird Calisthenics, the Seattle Skyline, and a Vigorously Bathing Puffin

Over Labor Day weekend we traveled north to Seattle for our first visit. Mostly, we hit the tourist traps (how could we not?), which brought us to the top of the Space Needle, as well as to the EMP and Chihuly museums. We tried to bird a bit during a short boat voyage out on the Puget Sound, but our main target was Orca. While we weren't lucky enough to find any this trip (ample reason for coming back again), but we were treated to several Caspian Terns and a handful of Osprey, the original Seahawks.

Heermann's Gull

Our other must-see destination was the Seattle Aquarium, which, along with lots of other great exhibits on creatures of the Sound, has a small but lively area dedicated just to seabirds. Inhabitants included auklets, murres, and guillemots, but it was a Tufted Puffin that stole the show with its "vigorous bathing," as Maureen described it.

Tufted Puffin

We didn't make a serious effort to bird until Monday morning, and all signs indicated that Discovery Park was THE place to be. The park is huge, and if we'd had all day to explore I'm sure we could have turned up some great stuff. Unfortunately, we squandered what little time we had just getting our bearings, and trying to find any trails that would take us out to the water so we could do some serious shorebirding. We'll certainly have to try Discovery again on our next visit, but looking over eBird reports before we left town, it was clear we needed to make one last stop.

Steller's Jay

We don't seem to have any trouble turning up small numbers of Black Turnstones from time to time, but never more than a dozen. It's proved more challenging for us to see Surfbirds well, and in fact we'd only ever seen one, and it had been exactly a year and a day earlier. Now we were faced with possibly seeing 50 turnstones and nearly 100(!) Surfbirds. Needless to say, we were sold on the need to make a little detour, but how good a look could we actually get?

Surfbird

Black Turnstone

Pretty damn good, it turns out. We arrived at Don Armeni Boat Ramp in the late afternoon, and lugged our gear up onto the sidewalk. Just as we were deciding whether to turn left or right, we saw a couple of Black Turnstone a few feet away, directly in front of us. And there was a Surfbird. The three of them flew off a little ways, and we worried they were about to leave us for good. On the contrary, they were leading us directly to the motherlode.

There were easily 30 of each, lazing on the rocks, peacefully intermingled excepting the occasional squabble. We were set up along the rim of the Puget Sound, and directly across the water from us was the entire Seattle skyline. So our last view of the city was ripped straight from a postcard, and our last memory was of hanging out with scores of awesome shorebirds. Not bad for a first visit.

And now for some SHOREBIRD CALISTHENICS