Saturday's pelagic out of Lewes, DE produced a nice collection of  
winter seabirds and the best cetacean show I've ever seen in the  
Mid-Atlantic.  Conditions were overcast with a bit of a swell early,  
but the winds stayed fairly light giving us a good ride and good  
birding conditions.

The trip had trouble getting far from shore due to a huge  
concentration of Herring that attracted big numbers of GANNETS and  
cetaceans.  Before we even made it out 7 miles, we found 5 species;  
FIN WHALE, HUMPBACK WHALE, MINKE WHALE, COMMON DOLPHIN, AND HARBOR  
PORPOISE.  We had excellent and multiple views of all the whale  
species, including a Humpback that swam right towards the boat.

Highlights included great looks at DOVEKIE, RAZORBILL, ATLANTIC  
PUFFIN, and NORTHERN FULMAR.  We also had an interesting first-winter  
gull that had characteristics of a EUROPEAN HERRING GULL.  I'll try to  
get the pics posted later and ask for comment from some of the gull  
experts out there.  An interesting pelagic sighting was that of a  
KILLDEER.

Here are the final counts:

Full counts for the birds we found follow:

     SPECIES                  DE      MD      TOTAL
     -----------------------  ------  ------  ------
     Surf Scoter                  26       -      26
     Black Scoter                 14       -      14
     White-winged Scoter           5       -       5
     Long-tailed Duck              1       -       1
     Red-throated Loon            17       -      17
     Common Loon                  25       -      25
     NORTHERN FULMAR               1      10      11
     Northern Gannet             780      80     860
     KILLDEER                      1       -       1
     Bonaparte's Gull              3       1       4
     Herring Gull                166     170     336
     LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL      1       2       3 (1 1st & 2 adult)
     Great black-backed Gull      55      35      90
     BLACK-LEGGED KITTIWAKE        3       -       3
     DOVEKIE                       4      83      87
     RAZORBILL                    15       -      15
     large alcid sp.               2       -       2
     ATLANTIC PUFFIN               -       2       2

     FIN WHALE                     6       -       6
     MINKE WHALE                   3       -       3
     HUMPBACK WHALE                5       -       5
     HARBOR PORPOISE              20       -      20
     Common Dolphin                4      22      26



Our next trip is out of Cape May on March 16 and our next trip out of  
Lewes is on April 5.  We're also doing trips out of the Outer Banks  
this year, and I'll once again be leading on the Searcher 5-day trip  
out of San Diego in September.  Feel free to contact us for more info.


-PAG

Paul A. Guris
See Life Paulagics
P.O. Box 161
Green Lane, PA  18054
www.paulagics.com
215-234-6805