Along with six Spanish seabirders, plus Elaine Cooke, Steve Howell and Hadoram Shirihai, I have just returned from the first ever 3 days of pelagic expeditions in search of Zino's Petrels at sea organised by Catarina Fagundes and Hugo Romano of Madeira Wind Birds over the afternoon-evenings of 14, 15 and 16 May, leaving harbour on Caniçal on Madeira at 14.00L and returning any time between 22.30L and 01.00L. We all stayed in the highly recommendable White Waters Hotel in the nearby town of Machico.
Birding was done from an 11.5m RIB (Rigid Inflatable Boat) with 2x200hp outboards skippered by Catarina which means that although low on the water it is pretty stable although one is likely to get wet if there is a beam sea or wind (which happened) and coming back late after dark after staying in the lee of the Desertas islands on Sunday 16 May I seemed to get a goodly portion of the North Atlantic on top of me and I wasn't alone. All of us from Spain agreed that we had been privileged to enjoy (most of the time) what must be definitely one of life's great seabirding experiences on this side of the Atlantic!
As to the birding, the brief list below will give an idea, but basically we saw all that we hoped for and then some,missing out only on Leach's Storm-petrel.
Petrels
Zino's Pterodroma madeira, of which there are only 80 pairs and all breed on the top of Pico de Areeiro, the highest point of Madeira. Wind Birds will take you up to hear the immatures calling as they come in to the breeding area after dark, but the walk is hard and not for those with dicey knees, heart problems (you are at c.1.800m a.s.l.) or just darned unfit Seen well several times.Fea's Pterodroma feae, also seen, breeds on Bugio, one of the Desertas islands.Seen only a few times, breeds later than Zino's.Bulwer's Bulweria bulweri, suprisingly numerous, seen well.
Shearwaters
Cory's Calonectris diomedea, race borealis, numerous (I should add that I don't go for the Med. race diomedea being separated as a separate sp. increasingly often known as Scopoli's.Manx P. puffinus, quite common.Little / Barolo (according to taste) P. baroli, only a couple which went by, never investigated the chum and ignored us totally.
Storm-petrels
Wilson's Oceanites oceanicus, a few but seen well. White-faced Pelagodroma marina, superb views of this fantastic little stormie which was much more numerous than we had hoped for.Madeiran / Band-rumped Oceanodroma castro (forget the 4 proposed races for the moment), 2-3 birds but seen well. European/British Hydrobates pelagicus, few but seen well, many appeared to show far more white in the underwing than those I have seen in the Med. and North Sea.
And what else? A sea a Grey/Red Phalarope stayed alongside the chum feeding one afternoon and we had brief but good views of an adult Sabine's Gull in breeding plumage, plus a single Arctic Tern. From the shore we saw Common Terns in Funchal harbour (4) and at Porto Moniz (>20) and 2 Roseate Terns in Funchal harbour. I have a slew of photos to sort out of Madeiran Yellow-legged Gulls (anyone interested in sado-masochism should get in touch after the end of May) and we also saw a single adult Lesser Black-backed off the Desertas. We saw 4 Sperm Whales, Spotted Dolphins and a single turtle.There will be a really full report in my birding-the-costa blog sometime in early June.
Regards,Andy Paterson
Torremolinos, España
http://birding-the-costa.blogspot.com/ http://guiri-pajarero-suelto.blogspot.com/
