Final Winter Pelagic (05-08Mar2021)

I had huge hopes for this past weekend's trip from Wanchese.  I am missing some birds that are very unlikely after the last winter pelagic.  Sometimes Brian will run a trip in December, but that is the exception and not the norm.  I was missing Great Skua, Northern Fulmar, Little Gull, Red Phalarope and either of the Murres.  The weather forecast was awesome with no rain and negligible winds.  I headed up Friday afternoon making it to Alligator NWR in time to take a drive through the refuge.

The Rough-legged Hawk was finally perched in a tree but like an idiot I flushed it before I could get my camera out.  I have seen many RLHAs but have never had a decent picture.

The morning turned out to be be more windy than forecasted but we went out none the less.

Little Gulls were hanging out just outside the inlet.  

Kate photographed 8 in one picture!

My camera must have been on the wrong settings because most of the pics were over-exposed.

Further out to sea we started picking up some Northern Fulmars.

Razorbills were plentiful within a couple miles of the inlet.

Dovekies too.

We motored out 30 miles to try and pick up some Puffins and instead were treated to some cool mammals and fish.

Hammerhead Shark

Common Dolphin - nice to see another species of dolphin as we mainly get Bottlenose in close.

Oddly enough the only Manx Shearwaters we saw were out in the Gulf Stream.

We picked up some activity near a fishing boat and hoped for shearwaters but ended up with gulls and fulmars.

Northern Fulmar partaking in some fish probably discarded by the fishing boat.

Mola Mola or Ocean Sunfish.

Loggerhead Sea Turtle

Atlantic Puffin - we finally got the puffin on the way back in.

Razorbill

Lesser Black-backed Gull - this LBBG had a really cool tail pattern as it was in plumage transition.

Northern Gannet

I wonder what the history of this old building is. It is on an island outside Wanchese harbor.  Looks haunted.

In the morning on the way home I took another drive through Alligator.

Belted Kingfisher

Red Wolf! I was not sure if it was a Red Wold or Coyote but the guy in the truck behind the wolf got out and had a telemetry rig so I asked him and he confirmed it was one of the few remaining Red Wolves on the refuge.  If you look closely on the picture, you can make out the red radio collar. The Coyotes are tagged too but with a different color.

Horned Lark - I stopped at a couple farm fields on the way home and finally found some Horned Larks I could photograph.

Back home I have been enjoying that nice time between when the weather warms up but before the hordes start hitting the beaches.

Common Eider - thankfully they finally took this species off the rare bird status in eBird.

House Finches are super common but I rarely photograph them, hence why it took so long to add one to my year list.

One nice evening I brought Melissa for a walk in CB State Park to look for owls and she promptly found a nest!

Great Horned Owl on nest.

John F recently wrote that he can tell the reliability of some eBird checklists on the coast based on reports of Common Grackles versus Boat-tailed.  I agree, but sometimes I also see large flocks of Common Grackles near the beach.  This particular morning I had a huge flock on a house at Wrightsville Beach.  Its easy to tell when the flock is huge and every bird is black. Boat-tailed flocks usually have one or two brown female types that give them away, not to mention they sound totally different.

Short-billed Dowitcher on the north end.  I also had a guy on the north end of WB sunning his anus one afternoon.  If you never heard of this phenomenon, here is an explanation.  

Perineum Sunning, also known as Butthole Tanning, refers to the practice of exposing one's anus to the sun for supposed health benefits. The practice has been attempted for several years, but went viral in 2019 following a post by Instagram user metaphysicalmeagan about the practice that attracted media attention.

I will spare you all a picture of that.