For the past three days the east coast of Florida has been getting very large numbers of Greater Shearwaters from shore.  On Thursday there were over 400 Greaters seen along with 30 Cory’s and 4 Audubon’s in a little over an hour from Sebastian Inlet.  A Band-rumped Storm-petrel and Brown Booby were also present.  The next day there were fewer birds around, only 6 Greaters and 2 Cory’s, but three Brown Boobies and a Wilson’s Storm-petrel.  A dead bird was found at Coconut Point. 

There were a few more birds around today up and down the beach.  At my first stop, Coconut Point, there was a Greater Shearwater sitting close to shore in the ocean.  I threw my binoculars and cell phone in the car and returned to dive into the water to try and catch the bird.  After finally making it past where the waves break, I made it out to the bird and realized that it would be too hard to pick up and swim back to shore with.  Instead tried pushing the exhausted bird to shore, but gave up after a while and returned to shore exhausted myself.  After a while the bird was pushed onto shore by a few large waves and the bird slipped through my hands a few times and was picked up by a fisherman who saw my failed attempts to catch the bird.  Once in my hands I could feel the birds heart racing as it nervously tried to free itself.  While this was going on I explained to the fisherman what was happening, how all of these birds are exhausted and washing up on shore and he seemed interested in the bird.  I took it to a local wildlife hospital where some turtle researchers were bringing some more shearwaters in.   On my way home I found five Greaters and two Cory’s as well as a healthy population of Least Terns with young and a group of 18 Black Skimmers.

Greater Shearwater found at Coconut Point

Greater Shearwater at Coconut Point

Greater Shearwater at Eau Gallie Causeway and A1A

Cory’s Shearwater near the same location

Here is a report written by Bob Wallace:

Yesterday Mike "One Eye" Brothers, Roberto "Toe" Torres, Trey "Trey" Mitchell and Andy "the Graduate" Bankert joined Bob Wallace on his  31′ Contender "The Banging Bitch", and ran 105 nm off of Ponce Inlet in search of tuna and pterodromas.  Andy was at 325 in his attempt to break David Simpson’s FL Big Year total of 365, and needed some pelagic species for his list.  Weather conditions were perfect, after 3 weeks of 15-30 knot winds, with a light W wind following us out, and then a light SE breeze creating following seas on the way home, which is about as good as it could get.  Not much air to get the shearwaters aloft, but much more comfortable than banging into a head sea both directions!

    We released a baby Hawksbill from the Ponce Marine  Institute at the western edge of the Gulf Stream, to help our turtle karma.  Not long afterwards we found the first pelagics, a Leach’s and then a Band-rumped Storm Petrel, and the first Black-capped Petrel of the day, at about 60 nm offshore.  Once we passed the eastern edge of the stream at 78nm off, we found the first flock of Sooty Terns on radar, with a Greater and Audubons Shearwater underneath.  We kept working east, finding several more Black-caps, in the 85-95nm range, and eventually found a large flock of Sooties, with 2 Brown Noddies, an Audubons and a BCPE, over tuna.  We landed 2 Skipjack, but no Yellowfins.  Perhaps the very strong winds from the West over the last week had pushed the yellowfins out much deeper, but we were unable to find them.  There were not many flocks at all compared to earlier in May, or my experience in June and July from previous years.

    On our run home, we saw a Band-rump at about 60nm, and put out a chum slick, and within 5 minutes had Band-rumps, Wilsons and Leach’s in the slick.  What is the density of these species in apparently a vacant ocean, that they appear so quickly with the scent of the oil?

    We encountered 1 more BRSP at only 20nm offshore, and a late juvenile Gannet.

    Andy added 4 year birds, but we never found a Tropicbird for him.

    Species totals:

    Black-capped Petrel – 6

    Audubon’s Shearwater – 5

    Greater Shearwater – 1

    Leach’s Storm-Petrel – 2

    Wilson’s Storm-Petrel – 6

    Band-rumped Storm-Petrel – 8

    Gannet – 1

    Sooty Tern – 150+

    Bridled Tern – 6

    Brown Noddy – 2

Over the past week Viera has had White-rumped, Stilt, and Semipalmated Sandpiper, Short-billed Dowitcher, Black-necked Stilts with young, Crested Caracara, Blue-winged Teal, Ring-necked Duck, Least Bittern and Purple Gallinule. 

White-rumped and Semipalmated Sandpipers

White-rumped Sandpiper