With 2005 drawing to a close, Ryan and I decided there would be no better way to finish our best birding year to date than with a winter pelagic on the Atlantic with See Life Paulagics in late December. While the possibilities for adding new species like Northern Fulmar, Great Skua, Dovekie, Thick-billed Murre, and Atlantic Puffin to our year lists were remote, they certainly were enticing nonetheless. Even if said species were not to be observed, it was going to be a fun time out on the ocean. In 2005 I spent more time than ever before in my pursuit of pelagic species with a total of 7 CA pelagics taken, and this one out of NJ. This was also to be Ryan’s first official pelagic (we had done whale-watch pelagics before), so it seemed like the perfect way to end an incredible year of birding and travel. Unfortunately, the weather had different ideas for the definition of perfect…

Pulling into the Belmar Motor Lodge (left) the night before the pelagic, the light rain and whipping winds (gusts to 30mph) suggested the following day’s sea conditions were going to be less than ideal. Fortunately, the temperatures were going to remain fairly warm with day time temps in the upper 40’s. If a mid-winter pelagic trip was going to have nasty weather, at least it wasn’t going to be cold! The main concern for Ryan and I however was the chance the trip could be canceled due to high seas. I personally would rather deal with large waves than to drive on the Garden State for no reason.

Nevertheless, I tried putting ideas of bad weather behind me, and having arrived at the hotel several hours before Ryan, I decided to use my free time to comb over the finer points of identifying murres in my field guide, and to sneak in a quick late-night nap. But before I knew it Ryan had pulled up and we were discussing details of the next day’s trip. With little sleep the night before for myself, and a long day of driving for the both of us we decided to get some sleep and rest up for the next day’s adventure.

Waking up across the street from the dock was a huge bonus for us, and allowed us some time to stop at the coffee shop (left) for some warm beverages before walking over to the boat. With a large group of people gathered around, everybody anxiously checked in, and by 7:30am we were all aboard the boat, ready to get our trip underway. The skies were relatively clear, and conditions were breezy, but how were the waves? While many people huddled into the warm cabin, Ryan and I decided to get our trip started A.S.A.P.! We walked to the bow of the boat to see what could be found while we were still secured to the dock. A few minutes of scanning with our bins produced several flocks of BUFFLEHEAD, RED-BREASTED MERGANSERS, and BRANT, including this distant flock located directly across from us (below).

We soon unhooked, and 15 minutes and several draw bridges later we were out of the harbor, and onto the Atlantic Ocean just off the coast of NJ. Despite the high winds, sea conditions were not as rough as we had expected! They were certainly less than ideal, not allowing us to get far offshore for the majority of our targets, but at least we were out.

Like all good pelagics, once underway the crew quickly got set on cutting fish up for chum (below). This is an essential part of any ocean going birding experience. The cut up fish is thrown overboard, drawing gulls in which follow the boat looking for handouts. Other sea going birds such as gannets, shearwaters, jaegers, etc. that normally don’t follow boats will see all the commotion from the gulls and investigate, allowing birders a closer look, in theory. And as one can see from the following picture, it isn’t too hard to get the gulls to follow.

However, these gulls remained the closest birds sighted for most of the day, which wasn’t all bad *see later*. Even though we couldn’t get offshore, we did see lots of birds while we cruised only a few miles out, including: flyby COMMON and RED-THROATED LOONS, LONG-TAILED DUCKS, and BLACK, SURF, and WHITE-WINGED SCOTERS. Several flocks of flyby BONAPARTE’S GULLS were also fun to look at, but produced no Little Gulls in tow. Sad to say this was shaping up to be a slow day. But Ryan and I made the best of it, often filling slow moments with talk about our previous cross-country trip we completed just a month before.

Taking breaks for food, and joking around, several hours of the trip had gone by quickly and the majority of commotion on the boat was brought about by distant sightings of RAZORBILLS. While this was a bird Ryan and I had already observed in the first days of ‘05, we still took delight in seeing these wonderful alcids zipping by, and by the day’s end, with a little patience, we did see at least one or two individuals close up, periodically diving. Another good bird of note in the late day hours were NORTHERN GANNETS (below) investigating the boat, and the chum it gave out in NY waters.

Still, the most interesting bird of the day, and one of the last ones we observed was a white-winged gull that I had noticed following the boat circling around the bow with the other gulls looking for chum. By the time I had gotten Ryan on the bird it had flown from the bow back towards the stern. Ryan and I quickly gave foot, but when we finally relocated the bird, one of the boat’s spotters called out “GLAUCOUS GULL”. DANG, beat me to it. Well, as the bird circled around and landed close to the boat, something was slightly different about the bird that didn’t add up quite right to a straight up Glaucous Gull. Fortunately, Angus Wilson, one of the spotters on board had a camera and was able to snap some pictures and post them to the web (Photos). Recent discussion of the bird seems to indicate that it is a GLAUCOUS GULL x HERRING GULL hybrid (NELSON’S GULL). I highly recommend looking at the photos to check out this puzzling, but beautiful bird, and to read into why this bird’s ID was subject to question.

The last species to be observed this day was a lone Iceland Gull that followed the boat at a great distance. With our chum gone, passengers tried throwing out animal crackers, bread, even sandwiches in hopes the gull would come closer. Unfortunately for many people on board, it did not.

Soon after the Iceland Gull, and 8 hours after Ryan and I departed shore along with 30 other individuals we arrived back in Belmar at the dock. After stepping back onto dry land we walked back to our vehicles and got ready for our drives home (below).

We joked about the lack of new birds to our year lists, but took it in stride. We even tried a last ditch-effort looking at nearby gulls for a Lesser Black-backed, but had no luck. It was time to head home. Ryan and I shook hands as usual when we depart, and within a few moments I was back on the Garden State Parkway heading north- heading north towards home, and heading north towards a new year.

~Chad

For more pictures from this trip, please visit our Belmar photo set on flickr.com.