Anyone know anything about Atlantic puffins?
I can't imagine these guys were puffins, but everything about them said "puffin." Unfortunately I did not have my binoculars, and I could see were the white on the heads and white bellies while they swam, but the camera on my phone couldn't zoom in enough to see the bills. The voice sounded right from the
recording on Wikipedia, but the pattern was different; imagine the voice on the recording giving distinct calls rather than long moans. There was a group of maybe 70, diving and flying short distances so the group sort of morphed along.
Except that they were on the Potomac sixty miles from the Chesapeake, and 150 miles from the ocean where they are said to winter 200 miles or so out to sea. There's no way they would be this far inland, this time of year, is there? The
Birds of Virginia Wikipedia page and
this website says they have been seen in the state, but that was surely on the coast and not inland. They seemed to fly like puffins, landing on the water by skidding on their butts almost upright until they stopped. The only other bird close in the book is bufflehead, but bufflehead are silent and these ones today were quite talkative.
Verdict: Am I wishful thinking nuts? Or could these have been puffins?