Sections
CalendarBoat: M.V. Contagious, skippered by Dale Wellham.
CONDITIONS
We started the day by pushing into a sloppy sea created by a solid 10-15 knots of south-easterly wind, making for a slightly slower journey out. The onshore breeze stayed with us all day, only dropping back by the time we'd decided to head back for port. Overall, pretty ideal conditions for seabirds really. We commenced the drift at -32.8421958 152.6439717 at 10:42, drifting very slowly due to the wind vs current situation, ending at -32.80863, 152.64986. Water temperature 20 degrees inshore and 23 degrees at the shelf.
ACTIVITY
Departed Nelson Bay public wharf at 7:38am returning by 3:58pm. No birds showed interest in the boat except for four Silver Gulls that randomly arrived and departed soon after. A couple of distant brown shearwaters went unidentified about half-way out, but not long afterwards, whilst stopping to check a small molly (which turned out to be our first Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross of the season) a small, pied bird was noticed about 100m behind the boat. The cry went out Cape Petrel! - it is quite amazing for the old timers on board how much excitement a Cape Petrel causes these days as they have become something of a novelty (they used to be a regular fixture on winter trips).
A few more albatross and some distant dark Pterodromas greeted us at the start of our drift, along with two very late-departing Wedge-tailed Shearwaters. It wasn't long before our first Wilson's Stormies entered the fray, and as the Pterodromas came into view they were mostly Solander's with a couple or Grey-faced mixed in before an intermediate Kermadec flew in and chased one of the Solander's around (our first June Kermadec). There was a turnover of Solander's Petrels happening, whilst an adult Campbell Albatross was our first customer. That bird was soon joined by an immature bird that went straight to the adult bird on the water and interacted for quite some time, almost as if they knew each other. In the end we had four Campbells around the boat at one time. We had a total of four Crested Terns foraging in the slick at one point, but the highlight was to be when a prion that was very obviously a whalebird flew in. Cameras went into overdrive and there were differing opinions on the identity of the bird, but eventually confirmed as an Antarctic. It was joined by Fairy soon after, whilst one more prion got away. A close-ish encounter with some humpback whales provided the only excitement on the return leg, with not a single bird following the boat for the entire journey.
Antarctic Prion. Photo: Allan Richardson
BIRDS
15 species were recorded outside of Port Stephens, but a count of five albatross is good for Port Stephens. Counts are totals for birds seen outside the heads (with the maximum number visible from the boat at one time in brackets) many are estimates. Taxonomy follows the BirdLife Australia Working List V3.
Wilson's Storm-petrel: 9 (3). Mostly pelagic, a couple seen on the way out.
Wedge-tailed Shearwater: 2 (2). Two very late-departing birds seen not far from the shelf break; our first June Wedgies.
Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross: 6 (2). Four adults and two juveniles.
Campbell Albatross: 4 (4). Two adults and two immature, all at the shelf.
Black-browed-type Albatross: 1. One unidentifiable bird.
Shy-type Albatross: 1. One bird that cruised past the stern late in the drift.
Buller's Albatross: 2 (1). One bird about halfway out and one at the shelf about midway through our drift.
Solander's (Providence) Petrel: 35 (3). Good numbers and evidence of a turnover of birds, also a few seen within the last few miles before the shelf break.
Grey-faced Petrel: 4 (1). All in pelagic waters.
Kermadec Petrel: 1. Intermediate morph bird that frustratingly turned away from its course towards the boat to chase a Solander's Petrel out of view.
Cape Petrel: 1. Lone bird seen randomly while we stopped to check our first molly for the day. Consistently a crowd-pleaser these days.
Fairy Prion: 1. This bird arrived at about the same time that the Antarctic went out of view, feeding in the slick like a storm-petrel.
Antarctic Prion: 1. Well-seen and very obviously different behaviour to the Fairy, tending to arc up in the air dynamically and rarely touching the water surface.
Prion sp. 1. One unidentifiable bird.
Australasian Gannet: 15 (3). All adults on the ocean (once we were back inside the port we saw some young birds).
Crested Tern: 14 (4). Mostly inshore but four birds at the shelf.
Silver Gull: 11 (4). Four birds followed the boat for a while on the outward leg.
MAMMALS
Short-beaked Common Dolphin: 20. A single pod on the inward journey was the only sign of oceanic dolphins all day.
Humpback Whale: 10. Mostly seen distantly except for a couple seen at close range about 3 miles from the heads on the inward leg.
FISH
Flying Fish. A few individuals seen.