Highlights of yesterday’s SOSSA pelagic off Wollongong: A Westland Petrel and two Black Petrels together; a Buller’s Shearwater, a very late Indian Yellow-nosed Albatross (1st year bird) and high numbers of Flesh-footed Shearwaters (finally!). A full trip report will be posted on the SOSSA website soon and photos on Raja’s website. Westland Petrel is on BARC’s review list. A submission is in preparation. The first conspicuous field mark was the heavy ‘secondary moult’ of the bird. However, on closer examination of the photos (unfortunately we weren’t able to catch the bird), we found that not only secondaries, primaries and rectrices were abraded but also the whole underparts of the bird – possibly indicating that it had landed in some toxic stuff.
Check out the Westland Petrels in heavy wear and moult off Kaikoura in December 2010: http://www.adarman.com/Birds/Petrels-Shearwaters/Westland-Petrel
and compare to the prisitine Black Petrels in the Hauraki Gulf in December 2010: http://www.adarman.com/Birds/Petrels-Shearwaters/Black-Petrel
Cheers,
Nikolas for all on the Sandra K
