[obol] Ancient Murrelets in Curry County

[Matt Brady]

Hi OBOLers.  Today, while conducting Marbled Murrelet surveys, Ryan Terrill, Brenden O'Connor and I found a pair of adult ANCIENT MURRELETS.  They were ~650 meters offshore of Lookout Rock, which is a few kilometers south of Humbug Mountain and north of Gold Beach.  There were also quite a few Marbled Murrelets out there, and many Cassin's Auklets relatively close to shore.  The Ancients were our seventh species of Alcid for the day.
I haven't counted them all up yet, but we had our season high count of Marbled Murrelets between Alsea Bay and Yachats in Lincoln County on July 26th.  There were 100+ Murrelets out there, mostly too far out to see from shore, though many more could have been just beyond the surf zone.  Anyway, good birding,
Matt Brady