Craveri’s, NESTING Black & AmericanXBlack Oystercatchers

By – 2:26 pm

Forgot to mention that during our offshore trip today, Friday, we also saw 5 Craveri’s Murrelets at the 30-Mile Bank and about a dozen Cassin’s Auklets. As we motored back in to San Diego Bay, we had a Black and an American X Black Oystercatcher at the mouth of the bay on Zuniga Jetty. This is presumably the long-staying American X Black from nearby Cabrillo National Monument, etc. And also today, we were alerted by Brennan Mulrooney to an iNaturalist report by someone of presumably this same pair of one Black and one American X Black with a young CHICK on the rocks at the tidepools area of Cabrillo N. M. photo’d on 3 July. This establishes the first fully confirmed nesting record of oystercatchers in San Diego County. There had been one or two previous “strongly suggestive” events (e.g., see Atlas).

–Paul Lehman, San Diego