Date: 3/1/25 3:57 am From: <lehman.paul...> via groups.io <lehman.paul...> Subject: [SanDiegoRegionBirding] Bird Festival Pelagic Trip, Feb 28th: offshore Vega Gull
The San Diego pelagic trip on 28 Feb as part of the San Diego Bird Festival visited the Nine-Mile Bank and waters off La Jolla and Mission Bay. There was a surface chop all day but otherwise conditions were reasonable. The number and variety of seabirds offshore was about as low as we've ever seen. The clear surprise of the trip was the infamous second-cycle Vega Gull found in a feeding group of gulls and pelicans some 8 miles west of Mission Bay. It then followed the boast eastward for another 1.9 miles to 6.1 miles off Mission Bay. This is the second time this bird, present since Oct, has been found well offshore on a pelagic trip--the other time on Jan 1st some 14 miles west of Point Loma! Totals for the day, once we were offshore, were:
Surf Scoter 4
Pomarine Jaeger 1
Scripps's Murrelet 19
Rhinoceros Auklet 19
Bonaparte's Gull 43
Heermann's Gull 6
Western Gull 300
California Gull 90
(American) Herring Gull 2
"VEGA" GULL 1 (initially 32.792, -117.393)
Royal Tern 4
Pacific Loon 1
Pink-footed Shearwater 3
Pelagic Cormorant 1
Brandt's Cormorant 65
Double-crested Cormorant 4
Brown Pelican 65
Also: Surfbird 30 (jetties)
--Paul Lehman, Dave Povey, Nancy Christensen, Alex Abela, Paul Mulholland, Nick Thorpe, San Diego
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