David Mitford, Stuart
Pickering and I had a reasonable sea watch yesterday afternoon (Saturday 4th March 2006)
from Magic Pt in Maroubra (approx. 10km south of Sydney CBD). With the severe
weather present over recent days much further up the coast (particularly around
SE QLD), we thought there may have been a chance for some interesting tropical
sea birds making their way further south but this was not to be the case. Winds
around Maroubra were a light south-easterly with the seas fairly calm closer
inshore not driving many shearwaters within a km from shore apart from a few
feeding groups.
We did see a reasonably close Long-tailed Jaeger fly past, a good
number of Fleshy-footed Shearwaters and an adult breeding Caspian Tern (not regularly
seen from Magic Pt although regularly present just around the corner in Botany
Bay) were our sea bird highlights. However an even better highlight, was seeing
2 pods of FALSE KILLER WHALES (one pod of at least or 6 or 7 individuals and
another of at least 4 but probably even more than that) which hanged around for
a while. They appeared to be at times charging at their prey (being some
descent size fish) and at times leaping out of the water. A few Bottle-nosed
Dolphins were also present about the same time we were observing the False
Killer Whales. I do recall seeing at least 12 false Killer Whales with Graham
Turner from Magic Pt on 20/3/04.
A good close encounter with an adult Peregrine Falcon flying past at
eye level a few metres in front of us concluded a good afternoon at Maroubra
for David and I. We also heard a Lewin’s Rail calling on dusk at its
favourite location beside the drain at the southern end of Maroubra beach.
A list of sea birds species and the minimum numbers seen for the
afternoon from Magic Pt is as follows:
Fairy Penguin (2 heard calling)
Wedge-tailed Shearwater (500)
Fleshy-footed Shearwater (50)
Fluttering Shearwater (4)
Australasian Gannet (200)
Little Pied Cormorant (1)
Little Black Cormorant (2)
Pied Cormorant (1)
Great Cormorant (2)
Arctic Jaeger (3)
Pomarine Jaeger (50)
Long-tailed Jaeger (1)
Silver Gull (300)
Crested Tern (50)
Caspian Tern (1)
Edwin Vella
