Last Saturday, I spent a good part of the day sea watching
from Magic Pt, Maroubra (about 10km south of the
Sydney CBD) and was also joined by David Mitford for a few hours that afternoon. The
winds were moderate south to south-easterly this time and produced good numbers
of sea birds, especially during the first 2 hours around mid-day. During that time,
hundreds of both Short-tailed and Wedge-tailed Shearwaters were seen traveling
south and into the wind, with the odd Sooty Shearwaters amongst them. However
after this time, the numbers of shearwaters appeared to have dropped off, while
on the other hand, the numbers of Pomarine Jaegers (as
on previous occasions) appeared to increase in numbers towards the end of the
afternoon.
No unusual seabirds were seen on this occasion, but a single
Arctic Jaeger was observed. There appears to have been fewer numbers of this
species seen this year from Magic Pt and I have seen more Long-tailed Jaegers
than Arctic Jaegers (at least 10:1) at this location in the past few months.
Also of interest were 2 White-faced Herons heading about a kilometre out to sea but in a slightly northerly direction.
I was also hoping to see some cetaceans as David Mitford saw a few False Killer Whales from
here a few days ago amongst 2 other mammal species (Common Dolphins and Seal). Graham Turner and I had good views of several
False Killers Whales about this time last year from Magic Pt, so I am wondering
if this is the best time of the year to see this species?
The species and minimum numbers of sea birds seen from
Magic Pt on Saturday afternoon were:
Fairy Penguin (1 heard calling below Magic Pt)
Wedge-tailed Shearwater (500)
Fleshy-footed Shearwater (5)
Short-tailed Shearwater (245)
Sooty Shearwater (2)
Fluttering Shearwater (1)
Australasian Gannet (108)
Little Black Cormorant (4)
Great Cormorant (2)
Pied Cormorant (4)
Arctic Jaeger (1)
Pomarine Jaeger (43)
Silver Gull (600)
Crested Tern (65)
Edwin Vella
