On Saturday Oct 1, we ran our annual fall pelagic trip with Island Packers from the Ventura Harbor. We had a great forecast and a nice setup of sea conditions so we left the harbor with a game plan and a sense of optimism. That didn't last very long after we heard radio chatter that the Navy was firing a missile at some point during the morning, which closed off most of the waters south of the Channel Islands. Our hopes that this exercise would be done by 0930 dragged on through the morning and we had to adjust our route with the severe limitations imposed upon us. It is tough to stay focused when the radio in the wheel house is blowing up with constant communication between the Navy and the fishing fleet; the latter of which was violating the boundaries of the closure so frequently that the launch had to be delayed again and again. With our hopes of visiting Santa Barbara Island and it's booby colony becoming more unrealistic by the minute, we adjusted and here is how the day went...
After leaving the harbor we started the trip with an unusual surprise when we found rafts of thousands of Black-vented Shearwaters sitting on the water right past the breakwaters. The birds must have been feeding all night as they were piled up on the water and not as skittish as they might normally be. We had great looks, which included several leucistic birds, and then moved on to Anacapa Island. The crossing was slow bird wise, but Anacapa provided our first thrill of the day after we found a Brown Booby and then a Masked Booby perched below the lighthouse on the east end of Anacapa. These two birds just sat there giving everyone on board great views.
Our original intention from here was to run west-southwest before eventually turning towards Santa Barbara Island. With the missile launch still pending the Navy told us we couldn't go south and we had to stay with a few miles of the islands. We adjusted and moved west on the south side of Anacapa and Santa Cruz. We were rewarded with nearly 30 Craveri's Murrelets behind Anacapa and as we headed west into Santa Barbara County waters we had great looks at a few close Ashy Storm-Petrels. This run was slow but we did have a few jaegers of all three species and the three expected species of shearwaters (Black-vented, Pink-footed, and Sooty) among other birds. We had hoped we would be cleared to move south somewhere along this route but it did not happen so we continued to the Santa Rosa Passage where we checked Bird Rock and found a Peregrine Falcon and a pair of Bald Eagles sitting on a midden on the adjacent part of Santa Cruz Island.
Moving into the Santa Cruz Canyon, we encountered some small flocks of Pink-footed Shearwaters that had other birds feeding with them and then somewhere off the east end of Santa Rosa Island, the day went haywire. Not long after finding Curtis Marantz his long-awaited Santa Barbara County Craveri's Murrelet, we had a few shearwaters in front of the boat when one of our sharp-eyed passengers said, "there is a white-headed Pink-footed in this flock." Linda Terrill said that I leapt off the deck at this point, but among a series of expletives flowing from my mouth were the two words I have only ever yelled once before in unison from a boat...STREAKED SHEARWATER!!!!!! Among a ton of out-of-control emotions and ensuing panic of birders, we just stopped the boat, started getting everyone on the bird, carefully evaluated our ID to make sure we weren't looking at a white-headed Pink-footed Shearwater, and then spent an extensive amount of time with this bird. Finding rare seabirds is often tricky business as some birds fly by the boat quickly or a bird flushes, never to be seen again. Many times only a few people on board see the very rare ones. However...Captain Joel Barrett managed the boat impeccably and everyone had incredible views of this mega rarity (Only the 20th for the state and the second off southern California). Although it flushed a few times, the low winds had the shearwaters settling back on the water so we had repeated looks at it. We quickly forgot about the travel restrictions imposed by the Navy which had ultimately and serendipitously led us to this bird. There it is...rare bird found, a boat full of satisfied birders, day is done...hardly!
The Navy pulled their restrictions, but we would not have time to head to SBI. We followed the shearwaters south along the eastern part of the Santa Rosa Flats and the number of birds increased ultimately revealing a few Buller's Shearwaters. A few birders got their life Streaked before their life Buller's...life is not fair. While still working the Streaked we found a Nazca Booby sitting on the water; our third booby of the day. We also had another interesting bird flash by that may have been a Wedge-tailed Shearwater. The winds were increasing so the birds were becoming more mobile. We did gather some photos of distant flocks on the water where we believed this bird briefly settled so we will see if we can find it after-the-fact. They were not very cooperative.
Our run south and then east into the deep waters of the Santa Cruz Basin continued to produce birds and we started finding storm-petrels including Black, Ashy, and Least. Our jaeger numbers were increasing and as we traversed the basin we had impressive numbers of Long-tailed Jaegers with decent numbers of Pomarines and a few Parasitics. Here and elsewhere starting at the Santa Rosa Passage, we also found a few South Polar Skuas. Along our run east we continued to encounter Craveri's Murrelets which were often clumped by pairs in loose groups of as many as 10-12 birds in view at a time. We will see what our eBird reveals, but we certainly had somewhere in the ballpark of 50-100 for the day. They were the most abundant alcid by far, but we did have a few Cassin's Auklets and Rhinoceros Auklets. The jaeger show continued with a few flocks chasing groups of Common Terns and Sabine's Gulls. Careful inspection of the tern flocks found us a few Arctic and Black Terns as well. The number of birds in the Santa Cruz Basin was awesome and our ride back was filled with jaegers, terns, shearwaters, murrelets, and phalaropes.

I joked that when life gives you lemons, you spike the lemonade with tequila and have the kind of day we ultimately had at sea. While we reflected that the day would have been great even without the Streaked Shearwater, we are not trading that one in. We will remember this one for a long time. Many thanks to Joel Barrett and Island Packers for supporting our pelagic trips and working with us to consistently provide great pelagic experiences. I also want to give a shout-out to our leaders who busted their butts all day...many thanks to Jon Feenstra, Peter Gaede, Hugh Ranson, Bob Schallmann, and Wes Fritz. Among the kind words I received as we wrapped up was sentiments from one very seasoned pelagic birder and dear friend who said she was impressed at how well people worked together and that there was a pleasant vibe on the boat throughout the day. One for the ages...
Dave Pereksta Ventura