ML391115581

Age

Not specified

Sex

Not specified

Observation details

Unbelievable. Far and away my best self-found bird, and a fantastic record for Pelee. After Steve Charbonneau’s report on Wednesday, I went out to the Tip that day in the late afternoon and stayed until sunset in a desperation attempt at seeing the Gannet, with no luck. This morning I decided to go to Pelee despite having a flight to catch in the afternoon. When I arrived I noticed Keith Burk’s car at the Tip lot, and saw him leaving the Tip proper to scope off the east side. I walked up to the Tip and set up my scope to scan the gulls on the sand spit. Less than ninety seconds later, I had my bins up and noticed a notably large dark bird come into view only about 50-60m behind the gulls off the Tip. I immediately started freaking out because it looked really good for Northern Gannet. I could not get my scope on the bird due to my excitement so I went back to my binoculars. It banked to the side and showed long, narrow and angular wings and a large pointed bill. I immediately shouted “GANNET” several times at the top of my lungs and broke birder’s code by taking my bins off of it to run to Keith. There was no doubt in the ID. I was so focused on making sure someone else saw it that snapping a photo wasn’t a reflex. In the excitement I/we lost the bird before Keith could get on it. I called Jeremy Bensette and told him to put the word out. About 5 minutes later Keith and I simultaneously refound the bird in a gull feeding frenzy off the east side. At that point, Keith made more calls and a small group of birders were able to come and see the bird. Further observation allowed for a better assessment of field marks: large seabird, dark brown upperside with paler underside, with long, narrow and pointed wings that were pale underneath, especially towards its body. The white uppertail coverts were seen well on multiple occasions. The bill was large, long and pointed, though never seen as well as when I first had the bird off the Tip. The tail was pointed in much the same way as the bill, making the head and tail look the same length from a distance. For the ~2 hours that we stayed with the Gannet, it spent a large part of its time on the water or alternating between flying low and sitting on the water. The bird was harassed almost constantly by the gulls around it for the entire time we got to watch it. We also got to watch the bird plunge-dive on numerous occasions; so incredible! In total, I saw the bird for approximately an aggregate hour and a quarter between the initial 9:25 observation and when we lost it off the west side of the Tip at ~11:25. Pelee lifer for all present, Ontario lifer for a few, and lifer-lifer for me!

Technical information

Model

NIKON D7500

Lens

200-500mm f/5.6

ISO

200

Focal length

500 mm

Flash

Flash did not fire

f-stop

f/7.1

Shutter speed

1/500 sec

Dimensions

1311 pixels x 873 pixels

Original file size

553.01 KB