Share On the August 8th Texas Pelagic I had the good fortune to meet Chuck Sexton. He told me about the pelagic exploits of Sheritan Burr from 1976 to 1986. He just sent me a summary spreadsheet from Sheritan’s field notes of 32 “Offshore” fishing trips he went on from Port Aransas aboard the Scat Cat and Wharf Cat. Here is Chuck’s email describing the notes: “Gary, Just to whet your appetite, I’m attaching Sheriton Burr’s summary chart of pelagic and offshore sightings for trips out of Port Aransas from 1976 to 1986. This summarizes about 32 boat trips, many of which Sheriton made by himself (i.e. the only birder) on the Scat Cat*. However, several of these trips had multiple birders (always as half-priced “riders”) and he mentioned two chartered birding-only trips (Oct 1981 and Oct 1982). Somewhere in a folder I have the trip-by-trip summaries that he’d typed up and circulated to several of us, updated to about 1991. * Back in those days, Fisherman’s Wharf in Port Aransas would charge “riders” (i.e. non-fishing observers) half price (about $60) to join a fishing excursion. We typically occupied the upper deck on the Scat Cat or Wharf Cat, which would take fishermen out to the snapper banks and/or to some of the oil rigs offshore, but always on the shelf. It was always fun to bird on the way out, then watch the circus of 50 to 80 tangled, drunk, sleepy fishermen and their poles for a few hours, then enjoy the ride back to dock. Most of those were 8 to 10 hour trips, if I recall correctly. I don’t think we ever got out to the edge of the shelf except on one charted trip in about 1990 or so which is NOT included on this summary chart. You’ll notice that I had highlighted June on...
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