Brown Booby off Alden Bank (an area between Ferndale & Sucia Island)

[Eric Ellingson]

A bit reluctant to head out from the marina in SeaBird due to the wind waves a bit more than I like for birding, I went anyway.  

As usual not much until I got near Alden Bank. There were about four main bait ball gatherings spread around that had maybe 100-200 birds each. The usual suspects of Common Murre, Rhinocerous Auklet, Pigeon Guillemot, (California, Glaucous-winged,  Heermans & Bonaparte's) Gulls.  

I was on my way back home from a brief trip over to Matia, after Alden Bank, when I encountered a flock of 53 Red-necked Phalarope. Most I'd ever seen in one spot/flock. After crossing back over Alden Bank I went by a couple of the bait-ball gatherings to see if any new showed up ... on the far side of a large gathering of mostly gulls, a large bicolored bird took flight. My first thought was a Jaeger but that did not fully compute.  Holly .... a booby! I could hardly believe it. I watched it land near another large bait-ball gathering. Motoring over to the area I watched for some time. It seemed to keep an eye on me and even though quite a distance it took off again. I let it be and headed home.

I'd notified a few local birders of the sighting and set a time to go back out again.  It was truly a long shot to find a single bird in such a large body of water again but dang it, it was done. All aboard got good looks at it. It would fly off quite some distance and then return. The last sighting we had of it, it was headed toward Matia/Sucia Islands.

My eBird list here with photos.

Some Flickr photos here of the Brown Booby

Eric Ellingson

[Martha Dyck]

Wow!  That is impressive!  Excellent photos...Has a booby EVER been seen here?

Martha Dyck

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[Clement Stevens]

Great shots Eric

On Aug 13, 2022, at 10:19 AM, Martha Dyck <dyckm...@gmail.com> wrote:



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