The San Diego pelagic trip on Saturday, September 26, aboard “Legacy” out of Seaforth Landing and sponsored by Buena Vista Audubon Society was highlighted by boobies and storm-petrels. A cooperative Red-footed Booby circled the boat time and time again over a distance of over four miles some 5-1/4 to 9-3/4 miles off Mission Bay and Point Loma, a young Masked/Nazca booby was roosting at the end of the Mission Bay jetty as we departed in the morning, and a Cocos Booby was off Point Loma. A good total of 240 Least Storm-Petrels (scattered, but mostly at the 30-Mile Bank, but also as close as barely over a mile or two from shore), plus moderate numbers of Leach’s (18+). Somewhat surprising were the Great Blue Heron over the San Diego Trough and the Merlin out at “The Corner,” some 33-1/3 miles offshore.
Offshore totals for the trip were as follows:
- Red-necked Phalarope 200
- Red Phalarope 6
- Pomarine Jaeger 2
- Parasitic Jaeger 5
- jaeger sp. 2
- Cassin’s Auklet 1
- Sabine’s Gull 4
- Heermann’s Gull 4
- Western Gull 300
- California Gull 2
- Common Tern 10
- Elegant Tern 4 (low)
- loon sp. 1
- Leach’s Storm-Petrel 18
- Black Storm-Petrel 105
- Least Storm-Petrel 240
- Sooty Shearwater 1
- Pink-footed Shearwater 13
- Black-vented Shearwater 700
- Masked/Nazca Booby 1
- Cocos Booby 1
- Red-footed Booby 1
- Brandt’s Cormorant 3
- Brown Pelican 5
- Great Blue Heron 1
- Merlin 1
- Brown-headed Cowbird 1
- Yellow-rumped Warbler 1
- Also: Hammerhead Shark, N. Elephant Seal, Calif. Flying Fish, Mola-Mola, Pelagic Red Crabs
Paul Lehman, Bruce Rideout, Dan Jehl, Nick Barber, Dan King, Paul Mulholland, Nick Thorpe, Patti & Sally, San Diego
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