Date: Sun, 1 Apr 2001 18:37:31 EDT Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Gail Mackiernan Subject: Little Gulls still @ Back River Hi all -- Today being a bit better weather than predicted (although I was feeling down after UMD's loss in Final Four and the change to DST), Barry and I returned to Back River so *I* might see the Little Gulls. We were not disappointed, although the number of Bonaparte's was down a bit from yesterday (estimate 2000). We saw an adult, beautiful summer-plumaged LITTLE GULL flying out over the river with Bonies, from the afore-mentioned vantage point at the riverside parking lot down behind the Royal Farms gas station. We watched it fly about for about 20 minutes, then it sat down on the river and began to preen. It was easy to see the differences in size, proportion, wing extension etc. from the many Bonaparte's Gulls. We then scoped above the bridge, from the small paved pulloff on left just before Eastern Ave. crosses bridge (a fisherman's pulloff). There we had an adult, winter-plumaged LITTLE GULL very close, both flying and swimming, only about 50 yards out. We looked from Diamond Point and several other vantage points, as well as in Back River WWTP itself (which had about 500 Bonies in it) but only saw the two Littles today. Other birds of interest included three summer-plumaged Laughing Gulls in the sewage plant, and a drake and two duck Blue-winged Teal on the river, as well as hundreds (1000s?) of Tree and Rough-winged Swallows hawking out over the water. These Little Gulls may stay around for a while, but the weather will be warming up and if anyone wants to see them they should get out to Back River. We were pretty surprised not to see a single other birder all day. Gail Mackiernan and Barry Cooper Colesville, MD ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================