Here's the text generator I used to make the title. cooltext.com Does this text ruin the majestic clean power of the pelican photo combined with the alluring effect of the deep blue glowing text? Yes? I'll try and make it smaller and smaller and smaller now you can't read it haha
Expectations vs. Reality
Expectation: You will see a Code 7 on your trip. But if you don't, you'll probably see a bunch of Code 2s, anyway.
Reality:
If you're going on a pelagic trip in Southern California, you'll see Black-vented Shearwaters which are from some unfathomable, inexplicable reason listed as Code 2s on the ABA list, right next to Olive-backed Pipit, a bird that has only been recorded in the lower 48 4 freaking times.The Ivory-billed Woodpecker has been recorded a couple more hundred times than that. Alaska, you're so unfair.
Guess what? Black-vented Shearwater butt.
Also, you can see Black-vented Shearwaters from shore.
Pelagic trips are like Russian Roulette. Don't expect to get anything 100%, unless you're in Southern California in the winter. Then you can expect Black-vented Shearwaters. LOTS.
Somehow, I missed seeing any jaegers, fulmars, or albatrosses on my first pelagic trip. Someone thought they spotted a fulmar near an oil rig, but from the views I had with 8X binoculars it could have been a magical pink flying bigfoot (That line "it could have been bigfoot for all I know" is way too cliche in the birding world. I had to stir it up a bit).
Expectation: There are many birds out in the ocean.
Reality: There are lots of gulls in the ocean, and Black-vented Shearwaters if you're in the right place in winter. That's if you chum (toss out food for birds). As soon as you run out of buttered popcorn and stale bread to give gulls diarrhea with, the number of birds goes down faster than a pelagic ship in a storm. Of course, on the pelagic trip I went on we ran out of chum right before a Little Gull showed up.
Have you seen enough pictures of Black-vented Shearwaters yet?
Expectation: You will see many lifers, if it's your first time.
Reality: You will see more than many lifers. You will see enough lifers to make yourself feel like a beginner for the rest of the month. Like I said though, pelagic trips are games of Russian Roulette. The predictability of getting a large set of expected birds is similar to the probability that the ABA checklists coding and taxonomy will one day be fixed to make sense (I could go on and on...).
Poop-pocalypse 2015? No, just a whole lot of chumming.
One year there could be thousands of Ancient Murrelets moving down the coast. The next year Ancient Murrelets down in Southern California would be a myth unheard of by most birders except those legendary old-timers that went on the previous year's pelagic trip.
You know shiz's gone down when you can see Ancient Murrelets swimming ten feet from the harbor. Keep in mind that this is a species I tried to scope out five miles from shore in Central CA, while this dandy cute fellow was swimming ten feet from dry land back in Southern CA. Argh.
Expectation: Shearwaters are big and cool.
Reality: If gulls are the buff guys that work out at the gym, shearwaters are the little skinny nerd birds (see what I did there??) that everyone makes fun of for being undersized.
Expectation: There will be alcids.
I thought that was a loose feather at first, but no, that little bump is the horn of a Rhinoceros Auklet.
If birds had to pass a flight safety test and get a license, murrelets and auklets would be forever stuck in the water. They provide the number one entertainment for slightly sleepy bird-starved pelagic birders. Watch their attempts to lift off closely.
None other than the famous Common Murre, which are considerably better-looking than most other murres but are trashed upon because of their name.
Scripp's Murrelet, which may or may not exist depending on how old your field guide is.
Expectation: It's easy to take photos of flying shearwaters.
Reality: Good luck on that one.
Expectations: Identification is a pain!
Reality: Your trip leaders identify every single bird before you even see them, so identification is one of the least of your problems. Identification improvement? Definitely harder. Me? I'm still trying to differentiate between distant Northern Fulmars and magical pink flying bigfoots.
At least I can identify Brown Boobies.
Here is an oversharpened Brown Booby. Revel in its oil-rig-lantern glory.
Adult Brown Boobies are much more attractive, but have poor aesthetic choices when it comes to perching places.
There was nowhere else to post this Red Phalarope, so I inserted it here.
Expectations: You might get
Reality: Red-necked Grebe manages to be reported in the relatively isolated-from-ocean harbor hours before we go there and then, it suddenly disappears.
Happy Pelagic Birding (and a very late new year!)
Chiccadee
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