From: Brad McKinney Date: Sun, 29 Sep 2013 19:24:26 GMT Trip report for South Padre Island pelagic, 28 September 2013 Challenging weather conditions, including choppy 4-6 foot seas and 20+ kt. winds, made a slow and rough journey out to deepwater. Due to recent storm activity in the Gulf of Mexico, there were few shrimp boats, and the few we came across held few birds, although we did have nice looks at Common Tern amongst the many Royal Terns on the way out. Unfavorable currents in the latter part of September pushed the blue oceanic waters well offshore, which we didn’t reach until 11:35 am when we were already on the 100-fathom curve. Despite all of this, we had a great group of birders and tireless leaders who pulled together to make this trip a good one. By the end of the day we managed a hard-earned five seabird species, including Cory’s (3) and Audubon’s Shearwaters, Bridled Tern (2) Masked Booby and two unidentified jaegers. A brief recap: At 7:45 am, we had a distant jaeger harassing a Royal Tern at the stern. With our prime objective being to get out to deepwater, we chose not to chase this bird but to continue east. A distant Magnificent Frigatebird was also seen early on, along with several groups of bottlenose dolphins. At 8:38 am we had our first Cory’s Shearwater gliding swiftly over the shallow continental shelf waters. Analysis of photos may determine the race of this bird as Mediterranean or Atlantic Cory’s. The vast majority of the Cory’s Shearwaters seen in summer and fall in the western Gulf of Mexico breed on several islands in the Mediterranean Sea and are sometimes referred to as Scolopi’s Shearwater. The link below is of the second Cory’s Shearwater, a Mediterranean Cory’s, seen just off the 100-fathom curve about 50 miles out. Close...
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