Date: 11/9/25 7:35 pm From: Naresh Satyan via groups.io <naresh.satyan...> Subject: [LACoBirds] San Pedro channel trip report Nov 8
Hi all,
A small group of us went out on a 5 hr birding trip in the San Pedro channel out of Long Beach on Saturday Nov 8, on the zodiac Cetacea. We had high overcast conditions, 2-4 ft swells and light wind chop. We birded the San Pedro / Palos Verdes escarpment from the box canyon at San Pedro west to Point Vicente, then out to the 270 Bank, and took a mid-channel route back to Angel's Gate. We also carefully checked the length of the middle breakwater of the Los Angeles harbor on the way back to the dock.
There was a lot of feeding activity with scattered pods of common dolphins and a couple of humpback whales all along the escarpment, and this is where we had most of the bird life. There were a lot of pelicans and the expected four species of gulls (Western, California, Heermann's and Bonaparte's Gulls) -- we looked carefully, but didn't find any other gulls. We had a handful of Northern Fulmars, all sooty dark morphs, including a recently deceased bird floating on the water. Black-vented Shearwater numbers were very low -- this has been my experience in the channel for the second year in a row, and I understand the flocks of several thousands of birds are well to our south now. Sooty Shearwaters had departed, but a good number of Pink-footed Shearwaters were still lingering. These feeding flocks were attended by several Pomarine Jaegers, all well into primary molt, and we had a single Parasitic Jaeger.
The most surprising bird was a white-rumped Leach's Storm-Petrel on the 270 Bank -- a slightly unusual looking bird with a complete narrow white rump band with no dark down the center. Leach's Storm-Petrels are pretty rare in the San Pedro channel any time of the year, and I found no prior records on eBird in much of Southern California in November.
Red Phalaropes were around in decent numbers. We undoubtedly missed several birds in the swells and wind chop. Surprisingly, our total number of alcids was zero. Hopefully they will arrive as we get into the winter.
Along with the usual stuff on the breakwater, there were two Wandering Tattlers, and a whopping 63 Black Oystercatchers including several hatch-year birds. Presumably the high count was influenced by a very high tide that submerged much of their foraging habitat. We also had a messy-looking hybrid oystercatcher that has been on the breakwater for a few years now.
Marine mammals included scattered pods of common dolphins with many babies, two humpback whales, an elephant seal, California sea lions and harbor seals. A Mako shark executed a perfect breach right next to the boat at one point, seen by most people on the boat.
