On Tuesday evening I discovered that a black-capped petrel had been seen over Lake Jackson the day before, maybe a mile from my house at best. Some enterprising birder had rushed to the lake as Hurricane Irma was exiting the vicinity of Tallahassee to see if any sea birds had been blown inland by the storm.
This black-capped petrel is a remarkable testament to the power of the storm. This bird wouldn’t have been blown in directly from the Gulf of Mexico where it doesn’t occur, but would have been picked up either off the Atlantic Coast of Florida or from the Caribbean and carried hundreds of miles.
Here’s part of the comment from the ebird observation
Very surreal experience seeing this species on a freshwater lake in Tallahassee. distant but decent scope views for about a minute. It was flying in typical BCPE style. Fast sweeping arcs with 2-3 intermittent shallow wing beats. Dark upperparts white tail with dark terminal tail band. White nape. dark cap. Underparts white except for dark primaries, dark trailing edge to wing and obvious black bar on coverts. Bird behaved much like ones I have seen on Mike Brothers' New Smyrna Beach pelagics. Unreal seeing one with trees, boat docks and houses in the background!
Unfortunately I was not able to see this bird myself as I was in Baton Rouge at the time.
Here’s a little black-capped petrel biology. It is the size of small gull, white with a black cap and dark wings. The black-capped petrel is a gadfly petrel (genus Pterodroma). The gadfly petrels are among the more mysterious seabirds. They are named from their distinctive arcing and darting flight pattern which is very different from the flight of other petrels and related birds. There are about 35 species most of which breed on tropical and subtropical islands throughout the oceans of the world. Many of them seem to be rare, in many cases due to population declines from human alteration of their habitats although some species may always have been rare. For example, the Bermuda petrel apparently had a historical population of half a million birds at the time Europeans arrived in the region but was believed to be extinct sometime in the 17th century. Three hundred years later it was rediscovered and due to intense conservation efforts today the population consists of a few hundred individuals. Below is a video on Bermuda petrels.
Well I seem to have wandered off my main topic. The black-capped petrel is the ‘easiest’ of the gadfly petrels to see in American waters. They breed in the mountains of Hispaniola and Cuba and spend most of their time at sea in the Gulf Stream. Like many seabirds that nest inland they fly in to their nests at night. Based on observations on pelagic birding trips and other oceanic surveys the population of this species is estimated to be about 5000. The population was formerly much larger but the nesting birds are vulnerable to introduced predators, light poles and other navigation hazards, as well as removal of habitat. As you can imagine, hurricanes probably also have negative effects on the population of this species.
Here’s a couple of videos to give you a sense of these birds.
The one above shows nesting habitat in Haiti and gives some nice information on the species. Below is footage from a pelagic trip in the Gulf Stream off North Carolina. Be wary of watching this if you are susceptible to motion sickness.
Below is an interesting if not particularly dynamic video showing the use of radar to monitor petrels around nesting colonies.
And a short video of the release of a black-capped petrel in Haiti.
That’s it from me. As always feel free to discuss anything ‘birdy’ in the comments.