Trip Report. Noyo Pelagics, 1 March, 2026
Greetings Mendobirders –
We kicked off our 2026 Noyo Pelagics year in fine fashion yesterday, March 1st. Around 15 participants joined Richard and Corinne on the Kraken and Anchor Charters for a half-day trip to look for whales and get over Noyo Canyon. We thank Richard and Corinne for making this trip a go, despite a lighter roster than usual. Winds were light from the south for the entire trip, skies were mostly cloudy to mostly clear, and swell was low, all adding up to a great day on the water.
Right out of the harbor we spotted Gray Whale blows. This is a time when all but breeding females and pups begin to head north, although some of the whales were also headed south. By the Fort Bragg Gray Whale Festival later this month they all should be heading north; check out the Noyo Center for Marine Science (NCMS) webite/events page for lectures, whale watching opportunities, educational tours, and other events surrounding the festivities. Several NCMS folks and whale enthusiasts were aboard and were busy snapping photos of the Gray Whales to contribute to Happy Whale’s known-individual catalogue, enabling the study of individual movement patterns. Also call or check out Anchor Charters for opportunities to see Gray Whales this month!
Observing Gray Whales from the Kraken.
We then headed up to the canyon and within a few minutes had our first Black-footed Albatrosses, Black-legged Kittiwakes, and shearwaters. We wound up with 30-40 Black-foots but could not come up with any of the semi-expected Laysan or the semi-unexpected Short-tailed Albatross. We had 6-10 Laysans and three Short-taileds in April and May last year, and we’ll be scanning the horizons again this year on our four scheduled upcoming trips in these months. Kittiwakes were with us all day, 30-40 of these as well, and we tallied about 6 Pink-footed, one Short-tailed, one Sooty, and a few other dark shearwaters that got away without ID, not unanticipated with these two difficult-to-separate species. We also enjoyed all of the other usual birds over the canyon; four species alcids included two early Pigeon Guillemots in breeding plumage heading south, well off shore, probably to the Farallones. And, yes, gulls, a healthy flock of which followed us all day and consumed six bags of popcorn and two bags of Utz red-hot cheese balls. Among the gulls was a nice frosty individual that had us thinking of several rare species or combinations thereof, though after studying the photos we settled on the uncommon (but still interesting) American Herring x Glaucous-winged Gull, or “Cook Inlet” gull. Around this time a nice 8-10′ Salmon Shark was spotted right off the bow, among an early crop of by-the-wind sailors (Velella velella).
Black-legged Kittiwake, Black-footed Albatross, Short-tailed Shearwater, Pigeon Guillemot. Photos: Roger Adamson kittiwake) and Peter Pyle.
*Humpback Whales*! The highlight for most if not all on the trip was finding at least four Humpbacks back in the area, super early this year. Last year we did not see any until July. Not only did we see humps but also flipper flapping, breaching, and plenty of fluking, enabling us to record the under-tail patterns for individual ID. Often we know who they are and their entire history within 15 minutes of getting the shots. Interestingly, this time, none of them came up on Happy Whale at first, indicating unknown or poorly known individuals. Could this be due to the unusually early date for these at this location? Time and more photo-documentation will tell. By the time we got to the dock we did find a match for one of them, which we will highlight in our Trip Report (with photos), available soon at NoyoPelagics.com. As we headed in from the last whale, it twisted and waved half of its body and tail at us about 15 times. Yep, see you again, in April we hope.
Humpbacked Whale. Photos: Tim Bray
We teased our lead-up to the trip by saying we’d see Gray Whales, albatrosses… “and who knows what else? There has been very little coverage offshore in late February.” Well, humpbacks for one. For two, on our way back in, just 3.25 miles from shore, Tim spotted a small alcid on the water that wound up being a very confiding (for this species) Scripp’s Murrelet! This species is rare off our coast, usually far offshore, in August-October but is completely unexpected in early March. Checking eBird data, there are no records in Northern California in February and only one in March, toward the end of the month in Monterey Bay. It just goes to show that almost anything is possible on a Noyo Pelagics trip!
Scripp’s Murrelet. Photos: Roger Adamson, Connor Cochrane
Some more photos of the frolicking whale and murrelet are here:
https://ebird.org/checklist/S305207447
and we will include these and others on out soon-to-be-posted trip report. Our next full-day trip is planned for April 4th and we should have the sign-up buttons working this week at NoyoPelagics.com. We may also schedule more short-notice half-day trips (5-10 days in advance) and if you want to keep appraised of these, monitor Mendobirds and/or sign up for the Mendo-Pelagics list serve at Mendocino-Pelagics@groups.io | Home.
