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Subject:

CA Gull details from yesterday

From:

Jeff Shenot

Reply-To:

Jeff Shenot

Date:

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 10:02:14 -0400

Stan Arnold asked me to post some details from yesterday, since his email is down.

I arrived at about 12:15 at the Salisbury Landfill located just outside of Salisbury, on Brick Kiln Road.  When I arrived, I met Stan Arnold, Phil Davis, Jennifer Elmer and Joe Byrnes (I think - I hope I got names right) there outside of the gate.  They had been there over two hours and had looked in various places but had no luck yet.  We decided to pile into only two vehicles to enter into the facility, and as advised in earlier posts, we secured permission for us all to enter the landfill from the attendant at the gate, who was very pleasant.  We drove inside the landfill around the edge, to the active site where they take the trash to be buried.

Prior to looking, I briefly reviewed the plates, photos and text on 2nd winter California Gulls in Olsen and Larsson (Gulls of North America, Europe, and Asia).  There were not many (about 100-125) gulls in the immediate viewing area, and perhaps another 100 or were either feeding nearby or flying around in the vicinity.  I began by looking at the closest birds (~ 60 yards away), and the first one I looked at only a moment and decided it was a Ringer (first winters are similar).  The next bird was similar and at first I didn’t grasp what was different.  I first noticed its wing primaries were very solid and dark, and it had solid pale grey scapulars, but this seemed to be a distraction since it was fairly similar to the Ringer.  Then I realized two things I recall that were noteworthy.  It seemed larger than the Ringer, but not by as much as a Herring gull would have been.  And more conspicuous than this, was the color of its bicolor bill was not fleshy (pink or orange).  The first bird I looked at had a quite bright fleshy color and the second bird’s base color was a dull muddy or dirty sand color with a black tip.

I was about to say something to everyone when it got up with some other gulls, but the number of birds in the air was low so it was easy to mark the bird.  I said out loud I have a candidate… and briefly pointed to the bird and tried to describe which one it was.  Then I noticed the clincher - it had a very uniform and big dark terminal tail band with a very contrasting bright white rump!  I said something about this out loud, and heard Stan and Jennifer say yes! (they concurred) and as the birds quickly got up higher they moved away toward a nearby pond.  At this point the flock joined another flock of gulls that were already up in the vicinity of the pond, but the bird’s stark white rump patch and very solid terminal band were still readily seen even at the distance (~ 300 yards – purely a guess of memory; I did not estimate it when I was there).  In addition to the contrast to the white rump, the terminal tail band was noticeably longer/wider than the Ringer’s tail band, and darker.

I could hardly believe it, I had only just arrived and got extraordinarily lucky to see the bird so quickly!

The birds came down and went below the tree line out of sight, toward the nearby pond.  We all got in our two vehicles, and drove around on a path for landfill maintenance vehicles that led over to the pond.  However, just as we arrived the birds all got up and scattered, as an adult bald eagle came up from the pond carrying a large bird!  I did not identify the eagle’s victim, but it was gull-sized.  A few gulls circled up to higher overhead, perhaps waiting to see where the eagle was going, but it landed in a nearby pine tree and proceeded to eat its meal.  The few gulls that were still here then split for good, and most went back over to where we just came from, which was out of view, so we hightailed it back over to the original location again!

Unfortunately, we looked carefully through all the birds but did not see any candidate.  Although Stan got good looks in his scope at the bird when we first saw it, he was really hoping to relocate it to get a photo.  After a while we tried looking at the pond again, and there were a few gulls there now that had returned (although the eagle was still eating its meal).  We had only been out of our cars a few seconds when the eagle got up, flew low across the pond and scattered all the gulls again!  We sort of laughed (cringed) at our bad timing as the eagle perched again, this time on the shore not far from the pond.  We left the pond and went back to the original spot one more time, but could not relocate the California Gull.  From our vantage we could see many if not most of the gulls at the feeding location, but the CAGU may have still been there and gone unseen, since there were some birds that simply could not be seen from our vantage.

I decided to part then, very happily, and went with Stan to continue birding in other areas.

I don't know what was We looked at a nearby area (Nutter's Neck in Wicomico) for a reported Clay-colored sparrow, but had no luck.  We ran into Bill, Mike, and Jim (as mentioned by Bill), who found a Vesper but had no luck on the Clay-colored.  Bill and Jim left, and Stan, Mike and I looked briefly some more.  We saw Towhee, Chipping, Song, and White-throated Sparrows, a House Sparrow(!), Carolina and House Wren, Yellow-rumped and Palm (Yellow) Warblers, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Phoebe, and large numbers of Goldfinches (100+ feeding in the planted sunflowers; no siskins).

Stan and I went over to Blackwater.  We looked and found the 2 Hudsonian Godwits in the pool (field puddle) where previously mentioned on MDOsprey.  They were not together, and were at opposite ends of the pool.  Also there were Both yellowlegs (numerous Lessers), several Long-billed Dowitchers, a small group of Dunlin, one Black-bellied Plover and one Pectoral Sandpiper.

We went over to the Shorter's Wharf Rd to look for the Nelson's seen there early Saturday, and walked a good piece of it but had no luck.  We saw three single Savannahs, and found one area with numerous Song and Swamp sparrows.  Plus 4-5 Meadowlarks, both Yellowlegs, a Pied-billed Grebe, 2 single Wilson's Snipe, and I saw a group of 4 sparrows that were very distant out in the marsh (several hundred yards), and they had the look of sharptail's, but I would not even guess!

It was a great afternoon!

Cheers-
Jeff Shenot
Croom MD