Date: 9/1/25 12:13 pm From: Naresh Satyan via groups.io <naresh.satyan...> Subject: [LACoBirds] Pelagic trip report, circumnavigating San Clemente Island 083125
Hi all,
Some of us went out on a 10+ hr pelagic trip on the zodiac Skimmer out of Newport Harbor yesterday 08/31. The weather forecast was for reasonably calm winds midday, and captain Delaney suggested that we could try a route going around San Clemente island, which we were happy to explore. There are very few birding boats that go to these waters. The route was Newport Harbor -> Lasuen Sea Mount -> The Slide -> Mackerel Bank (Emery Knoll on eBird) -> San Clemente Ridge -> 474 Bank (a small bank at the boundary between LA county waters and the Santa Barbara Island "donut hole") -> eastern end of the San Nicholas Basin to the 381 Bank (southwest of San Clemente Island) -> south end of San Clemente Island -> back 60 miles to Newport Harbor. The total round trip distance was a whopping 209 miles in 10.5 hours.
We had sunny skies and 3-4 ft swells throughout the day. Winds were relatively calm from mid-morning to early afternoon, but we had significant wind chop early in the morning and especially in the afternoon on the return trip (particularly severe at the southern ends of the islands).
The highlights of the trip were: - 5 Red-billed Tropicbirds at various locations around San Clemente Island, most of which were very cooperative. These included a pair sitting on the water at Mackerel Bank, with one bird vocalizing, which was pretty neat. - At least 5 Guadalupe Murrelets: a single bird on the San Clemente Ridge north of San Clemente Island, and a group of 4 very vocal birds (2 adults, 2 chicks) in the San Nicholas basin on the west side of the island. - 26 Craveri's Murrelets, mostly in pairs or small groups, and mostly west of San Clemente Island.
We had 17 other black-and-white murrelets, some of which looked like possible Guadalupe Murrelets, that could not be identified confidently as the seas got rougher later in the afternoon. The only shearwaters were the expected three species: Black-vented Shearwaters close to shore, Pink-footed Shearwaters all along the route, and a few scattered Sooty Shearwaters. Storm-petrels were surprisingly scarce throughout the day, and we only had about 10 Black Storm-Petrels and 3 Leach's Storm-Petrels. Given the weather forecast, we did not expect to find vastly more alcids than storm-petrels! At the north end of San Clemente Ridge, we encountered our only Common Terns and Sabine's Gulls. Pomarine and Parasitic Jaegers were scattered along the route, but we had no Long-tailed Jaegers or South Polar Skuas.
There were almost no birds in the waters between the two islands.
Marine mammals have been scarce in these waters all season, but we did manage to find two Blue Whales northwest of San Clemente Island, a couple of other distant/elusive baleen whales, offshore bottlenose dolphins, short-beaked common dolphins, and a few Risso's dolphins.
