Date: Wed, 18 Feb 2004 15:28:33 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: JAMES FELLEY Subject: Tidal Basin gulls, 2/18 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline A lunchtime walk over the 14th St. bridge and around the Tidal Basin produced a welter of gulls. Dozens were on the ice near the Maine St. docks, and hundreds were on the ice of the Tidal Basin, all feasting on winter-killed gizzard shad. I saw no white-winged gulls of any sort. I did see at least 4 Lesser Black-backed gulls on the Tidal Basin, with VERY close looks at 2 first-winter birds. The breakdown of the gulls was something like this: 60% Herring 30% Greater-black-backed 10% Ring-billed Again, Ring-billed gulls seem very scarce compared to years past. Jim Jim Felley Smithsonian Institution felleyj@si.edu ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================