• Saturday 23rd June 2018 SOSSA PELAGIC TRIP, KIAMA, NSW, AUSTRALIA

     
    Published on 27-06-2018 07:31 AM
    Here's what was seen outside the harbour on the pelagic from Kiama on the MV Kato on Saturday 23 June 2018. The list uses the IOC Checklist v8.1 (Jan. 2018) for taxonomy, nomenclature & order of species. It gives fairly conservative numbers, which are estimates for the commoner species. There's also a map from Google Earth showing our route.

    Grey-backed Storm-Petrel

    Leaving Kiama Harbour at 07.40 hrs AEST, we travelled out in an ESE direction towards the shelf edge where we stopped in 230m+ waters at 34° 44’ 34” S; 151° 09’ 50” E, 28.9 km from the harbour, and began to chum and drift. The SE wind pushed us steadily 4.43 km further out into deeper waters, 09.33-11.28 hrs, as the banding team banded two Indian Ocean breeding Wandering Albatrosses, two Buller’s Albatrosses and caught a banded male Antipodean Albatross subspecies gibsoni. This bird had been first banded off Bellambi, north of Wollongong, on 11 August 1984, recaptured again off Bellambi in July 1986 and July 1988, before being caught on the breeding grounds for this subspecies on Adams Island in the Auckland Islands group, south of New Zealand, on 16 February 1997. It was caught again off Bellambi in July 2004 before being caught today, some 34 years after it was first banded. It appears to be a regular winter visitor to these waters off NSW. Before leaving this chumming spot we had to turn back and retrieve one of the banded Wanderers which had dislocated the carpal joint of one wing. This bird was taken on board and brought ashore for veterinary attention.


    Solander's Petrel

    The rate of our drift away from land meant that we could be pushed out so far as to make it difficult to return on time, so we moved closer to land, stopping next at 34° 44’ 54” S; 151° 05’ 52” E, 23.4 km from the harbour in shallower 160m+ shelf edge waters. Here, with the wind dropping, we drifted 530m south in the current as we chummed, 12.25-13.30 hrs, catching and banding a juvenile Southern Giant Petrel and two more Buller’s Albatrosses. With time running out, we set out back for shore, stopping briefly a couple of times to watch migrating Humpback Whales and catch one more Buller’s Albatross. We arrived back at the dock at 15.20 hrs.

    Sea conditions were rougher than forecast out at the shelf with choppy 1.5-2m waves, but these eased as the wind gradually dropped. Sea temperature was 19°.


    Oceanic Bottle-nosed Dolphin

    Highlights were the Grey-backed Storm Petrel, a rarity in these waters, and the 34+ yo Antipodean Albatross subspecies gibsoni.


    Species seen outside the harbour, maximum at any one time in brackets:

    063 Wilson's Storm Petrel - 2 (1)
    064 Grey-backed Storm Petrel - 1 (1)
    086 Wandering Albatross - 6+ (3) two caught and banded
    846-47 Antipodean Albatross - 3 (2) both antipodensis & gibsoni present; a banded male gibsoni caught
    088 Black-browed Albatross - 7+ (3)
    Black-browed/Campbell Albatross - 4 (2) immatures
    859 Campbell Albatross - 2 (2) an adult and an immature just starting to develop the characteristic pale iris
    091 Shy Albatross - 12+ (6) adults and immatures
    864 Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross - 5 (3) all adults
    931 Buller’s Albatross - 18+ (9) five birds caught & banded
    929 Southern Giant Petrel - 1 (1) juvenile caught & banded
    083 Fairy Prion - 30+ (10)
    971 Providence Petrel - 8+ (3)
    068 Fluttering Shearwater - 1+ (1)
    104 Australasian Gannet - 30+ (2) adults and juveniles
    125 Silver Gull - 5 (3)
    115 Greater Crested Tern - 15 (4)
    980 Brown Skua - 1 (1)

    We saw 3+ migrating Humpback Whales on our way out and pods of 2 and 6+ on our return. We were briefly joined by about 10 Common (Oceanic) Bottlenose Dolphins out at the shelf.


    Graham Barwell