A couple of days ago I noticed a large group of cormorants, gulls, and pelicans just offshore from Salmon Creek Beach. It appeared to be a feeding flock (lots of diving and splashing), but I couldn't tell what they were catching at first. Then I started noticing some birds with fairly good-sized orange-colored fish.
I've been having some trouble with my camera lens not focusing properly, and this flock was distant, but I'm hoping the photos might still be good enough to identify the fish they were eating.
Other times when I've seen flocks like this, they've been eating smaller silvery bait fish, so I'm not used to seeing them catch a larger orange fish. Although they caught a lot of these fish, they seemed to have trouble swallowing them.
I'm not sure about the identification of this fish, but my first guess is Striped Surfperch (Embiotoca lateralis). If you can help with the i.d., I'd appreciate it!
3 comments:
What about butterfish? Seabirds in AK used to feed on them in late August.
My opinion -- I think you're right about Embiotica but maybe consider jacksoni. It's hard to tell for sure.
Interesting, Matt! I'm not familiar with Black Surfperch, and after looking at photos, I see what you mean.
One other guess was Rainbow Seaperch (Hypsurus caryi).
I probably didn't capture enough detail in the photos for a definite i.d., but at least it's a fun observation. The fish were really too big for the birds to swallow -- even the pelicans -- so they all spent a lot of time snatching the fish in different ways and working on it, but I didn't see many birds actually fully swallow the fish.
Jackie
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