Tag Archives: Brandt’s Cormorants

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Craig Tooley recently spent some time photographing the birds on an offshore rock at The Sea Ranch. He found some Brown Pelicans in breeding plumage - yellow on the top of their white heads, and red skin on their throat patch. It certainly does seem early!

Those black birds are Brandt's Cormorants, and the dark brown bird is a juvenile Brandt's. At the very top of Craig's photo looks to be the bottom parts of a Western Gull. Nice to see everybody getting along!

Below is a video Craig took showing the pelicans preening themselves. They are resting on the journey southward.

I will miss their comings and goings during the winter months, and look forward to seeing them again in late spring.

Thanks to Craig for allowing me to share his photo and video with you here. To see much more of Craig's nature photography, here is his website: http://www.ruffimage.com

A beautiful cool day here today. Fog rolled in over the ocean this afternoon and it's a sea of white. A storm is arriving early tomorrow.

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Brandt's Cormorants are nesting along the Mendonoma Coast. Jon Shiu photographed this group at the Mendocino Headlands.

From the Cornell Lab of Ornithology: “The largest cormorant on the Pacific Coast, Brandt’s Cormorant is an expert diver that can swim deeper than 200 feet in pursuit of fish and shellfish. In addition to standard cormorant black, Brandt’s sports a vivid cobalt-blue throat patch and eyes during breeding season, along with wispy white feathers on the head. This species nests and forages in the California Current, an area of rich upwelling between British Columbia, Canada, and Baja California, Mexico.”

How great to see the blue throat patch in Jon’s photo!

Thanks to Jon for allowing me to share his photo.

It’s sunny with a gentle breeze…a beautiful day on the Mendonoma coast!

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Margaret Lindgren has an ideal job. She created the tour company, Unbeaten Path Tours. She loves the Mendonoma coast and gets to see nature up close and personal nearly every day. Recently she led a tour at the Point Arena-Stornetta Lands. Look at the beautiful day they had!

You can see the Lighthouse in the far distance. Margaret also photographed a colony of Brandt's Cormorants. The young ones are the brown ones.

Margaret and her tour also spotted a California Sea Lion, which she said was quite unusual for that particular spot. It was just headed into the water.

The Lands never disappoint - there is always something beautiful and/or interesting to see.

Thanks to Margaret for allowing me to share her photos with you here. To learn more about taking a tour with her - and I highly recommend it! - here is her website: https://www.unbeatenpathtours.com/

We had a nice, drenching rain last night. We received 1.85 inches at our place in Anchor Bay. So far we have received 2.40 inches of rain. Today is warm and humid! Can edible mushrooms be nearly at hand?

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Carolyn Carnell shared this photo of the big island sitting off the north end of The Sea Ranch, Gualala Point Island. It was very crowded that day!

Carolyn Carnell wrote, “This photo was taken while doing a drone survey to check on the Common Murres nests on the [west] side of Gualala Point Island. To our surprises it was covered with 112 Brown Pelicans, with many also in the water along with Common Murres having a feeding frenzy.”

Also on the island were Brandt's Cormorants and Western Gulls. Let's face it, GPI is a popular place to hang out! The Brown Pelicans were most likely resting before continuing their northward migration. As I've shown you in a previous post, the juveniles are now strong enough to be passing by the Mendonoma coast.

There was a lot of bait fish in the ocean which caused multiple feeding frenzies last week, a good sign of the health of the ocean.

Here's one of my favorite photos of GPI as big waves crash into it during a high surf event, taken by Richard Kuehn.

Thanks to Carolyn and Rich for allowing me to share their photos with you here.

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Gualala Point Island is a large, rocky island sitting off the northernmost end of The Sea Ranch. It is a haven for many birds and pinnipeds and many of us enjoy watching them from the bluffs. But on the far side, where we landlubbers cannot see, there is a large colony of Brandt's Cormorants currently nesting.

TSR are Stewards of the rocks and islands off their stretch of the coast, which are part of the California Coastal National Monument. They have formed a Task Force to monitor the seabirds. Recently their aerial photographer Craig Tooley went up with pilot Tom Osborne as part of their 5th year of monitoring and captured this photo. There are also some Common Murres in the photo, a cause for excitement. There is hope they may be prospecting for nests. And one lone Gull at the top, hoping for a free meal.

This is the big reason why fireworks over the 4th of July weekend in Gualala are a bad idea. We are fortunate to have nesting seabirds here. Don't feel sorry for us! We have fireworks in Point Arena 11 miles to the north.