Pelagic birds in Georgia waters |
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Knowledge of pelagic bird species off the coast of Georgia is still evolving. In fact, a large part of what is known about abundance and distribution has only been discovered since the early 1980's. Until the updated Annotated Checklist of Georgia Birds (2003), several of the species below were not on the state's regular checklist. A reason often cited for the lack of attention to Georgia coastal waters is the largely featureless continental shelf , which extends out to the shelf break, a depth of 200 meters. However, on that shelf there are more than a few areas with relief, or live bottom, capable of protecting and sustaining an
abundant food web. The shelf off Georgia is still in the process of being discovered and mapped by marine biologists and oceanographers. It seems clear that the relatively small area of these shelf floor outcroppings in relation to the vastness of the Georgia Embayment of the South Atlantic Bight has an impact on the numbers and species of birds to be seen on Georgia pelagic trips. That may not be altogether true. This is definitely not Cape Hatteras, or the Southern Oceans, but oceanographers studying the benthos - the floor of the ocean - have found that diatoms, a type of micro algae or phytoplankton, is produced even in these relatively barren regions. Phytoplankton is the foundation of the food web of the sea. Seabirds are an extraordinarily fascinating subject. I recently looked at video of a diving Common Loon taken by a Skidaway Institute camera 90 feet below the surface at R2, 40 miles offshore! Did you know that Royal Terns routinely forage from their nests more than 40 miles at sea - on a daily basis, and then return at night to land? Or if that doesn't impress you try this: Sooty Tern has no significant waterproofing in its feathers and cannot land on the sea for long. Unlike most other terns, it feeds by dipping into the water while on the wing. On the wing? While Sooty Tern may occasionally roost on basking sea turtles or Sargasso mats, some birds have been thought to go four or five years on the wing without ever coming to rest. One more. Five Wandering Albatrosses in one of the Southern oceans were fitted with GPS receivers while on the nest . They were tracked foraging at sea for up to two straight weeks and then returned to land to feed their nestlings. Distance covered: one bird traveled 15,000 kilometers. Offshore Georgia was originally suggested in the 1977 edition of Annotated Checklist of Georgia Birds, as latitude 30º42' to 32º02'N, a distance of 100 statute miles. Offshore Georgia is now out to 200 miles, consistent with ABA guidelines. This area encompasses all of the Georgia continental shelf waters, the Gulf Stream and part of the continental slope. Beyond the Gulf Stream, Georgia is virtually unexplored for birds. |
Perhaps the largest and most accessible of these is