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Just over two weeks ago I got up really, really early in the morning to be on the 'dock' (actually the parking lot of water's edge restaurant) in New Smyrna Beach, just south of Cape Canaveral on the Atlantic Coast of Florida, at the ungodly hour of 3 AM. I wasn't the first. Although the rest of the city was dark and quiet at that hour the parking lot was full of people parking cars and standing around looking unreasonably chipper and talking about birds. It was the start of a pelagic birding trip out to the far side of the gulf stream, some 50 miles to the east of us.
I'm not going to talk much about birds in this diary, I'm saving that for this weekend's Dawn Chorus. Here are some of the other sights from that day.
After an unsuccessful three hours of trying to sleep in the cabin this was my first sight of the day.
Just about the time I was first seeing the sun a dolphin leapt out of the water. Too dark to possible capture on film. It was a spotted dolphin - smaller and more acrobatic than the bottle nose dolphins we see close to the coast and who are mostly pretty leisurely except when actively pursuing food.
We saw dolphins several times in the morning. I think these are also spotted dolphins but I'm not sure.
This picture and the two below were taken while they were bow riding and the water was particularly choppy - the distance between me and the dolphins was changing very rapidly as the bow moved up and down.
The two images below are of bottle nose dolphins. The offshore populations are larger than the coastal ones. You can see scars on the side of the dolphin in the first picture which I am told are the result of interactions with other dolphins
One of the signs of the gulf stream is the sargassum weed, a type of brown algae.
The sargassum weed clings to itself and forms the characteristic weed lines as seen below.
These clumps of algae are habitat to many small animals, most of which are invisible from the boat. A few birds did perch on objects trapped in the weeds such as this Bridled Tern
A lot of debris gets trapped in the weed lines and, unfortunately, reveals how much human garbage, particularly plastic, is out in the ocean. Most of the trash is small fragments such as you see here but every now and then you see a larger item. I saw an entire plastic folding chair. The amount of trash is really shocking, even after hearing about it in news stories.
A few things passed by without being photographed. Flying Fish!!! I saw these throughout the day but they require lightning reflexes to capture. They are one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. Just incredible. Appearing out of nowhere and then flying low over the surface of the ocean like a shearwater.
And sea turtles. Three species were spotted but usually went under immediately. The only one I saw was this very large loggerhead that kind of posed for us before swimming under the boat and away.
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