The First Whale Watch of the Season

Northern Gannet

On Mother's Day, I took part of the family on the first whale watch of the year on Son IV Run by Plymouth Whale Watching.  It turned out to be a beautiful day on the water, sunny, with some light cirrus clouds and slight to moderate winds.  The boat was filled to capacity, which at times made it hard to photograph unless you were in the right spot because of the number of people lining the rail.  After leaving Plymouth Harbor and approaching the Gurnet.  We came across our first whales, active right whales.  Another good difficulty in photographing these whales, was the law which prevented approaching any closer than 500 yards to a right whale because of they are severely endangered and the speed of the boat must be decreased to 10 kn.  After this we traveled slowly up to Provincetown where off of Race Point.  We encountered both fin whales and humpback whales.  Both species were in the movement mode rather than the feeding mode.  There were a number of northern Gannet's flying around also.  Coming back again at the Gurnet area.  We saw right whales feeding.  In all, it was a wonderful day and enjoyed by everyone.

Right Whale Fluke on a Dive

Right Whale Tail Slapping

Right Whale Feeding

Fin Whale

Humpback Whale

Humpback Whale on a Dive

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Dovekie and More

Dovekie

The reason I traveled up to Provincetown was to visit MacMillan's Pier that juts out into the harbor.  There have been reports of Dovekie's present in the harbor and the last time I had obtained a photograph of the Dovekie was about 30 years ago, on New Year's Day in the picture was taken with slide film (and I don't know where they are).  When we first arrived and searched out the water of the harbor no Dovekie's was seen, but, red-breasted mergansers, common eiders and some horned grebes were present.  So out came the camera and lenses and we started taking pictures of these birds.  At the far right end of the pier a bird was swimming, with my binocular's I ID it: a long-tailed duck, a beautiful male in winter plumage.'s.  Snap, snap, went the shutter and I captured the bird for posterity. 

Long-tailed Duck

We roamed around  photographing the more common species. Suddenly, in the water between two of the docks suddenly appeared two Dovekie's.  Again, snap, snap went the shutter and I now had Dovekie pictures digitally.

Dovekie

When I downloaded the pictures into my computer and was reviewing them, what I had thought initially on the pier was a female red-breasted merganser turned out to be a first-year male red-breasted merganser.  The way to tell the first year-male from a female red-breasted merganser, is that the male red-breasted merganser as a black ring around its eye, while the female red-breasted merganser has a white line under its eye.

First Winter Red-breasted Merganser

Fishing Boats of Provincetown

Most people feel that Provincetown is a place to visit, sight-see, eat and shop. However, it is also a community of working fishermen and depending on the time of day or the time year MacMillan Wharf can be filled with various types of fishing vessels ranging from lobster boats, draggers and trawlers. These boats are interesting and make great photographic subjects. In the following photographs, I did post process them with NIK software and on a couple of the pictures I utilized Topaz Star Effects.

Trawler

Fishing Boat

Fishing Boat

Fishing Boat

Great name for a fishing boat

Fishing Boat

Fishing Boat

Dragger

Fishing Boats

Lobster gear

Trawling net

Gull in the rigging

Fishing Boat

Fishing Boat

Other Birds Seen on the Cape

Red-breasted Merganser-Male

During our birding trip on Thursday we also saw other species of birds in Provincetown harbor besides the gulls and the thick-billed murre. There were red-breasted mergansers and common eiders swimming and feeding.

Red-breasted Merganser-Female

Common Eider-Male

Common Eider-Female

After we had left Race Point we stopped at the Beech Forest, where the usual common passerines hang out. In fact, if you bring some sunflower seeds and put them in your palm Black-capped-Chickadees and tufted titmouse is will come down and feed right out of your hand. The birds are very used to people since feeding them by hand has been going on for many years and families will bring their children there and let the child feed the birds. A great way for children to learn about and enjoying nature.

Tufted Titmouse Feeding from Hand

Black-capped Chickadee Feeding from Hand

Other birds present at the Beech Forest, included red-breasted woodpeckers (unable to photograph) white-breasted nuthatch, white-throated sparrow and Blue Jays.

White-throated Sparrow

White-breasted Nuthatch

Blue Jay

The last interesting bird was a nice close-up of a juvenile Horned Grebe in Wellfleet Harbor.

Horned Grebe

Province Land Beaches Cape Cod National Seashore

Thursday on Cape Cod was more than just birding, there was scenics and landscapes to obtain. When we arrived at Herring Cove Beach, in the Province Lands of the Cape Cod National Seashore, the waves were really crashing onto the beach. I utilized my 500 mm lens with a 1.4 convertor on it, giving me a 700 mm lens, and photographed the waves. I used a low f-stop and a low ISO, which in the bright sun gave me a high shutter speed and created "frozen water drops". Utilizing a single picture, I converted the picture to an HDR in NIK HDR Pro and utilized a Jason Odell preset for a black and white conversion with selenium and adjusted it to my taste. I then utilized NIK color Efex Pro 2 and utilized detail extractor the finish up the picture.

Black and white conversion

Waves crashing

I then utilize my wide-angle lens to capture gulls hunkered down on the beach, with the waves crashing behind them.

Panoramic of gulls hunkering down and waves crashing

We then visited Race Point Beach. What surprised me about my visit there was for the first time, there were no footprints in the sand. So, more pictures were obtained. All we left behind were footprints.

The Sand

Beach, Sea and Sky

"Only Leave Footprints"

Thick-billed Murre (Uria lomvia)

Thick-billed Murre

It was Thursday again, and I was off again with Doug birding. We decide to start the day at Provincetown Harbor. The weather was sunny, low 40s, but with a stiff wind blowing. In the harbor, there were a number of birds and gulls, but the best finding was a Thick-build Murre. Doug first sighted it out in the harbor closer toward the breakwater. As we were observing the Murre, it swam toward us and down alongside the pier which allowed for good observation and some decent photographs.

The Thick-billed Murre is distributed around the polar and sub-polar regions of the northern hemisphere. They will spend all of their lives out on the waters except during the breeding season when they form colonies on cliffs. The Thick-billed Murre produce only one egg per year. An interesting fact, is when the young leave the nest, they jump into the sea where the male murre stays with the young and feeds it for approximately 8 weeks.

During the winter they will move southward, staying in cold ice-free waters.

They utilize their wings to swim under the water and they can dive up to 150 m and stay on the water for up to four minutes.

Thick-billed Murre

Thick-billed Murre

Thick-billed Murre

Life-saving Station and the Humane Society Of the Commonwealth Of Massachusetts

Finally, I will finish off my blogs about my last trip photographing on Cape Cod.  I am going to give some facts about the life-saving stations that were present on the Cape and also about the Humane Society of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

The Old Harbor Life-Saving Station that is present near Race Point on the Province Lands, Cape Cod National Seashore was originally built in Chatham in 1897 and was moved to Provincetown in November 1977.  In the summer, breeches buoy rescue enactments a conducted every Thursday evening.  Inside the station are the boats that were used to help rescue ship wreck sailors and other people that may have been on the ships.

In 1785, a group of Boston citizens met in the Bunch of Grapes Tavern because they were concerned about the needless deaths resulting from shipwrecks and drownings.  They formed in 1786, the Humane Society of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, modeled on the British Royal Humane Society.  The resources of Humane Society finance a number of firsts in the country, including life-saving Hudson rescue boats along the coast, and funding to create the Massachusetts General Hospital, McLean Hospital and the Boston Lying-in Hospital

The model that Humane Society founded for life-saving huts and boats with a model for the United States Life-Saving Service which with the US Revenue Service was the foundation for the US Coast Guard.

At Horseneck Point, Westport, Massachusetts, before the causeway leading to Gooseberry Neck, the Westport Fisherman's Association still maintains the structures that belong to the Humane Society.