24 Jul 2021

THE PETREL STATION TOUR REPORT

Had a cracker day at 'The Petrel Station' on our latest pelagic seabird tour out of Tutukaka (in northern New Zealand). The tour started off a bit slow until a series of fantastic birds dropped in, all putting on a quality show right off the boat.

The highlights of the tour were:

• 1 x Pink-footed Shearwater (mega rare for New Zealand)

• 1 x Grey-back Storm Petrel (rarely seen this far north)

• 1 x Brown (Subantarctic) Skua (not often seen this far north)

During the tour we saw 18 different seabird species, and enjoyed watching around 1,000 seabirds in total. An awesome day out. The full seabird species list is below.

If you’re interested in coming out to The Petrel Station then check out the upcoming seabird tour dates and get in touch – it’s always a great day out.

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Pink-footed Shearwater

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Brown Skua

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Black-browed Mollymawk

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Cook's Petrel

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Buller's Mollymawk

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Fairy Prion

Here’s the full tour results from the day:

Seabirds seen:

• 1 x Buller's Mollymawk

• 2 x Shy Mollymawk

• 2 x Black-browed Mollymawk

• 70 x Grey-faced Petrel

• 3 x Cook's Petrel

• 100 x Fairy Prion

• 1 x Pink-footed Shearwater

• 70 x Fluttering Shearwater

• 5 x Little Shearwater

• 1 x Grey-backed Storm-Petrel

• 2 x New Zealand Storm-Petrel

• 600 x Common Diving Petrel

• 15 x Australasian Gannet

• 1 x Brown (Subantarctic) Skua

• 7 x Black-backed Gull

• 100 x Red-billed Gull

• 49 x Pied Shag

• 2 x Little Black Shag