On Saturday 3.2.01 the strong to gale force north east winds provided some
land based tropical seabirding in Sydney.
Two juvenile Sooty Terns were taken into care at Taronga Zoo brought in from
Bondi. David Mitford found an exhausted adult with a broken leg at Mistral
Point, Maroubra. He had seen up to 8 Sooty Terns, a Long-tailed Jaeger and
two Buller's Shearwaters on an afternoon seawatch from this location on
2.2.01.
I arranged to meet him after work and collect the tern. We seawatched from
Mistral Point. David had seen a couple more Sooty Terns including a juvenile
sitting on the rocks unfortunately flushed by kids 10 minutes before I
arrived.
>From 1540-1900 we recorded
Grey Tern: single beating into wind first sighted by DM at 1735. It was
several hundred metres offshore and took me along time to locate but it kept
getting pushed towards us. When I finally picked it up in the scope it was
quickly identified as a Grey Tern by its diminutive size and uniformally
pale blue grey upperparts and head and paler appearing underparts. It was
watched for about five minutes until it turned into the wind and was quickly
lost against the sea. This was a new bird for David and a County tick for
me.
Sooty Tern: an adult and juvenile flew by very close in at 1710 and we saw
two distant adults shortly after.
Long-tailed Jaeger: adult type molting into summer plumage complete with two
long central tail streamers. The tern like flight, blue grey upperparts and
prominent white outer primary shaft and reasonably close distance allowed us
to be certain of this bird. We had another possible sitting on the water
being lost to view in the heavy swell.
Also seen Flesh-footed Shearwater (1), Sooty Shearwater (1), Short-tailed
Shearwater (2), Wedge-tailed Shearwater (500-1000), Aust Gannet (1 per DM),
Little Black Cormorant (1), Pomarine Jaeger (2), Arctic Jaeger (3), Silver
Gull and Crested Tern.
On the previous Saturday pelagic (27.1.01) off Wollongong we had logged
30-40 Sooty Terns, 1 Long-tailed Jaeger and 1 Tahiti Petrel.
There should be an excellent chance for tropical seabirds on this Saturday's
pelagic off Sydney.
Good birding
Dion
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