Our last regularly scheduled charter trip of the year to make a check of the Nine Mile Bank and the Coronados Islands. We never know what will show up in late fall migration -- there has been a lot of booby action out there this year -- and November is a good month to find Humpback Whales and Short-tailed Shearwaters in these waters.
This 9-hour trip board at 6:20 a.m. and departs Point Loma Sportfishing at 7:00 a.m. to explore the bird-rich Nine-mile Bank from the comfortable 85-foot live-aboard Grande. On our way out of San Diego harbor we'll motor slowly by the live bait tank barges for super-close-ups of lounging sea lions (with the big bulls baying to beat the band) several hundred Brandt's cormorants, several species of gulls, and dozens of shorebirds, egrets and herons.
We'll check for American and Black Oystercatchers and early Surfbirds and Wandering Tattlers amongst the cobbles of Ballast Point on the way out of the harbor, and we'll check the Zuniga Jetty for them on the way in. Has last year's Long-tailed Duck returned?
On this trip we expect to see two to four species of dolphins (Bottlenose, Common, Pacific White-sided and Risso's) and numerous seabirds including storm-petrels, phalarope, fulmars, shearwaters, auklets, murres, murrelets, and jaegers. This is also a good time of year to see early migrating loons and three species of cormorants.
Our goal on this trip is to see 4 species of shearwaters. November begins the season for San Diego Short-tailed Shearwaters. We expect numbers of Pink-footeds and Sooties (they're heading back to the Southern Hemisphere about now). Black-venteds are now here in force from their summer breeding grounds in Baja --- we'll sort through them for Manx Shearwaters -- experts think it's just a matter of time until we find one off San Diego in autumn. A Red-billed Tropicbird was photographed on the Nine Mile Bank on 13 Feb 2010.
We will follow the Nine Mile Bank south to the international border and cross the deep Coronado Canyon on our way to the Coronados Islands where we'll make our final check on the Brown Booby colony. Of course, one never knows what other species of booby might be amongst the Brown Boobies. We've seen Masked Boobies and Blue-footed Boobies on these rocks in recent years, and a Red-footed Booby rode Grande from Baja to San Diego in late September of 2008. We won't be this way again until the March 2011 San Diego Bird Festival trips to the islands. An immature Masked/Nacza Booby was photographed on the Nine Mile Bank on 23 July and 31 August, 2010 and an immature Blue-footed Booby was seen on the Coronados Islands on 3 September 2010.
LEADERS will include pelagic birding & marine mammal experts
Check-in Time: 6:00 a.m.
Boarding Time: 6:20 a.m.
Gates closed and locked: 6:40 a.m.
Return: 4:00 p.m.
REGISTRATION IS $90 the day of the trip. Advance registration is $75.
RESERVATIONS: Telephone Point Loma Sportfishing seven days a week at (619) 223-1627. Tell them to wish to make a reservation for a birding trip on Grande and give them the date of departure.
IMPORTANT DETAILS: Click for IMPORTANT INFORMATION about the boat, the landing, driving directions, maps, lodging, weather, refund and cancellation policies, on-board facilities, meals and snacks,
HOW TO PREPARE: Click for tips on how to prepare, what to wear, what to bring and when to arrive.
EXPECTED SPECIES: What we see depends on the season, the itinerary and how far from shore we venture. Learn more about what species we will probably see and what species might be seen.
CANCELLATION POLICY: Trips on this website are sponsored by different organizations using different boats departing from different landings and harbors. As such, policies vary from trip to trip. Prior to registering, please familiarize yourself the Grande and Point Loma Sportfishing's policies regarding reservations, cancellations, refunds and substitutions as well as reviewing driving directions, check-in times, procedures and equipment allowed on the boats.
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