White-headed and soft-P petrels, Birdlings flat NOW

[andrewcrossland]

Just wait fir a big storm coming up from the south and hitting kaitorete spit head on. AC

[AngryBird45]

But how are trips organised?

[Davidthomas]

They arent. Its usually just a few idiotic people who want to make thwmselves miserable in the wind/rain and hope for something interesting bird-wise.

99% of the time its pretty quiet and you dont see much of note.

[BerndHuss]

David, some people might feel offended by your comment :-;

[Davidthomas]

It’s meant in jest! Mostly because most of the time the weathers so miserable you’d be an idiot for being out in it. in saying that I’d be the first one there if I could be!!

I spent two hours in -10 getting snowed on recently for a twitch in BC Canada

[AngryBird45]

What type of weather is best for Birdlings Flat? Is any wind going north good or does it have to be specific?

[BerndHuss]

I knew that, David, that's why I added a wink. I would give my left arm for a really good bird. Birding sometimes requires a lot of willpower!

[Jan]

So that's how to do a wink! During that epic seawatch back in 2021, I expressed the opinion that those idiots were taking their lives in their hands. I got thrown off Michael Szabo's New Zealand Birders fb page and will never forgive him. How come he runs almost all the birding sites in NZ and puts everybodies msg from one site onto all the others as though he knows where they want them to go???

[AngryBird45]

It does seem good for seawatching at Birdlings Flat on Monday.

[Davidthomas]

I dont think the wind is consistent nor strong enough for long enough to really be worth bothering to be totally honest. You want a more direct 30+ knot wind for atleast 1 ideally 2 days. You need fairly strong winds to force the birds onshore. In the case of the antarctic petrel etc you were looking at 40-50 knot winds with gusts above that consistently for 2+ days blowing a big stream directly from the southern ocean.

The sort of weather you're looking for is more like what you see off the west coast Friday/Saturday next weekend. If you're looking at Windy.com wind maps you're aiming for minimum orange bordering red, aiming more towards consistent purple for atleast 12 hours ideally 1-2 days as mentioned earlier.