Victoria's "Mini-Pelagic" Take 1

There has to be a special kind of insanity associated with standing on the bow of the MV Coho, Port Angeles bound, in the driving snow, rain, and wind. Yet there I was, traveling both directions, in temperatures that could charitably be called freezing.

I boarded the Coho for the 10:30am sailing on Saturday with visions of Cassin's Auklet and Short-tailed Shearwater dancing through my head, as February is part of the right season for these two species, along with a couple of others, and the Victoria-Port Angeles trip presents one of the best ways to find them.

As I expected, the birds were scarce. One of the beauties of a winter pelagic or "mini-pelagic" is that the birds are few and far between, but there is a greater chance of something special. Through the wind and waves, I caught sight of the occasional Common Murre and Pigeon Guillemot, most in clean breeding plumage. As the boat crossed the border I finally lost all feeling in my face, and three Ancient Murrelets flew by, followed by more murres, guillemots, and a couple of Rhinoceros Auklets. Port Angeles Harbour was teeming with waterbirds of all varieties - Red-necked Grebes (one in full breeding plumage), loons, Long-tailed Ducks, goldeneyes, scoters, and cormorants as far as the eye could see!

There is not much to do in Port Angeles, even with only two hours to fill before the return trip (four hours in summer). A little exploring for lunch, and I lucked upon Peaks Brew Pub, which doesn't look like much from the outside, doesn't look like much from the inside, but has dynamite burgers and a great selection of microbrews.

The return to Victoria was a little milder than the first crossing, with flat water all the way out to the border, and wind marking the return into Canadian waters. On the return trip, I did catch sight of a single Cassin's Auklet alongside the boat. A quick check of the GPS revealed what I had feared, that we were still officially in the US. eBird tells me it is a new bird for my Clallam County list (I didn't even know I had one), so it wasn't a total loss.

Coming into Port Angeles

The 90 minute "mini-pelagic" crossing aboard the Coho is a great trip from Victoria (in season), and one that a good number of local birders take part in every year. This trip turns up great birds at appropriate times, such as Sooty, Pink-footed, and Short-tailed Shearwater, Fork-tailed Storm-Petrel, alcids, jaegers, and the occasional Brown Pelican, to name a few. This is a trip that I plan on taking "a few" more times this year, just to see what else might be out there. For their schedule and rates, check out www.cohoferry.com.

Burger and a Buteo

The recent weather has cancelled or postponed a lot of good birding. In fact, the one brief window of great weather happened to be on Friday, mid-day, when I was scheduled for a lunch meeting (sometimes work does take priority).

The lunch meeting took me to Crossroads Bar and Grill at Colwood Corners. As I met my appointment in the parking lot, I noticed a shape passing over. When I looked up, I almost fell over, and must have let out a string of words I can't repeat here, as my companion jumped a little, before I managed to blurt out "Holy #(*$#%, a Swainson's Hawk! My companion, not being a birder, looked at me blankly as I jumped up and down in the parking lot, trying to free my blackberry from it's holster to take a picture. It was not to be, as the bird disappeared behind some trees and out of sight before I could snap a shot. The pale wing linings and belly were clearly visible, as were the dark flight feathers, dark head, white chin, and barred tail with a wider terminal band. The bird had no black/dark on the wrists or leading edge of the wings.

There has been some some speculation that this bird, despite the lack of jesses, could be an escaped falconers bird, something I will be attempting to find out in the coming week.

If a wild bird, this would be the earliest British Columbia record by 10 days, excluding four historical Christmas Bird Count records. The other earliest record was a single bird seen in the 70's on March 7, on Saltspring Island (Birds of BC). There are a number of winter records for this species from surrounding states/provinces, and this year 2 individuals have spent the winter in North Carolina, where it is a less than annual vagrant.

Another one of the great questions of birding, and hopefully this bird can be relocated and verified as a wild one.

Hidden Gems in Victoria's Book Stores

It's too nasty out to resume my quest, so only on my second post, I will diverge from twitching already.

I was down at Russell Books (www.russellbooks.com) on Fort St last week, and scored a couple of great finds. The first is a paperback called "The Big Twitch" by Sean Dooley, which is an entertaining story about an Australian Big Year. For six bucks, not bad.

The second book is the gem, a hardcover 1979 copy of Birds of South Africa. From a collectible point of view, next to useless (for reasons described below), which is what attracted me to it in the first place. Aside from being a field guide to a place I dream of going, the cover page has one of those "with love from..." inscriptions, which makes it more than just a field guide. The colour plates are nice, reminding me of the plates from the old Peterson hardcover that was the start of my own bird book collection, but beside each plate is the legend, and beside the legends, the original owner has jotted down notes on where he saw what birds, little "11/03/79 - Kruger" type notations on many of the pages. To me, this is the prize. I have a piece of someone's birding history, and can follow along on his adventures with the turn of every page. I also paid six bucks for this beauty. What a score!

Victoria has a number of great book stores, and most of them have treasures like this hidden within. Also, don't discount out of the way places - my current best find was "Birds of Washington State" by W.L. Dawson, a two volume, limited print B.C. edition, with full page colour plates by Maj. Allan Brooks, released in 1909. This was hiding at Gallowglass Books in Duncan.

Get out and check them out, just leave a couple treasures for me (and let me know if you find a stash of A.C. Bent Life Histories, I'm still missing a few)!



Anyway, back to dreaming of birding!

Better Late Than Never.....

This blogging thing really is a lot easier than I thought it would be, so it is better to start now than not to start at all. Hopefully, this blog will take a bit more shape and get a bit better looking as I get the hang of it.

To bring this blog up to speed, I have decided, with a lot of inspiration from Russ Cannings' adventures last year, to try to set a new record for a Victoria Checklist Area big year. As much as I would like to venture further afield, work is keeping me close to home this year. The Victoria Checklist Area boundary, being North to the 49th Parallel and West as far as a line drawn from Ladysmith through Otter Point, is a little more manageable and a little easier on work, home, and budget.

The current record, established by Chris Saunders, stands at a daunting 251 (243 of these being self-found birds). It only takes a quick look at the Victoria Checklist to realize what exactly goes into that kind of number, and what exactly I have gotten myself into.

So I need to find 252 species. So far, I stand at 134, with a little over ten months left. The next 100 or so should be pretty straight-forward. The last 18, not so much. I have created a list page that I will keep updated as I go.

Along the way, I am looking forward to meeting Victoria birders I haven't had the pleasure of meeting yet, catching up with old friends, discovering some spots I haven't found yet, and maybe adding a lifer or two!

I may succeed, I may not, but either way it is going to be one heck of a fun year, and there are definitely worse things one could do than to spend a lot of time out birding! (and if I don't make it, there is always next year!)