[CINC] Condor Express Sat April 7, 2012

Sun Apr 8 18:14:31 PDT 2012

9am trip 

1 Gray whale by the end of Goleta pier; a juvenile about 5-7 years old 

It was shy and didn't show much then it went to a little deeper water and
BREACHED 2x - full body out of the water!

Then close to campus point it Spyhopped in the kelp to check out the
"corner" right by where Gray Whales Count was watching

Bottlenose dolphins 8 + 3 + 2 - all headed east

A Harbor Seal swimming by the boat

Sea Lions swimming (and of course on and near the buoy)

Lots of birds on the morning trip; super calm; clear; no wind

Pacific Loon

Cassin's Auklet

Surf Scoter

DC and Pelagic Cormorants 

Flocks of Brandt's flying by

Common Murre

Western Grebes

Snowy Egret standing on the kelp

Great Blue Heron

Black Crown Night Heron

CA and Western Gulls

Pelicans

12pm trip

10  Bottlenose dolphins off Shoreline Park

We cruised toward Hope Ranch and then turned out toward islands until we got
a call from the Gray Whales Count folks and did a u-turn to go see the 1
Gray whale but it only snorkeled ; no photo PID opps ; you could see it just
below the surface and it would only poke its blowhole through surface to
catch a breath and no other action; we followed it to the Bacara and then
turned for home

Very few birds compared it AM trip

3pm trip

For this trip we headed straight toward deeper water to see what we could
find

Harbor Seals and Sea Lions 

We found 50 Commons that played with boat a while and thrilled the crowd -
then head toward shore near western Carpinteria and followed shore home

100's of Grebes floating off of Carpinteria in several groups

Off of Carpinteria  pier we saw 1 Gray whale in surf zone that we followed a
bit but it was pretty shy too with just snorkeling and quick breaths

Kevin Bailey

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://www.rain.org/pipermail/channel_islands_naturalist_corps/attachments/20120408/dbbb8a65/attachment-0001.html>